Intro Natali
Intro Ben

Items of Interest

• Great Costumes from SDCC 2011 (btm)
  • Careful, some are a little saucy.

• Batman: The Last Laugh
  • Fan Film Done Right

Gold Sponsors:

Jeb Apps – Today in Geek History, Today in Movie History

• Want to wow all your friends with off-the-wall Movie Trivia?
• Want to know more about Geek History and share them with your friends?
• Today in Geek History and Today in Movie History are for you
• Both have been out on the Android Marketplace for awhile now
• After a long vetting period, Today in Movie History is now available on iTunes!!!
• Go check out both apps, TIGH  and TIMH, now available on both Android and iPhone
• Now As Seen on Wired.com!!

Natali’s Etsy!!!

• Need your noms????
• @UberDorkGirlie’s etsy is the way to go
• Whether it’s Woookie Cookies, Happy Pandas, or Unicorn Treats, every sweet tooth needs to try them out
• Need a present and don’t want to bake? then Natali’s Etsy store is the way to go

Deals of the Week / New Release

• New DVD Movie Releases
  • Rio, Rio 3-D BR
  • Conan the Barbarian (International Cut) – Conan the Destroyer, BR
  • Braveheart / Gladiator BR
  • Eastbound & Down S1 + 2 (think KSwiss)

Entertainment Geekly (new feature)

• Die Hard 5 Rumors
  • Yipee – Kai –  Why???
  • possibly directed by  Noam Murro (300 prequel, Xerxes)
  • Set largely in Russia w/ his Son, blah blah blah

• Cowboys & Aliens
  • Released and achieved #1 in the US (barely beat out the Smurfs)
  • What have yall heard and do yall plan to see?
  • Harrison Ford is looking rough

Geek Speak

• SDCC Talk (Kristin, etc)
  • New Movies (Spiderman, Ghostrider, etc)
  • Costumes
  • After-parties

• Video Graphics x 100,000, Real or Fantasy (sm)
  • A company claims to have moved from Polygons to pixel/atoms
  • “Improves the quality of computer graphics infinitely”
  • In todays technology, times a 100,000
  • explain polygons
  • Changing from polygons to atoms

Tech, Gaming, and Geek News

• Apple Antics
  • Apple has more money than America? (btm)
    • Latest news from the US Treasury is that the United States has an operating balance of $73.7 Billion
    • Apple’s most recent financial reports shows it’s reserves at $76.4 Billion
    • The US is spending approximately $200 Billion more than it takes in every month.
    • Apple, meanwhile, is raking in cash with it’s latest quarter showing 125% more income than this time last year.
    • What’s Apple planning to do with this extra cash?
      • Industry watchers think they are building a war chest to be used for later acquisitions for other businesses and technology patents.
      • Barnes and Noble bookstores and Netflix have both been identified as possible targets.
    • There’s also this really cool house on Pennsylvania Avenue they might be interested in. it’s white and we all know how much Apple likes white products.
  • Skype gets posted for iPad then promptly pulled
    • for a long time, no approved Skype app optimized for IPad
    • Presto, inadvertent publish and then a prompt pull by Skype itself
    • Hopefully means it will be released shortly
  • Apple blocks Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Australia
    • Claims 10 patent infringement including slide tab to unlock
    • Australia actually honored the injunction, Korean company has to respond
    • This after newest Galaxy Tab compares favorably with IPad 2

• Nintendo President Takes 50% Pay Cut to Reduce 3DS Price (btm)
  • The slow selling 3DS is cutting it’s price from $249 to $169
  • This means Nintendo will be losing money on each sale.
  • To help with the loss company president Satoru Iwata told shareholders that he and other executives will be taking a significant paycut.
  • He will be taking a 50% cut while directors close to the project are giving up 30% and other executives will be losing 20%

• Internet Enabled TVs Interfaces just got better (SM)
  • Ever get frustrated with your TV’s interface?
  • Most TV’s are internet connected nowadays but are a pain to setup and maneuver
  • Heck, if you own cable, you have plenty of on-demand but GL getting to it
  • Poor Interface design makes users not want to use your products
  • Insignia (owned by BB) recently has gone to the TiVo interface to solve that problem
  • Still no DVR included out of the box or over-the-air program guide
  • Wait-and-see but its a step in the right direction

• Blizzard Makes Diablo III Require An Internet Connection (udg)
  • Remember how Ubisoft has managed to upset just about every gamer on the planet by requiring an always-connected machine to play its PC games? Well, Blizzard is doing the exact same thing with Diablo III. That’s right Diablo fans, if you want to play you need a solid internet connection. Offline play is just not an option.
  • If you want a reason as to why this decision has been made, Blizzard is happy to provide you with two. The first is of course piracy, which they believe an always-connected game will limit. The second is down to providing a fair game on Battle.net.
  • Blizzard is not allowing any mods in Diablo III and doesn’t want any cheats being used either. The developer states the only way to control this is with a game they can guarantee isn’t running any such additional software. Keeping you online during play apparently solves that problem and means whatever level your character is, is a true representation of the time you have spent in the game, not some mod or cheat working overtime in the background.
  • The final bit of news that has appeared about the game is that buying it might not be the end of your spending. The auction house included in the game will accept real money for buying items as well as allowing you to sell them. Blizzard’s reason for including this is for those gamers who have, “more money than time.”
  • Has Blizzard just made three huge mistakes, or is this what needs to happen for PC gaming to survive? I can imagine a few pre-orders have been cancelled already, and have to question the logic behind what Blizzard is doing here.
  • Diablo has a massive following, yet removing mods, requiring a connection, and introducing cash to the game to get ahead all seem like steps that will turn fans off rather than building excitement for the release.

• Et tu Adobe? (udg)
  • So, along with everyone else ::cough Apple cough:: Adobe is abandoning Flash as well. Their new tool, Edge, still encourages all the “flashy” loveliness, except that if Edge does it- it’ll be CSS, Javascript or HTML5. NOT Flash.
  • Don’t start calling it the “Flash-killer,” Edge is not intended to put Flash out of its misery or even to encourage developers to switch over to HTML5, but rather open up a new development path while Flash development presumably hits a wall.
  • As of right now, Flash can do some things better than HTML5. So it’s still an important part of the web and not going to up and disappear any time soon. . Still, Adobe seems to be well aware that developers will eventually abandon Flash for HTML5 and while they don’t intend to expedite that process, they are doing what they can to grab a piece of the new pie.
  • At the moment, Edge is available, for free, to anyone who wants to see what it can do. The 1.0 version proper will probably launch sometime next year. While Edge is obviously still a very new tool, it holds promise for developers who are looking to move beyond the messy, messy world of Flash and users who are getting tired of not being able to view .swfs on their mobile devices because no one wants to deal with the messy, messy world of Flash. Even though Adobe is allowing Flash to continue kicking around, it’s good to see them with a horse in the HTML5 race. Here’s to hoping Edge can “cut” it, and Flash can slowly saunter off to pasture where it probably belongs.

• Japan Brings Us One Step Closer to Cylons (as usual) (btm)
  • Japanese researchers are working on a robot that reacts to situations by making educated guesses based on past experiences
  • Robot was built on a learning mechanism called Self-Organizing Incremental Neural Network (SOINN) which processes information and lets the robot estimate future patterns and networks.
  • Future applications are both endless and a little scary as SOINN allows robots to learn from the Internet and other robots.

• Paypal Strikes Back at Anonymous (udg)
  • I’m sure we all remember Anonymous’ attack on Paypal last year after they bloced the Wikileaks accounts transactions. Well, now they’ve come up with enough evidence to strike back at Anonymous with a lil help from the FBI. In fact they’ve got a list of over 1,000 IP addresses left behind when Anon attacked. (Remember my DOS lecture before?? Yup!)
  • These IP Addresses were left behind from the DDoS attacks which were targeted at PayPal. Those IP Addresses could prove both useful or useless to the FBI as they start their investigation. The DDoS attacks are usually performed on computers that have been infected with viruses so the owner of the machine might not even know they are playing part in the attack. However the FBI may be able to perform forensics on those computers to find out where the infection originated from.
  • I am sure this story will heat up as time progresses, stay tuned for more details.

Intarweb Goldmine

• Castles Made Out Of Human Hair (udg)

• • What goes well with the cultured human hair necklace? A castle made entirely out of human hair, of course! Artist Augustina Woodgate created 3,000 bricks of human hair and built two castle sculptures as part of a series called “I Want To Be A Princess.” One of the two sculptures, called Tower, reaches about four and a half feet off of the ground, and the different colored bricks are simply different colors of hair — the yellowish window framing is made of bricks of blonde hair.
  • Woodgate’s second sculpture, Sandcastle, sports molded tops — similar to how one molds parts of a sandcastle with buckets — that sit atop a chaotic pile of hair, simulating a crumbling base. Woodgate’s hair castles will be debuting at Spinello Gallery in Miami.

• Lithuanian Mayor Says Tanks for Illegally Parking (btm)
  • Arturas Zuoukas, mayor of the Lithuanian capital Vilnius is fed up with illegal parkers.
  • Decided to send a message by driving a Russian tank over illegally parked cars
  • Saying, “People with big and expensive cars can’t park wherever they feel like and ignore the rights of pedestrians and bike riders”
  • The shocked owner of the first Mercedes was photographed exiting a shop to find his car crushed by the smartly dressed civic leader.
  • The car was later re-crushed at a local junk yard.

• A Hallow Leg of a Different Kind (udg)
  • A South Carolina trooper says he found a kilogram of cocaine in a suspect’s prosthetic leg, after he pulled over a vehicle for driving slow in the fast lane.
  • The Anderson Independent-Mail reports trooper Brad Davis testified at a preliminary hearing Friday that he felt an odd bulge when he patted down Glodualdo Moreno Lojan. Davis says a plastic bag was stuffed between Lojan’s leg and his prosthesis.
  • Lojan and two others in the car face cocaine trafficking charges.
  • Davis says he pulled over the car with Texas plates in July for traveling 50 mph in the left lane on Interstate 85.
  • Lojan’s attorney, Kurt Tavernier, says the car should not have been stopped, since 50 mph is over the minimum highway speed.
  • The three remain in jail without bond.

• Computer Conducts Wedding
  • Guy in Houston couldn’t find a friend to officiate his wedding so he writes a program to do it for him
  • Called it Rev. Bit
  • he programmed Rev. Bit to declare at that most poignant moment during the ceremony when last objections may be raised: “If anyone here has anything to say that might change their minds or has any objections, they do not want to hear it and I will not recognize your objections since Miguel has programmed me to only recognize his commands.”
  • Get this, met his wife on “Sweet on Geeks”

Extra Links

• Square handling 4 million in payments daily

How To Reach Us on the IntarWebs

• On Twitter: Steven is @DarthMolen, Ben is @realityamuck , Natali is @UberDorkGirlie
• email us: darthmolen@thepowergeeks.com, uberdorkgirlie@thepowergeeks.com (yay!) and tovias@racomics.com
• And Become a Fan

We are LIVE on Ustream.  This week we talk R2D2 XBox360, Chinese going too far, and even a bit of Ant-Man the movie… WHAT??? Seriously?? blech

Intro Natali

Items of Interest

• R2D2 XBox360 (SM)
  • Kinect version
  • Total R2D2 paint job
  • Gold 3PO controller
  • Star Wars Kinect Game
  • Star Wars for system sounds…
  • Must.Buy.Immediately.In.NOVEMBER!!! NOOOOO!~

• Not as Cool as R2 But Dad Hacks Wall-E Toy To Make Real Robot

Gold Sponsors:

Jeb Apps – Today in Geek History, Today in Movie History

• Want to wow all your friends with off-the-wall Movie Trivia?
• Want to know more about Geek History and share them with your friends?
• Today in Geek History and Today in Movie History are for you
• Both have been out on the Android Marketplace for awhile now
• After a long vetting period, Today in Movie History is now available on iTunes!!!
• Go check out both apps, TIGH  and TIMH, now available on both Android and iPhone
• Now As Seen on Wired.com!!

Natali’s Etsy!!!

• Need your noms????
• @UberDorkGirlie’s etsy is the way to go
• Whether it’s Woookie Cookies, Happy Pandas, or Unicorn Treats, every sweet tooth needs to try them out
• Need a present and don’t want to bake? then Natali’s Etsy store is the way to go

Deals of the Week / New Release

• New Released DVD’s / BR
  • Source Code – Jake Gyllenhaal, Michelle Monaghan, Action thriller where a guy gets amnesia and has to uncover his identity and a bomb plot at the same time
  • Red Planet – More realistic, gritty portrayal of space travel.. might be worth some of your time
  • Blues Brothers / Animal House – RIP Jon Belushi

Entertainment Geekly (new feature)

• FX Picks up Superhero movies left and right
  • Recently acquired Captn America (the one in theatres)
  • Already had TF: Dark of the Moon, Green Lantern, X-Men: First Class, Thor, Tron: Legacy, Kung Fu Panda 2, The Green Hornet
  • Maybe they should rename themselves “TSN: The SuperHero Network
  • Most of these came from an epic 2008 deal with Marvel, before the Disney acquisition

• Ant-Man: the Film???
  • Ant-Man is the superhero persona of Hank Pym
  • Recently came to the forefront with the Avengers cartoon being so popular
  • Can shrink and enlarge at will, Super-Genius, Pacifist
  • Has pretty side-kick “The Wasp” (Janet Van Dyne)
  • Really worth a full featured film though???

• Wanna See What We’re Not Missing W/ WW?? (udg)
  • io9.com “We’ve seen the unaired Wonder Woman pilot, and it’s actually kind of worse than we expected. It’s bad in the ways that we were all expecting, but it’s also bad in other, more fundamental, ways.”
• Comic Con Trailers (udg)
  • Features- The Amazing Spider Man, Haywire, Sherlock Holmes 2, Dark Knight Rises Teaser

Geek Speak

• SDCC! – Tease it for next week, Everyone has hangovers, we’ll bring on some heavy hitters and have a good round-table

Tech, Gaming, and Geek News

• The Chinese Have Now Gone TOO FAR! (udg)
  • Cuz selling fake iTunes cards and really cheap Apple knockoffs on their sites weren’t enough, last week five supposed Apple stores were operating in China. Only they weren’t actually official Apple stores!
  • To make it worse, they were nearly flawless copies of the official stores. To the point that the employees thought they were working for Apple!
  • Two of those five have since closed. But, not for them being complete fakes. Nope, the only reason they are closed is because neither had a business license in the first place.
  • The iFakes hit the major media and were brought to light last week when blogger  BirdAbroad visited one and spoke to staff. The store she located and visited was in the southwestern city of Kumming, and is not one of the two that have been shutdown. There’s a video of how Apple Store-like the store is in our show notes.
  • What’s going to happen to the other 3 stores is unclear at the moment. Chinese law does deem the stores illegal, but it’s the Chinese. If they’re able to cough up a business license, there’s no guarantee they’ll get shut down.
  • One thing is certain- Apple is definitely going to be talking to Chinese officials and this could get interesting.

• Hacker Caught, 10 years in jail (SM)
  • Rogelio Hackett Jr. 25, of lithiuania, plead guilty to stealing 635,000 credit cards
  • Instead of light slap: Go directly to jail, do not pass go, do not collect $200
  • Must pay $100,000 fine and serve 10 years in a jail
  • Guy had been hacking since 2002, and trafficing in purchased accts
  • Before you go all boo-hoo, the CC companies found that he bamboozled over $36 million dollars over the years
  • Yeah, I’m personally glad they threw the book at him

• Google’s Print Mag (udg)
  • Because you know they haven’t launched enough new stuff over the last few weeks, Google has now released the first US edition of its marketing mag Think Quarterly.
  • Actual print copies of the mag will be sent to a select and limited and are all kinds of lux with a magnetic cover, heat-sensitive end paper and a pretty blue ribbon fastener. Don’t fret though, us little people get to at least check out the online version.
  • The magazine is essentially a very pretty advertisement for how wonderful Google is, with a feature story highlighting the positive work done at Google. In addition to several pages dominated by advertising executives, the magazine also has several essays on the future of the Internet and society. I actually kinda dug it.
  • The UK version of Think Quarterly launched in March 2011, under the clear distinction that it is not intended to be a consumer magazine. Through Think Quarterly, Google may be taking steps to change its image from a familiar search engine to a group of innovative thinkers and strategists who have a real impact on the world.
  • But change their image with who? Well, potential advertisers of course. They are the people getting the snazzy print version, after all. The rest of us Googlers are just left with our Intarwebs.

• Samsung passes Apple in Smartphone Sales (SM)
  • Samsung passed Nokia for new sales in the last quarter
  • According to bloomberg, 18-21 million handsets were sold in the last quarter
  • Thats in comparison to the 20 million sold by Apple
  • Nokia has been sliding from their dominance for awhile now
  • M$ partnership has not helped them.
  • Lets be real, Everyone is waiting on the IPhone 5…

• Data Furnaces (udg)
  • Servers are energy hogs. Not just to run, but they get so bloomin hot you have to use more energy for the air conditioning that keeps the waste heat at by. This problem with inefficiency is only going to compound as the hoopla about the cloud continues.
  • Seems Microsoft has come up with a wacky-in-a-way-that-just-may-work solution: Distribute cloud servers to businesses and homes for use as heaters.
  • “Data Furnaces” as Microsoft dubbed them in a research paper on the subject would provide exhaust that, while too cool for energy regeneration (104-122 °F), is just right for space heating. Not only does this reduce waste, but it could increase the overall efficiency of the cloud servers involved by making it far more practical to locate specific servers near the areas they serve.
  • That’s a lot of win right there.
  • Obviously with issues like size, the fact heating systems are complicated, security, reliability, you get the point- this is something for way off in the future. But, it’s definitely got my interest piqued.

• Netflix Up, Blockbuster Wooing (SM)
  • Netflix made a profit, just not as much as investors had hoped.
  • To blame? The price hike announcement for September
  • Not all doom and gloom, their subscriptions are up 70% for streaming
  • Netflix talks with Dreamworks (Shrek, Kung Fu Panda, Madagascar)
  • Blockbuster is looking to capitalize w/ a $9.99 1-disc out plan
  • (still no streaming from BB)
• Fox Gets Stupid (udg)
  • In what is probably one of the lamest ideas I’ve heard in a very long time, Fox has just announced that it will only allow approved cable or satellite consumers free next-day access to its popular TV shows. Fans could previously catch shows the next day on Fox.com or Hulu.com for free.
  • Don’t have cable or want to pay for Hulu? Well then you’ll have to wait until 8 days after they’ve aired to watch it.
  • Got DISH? No worries!
  • “DISH Network is proud to be the first pay-TV provider in America to give customers the opportunity to take full advantage of the new Fox.com viewing experience — at no additional cost,” according to a Fox press release.
  • Hulu Plus customers will also still have access to Fox shows, according to a tweet from New York Times reporter Brian Stelter. Fox hopes to add more cable and satellite partners in the coming months.

Intarweb Goldmine

• What Ya Get For Being A Sound Sleeper In South Africa(udg)
  • A 50-year-old South African man woke up inside a mortuary over the weekend and screamed to be let out – scaring away attendants who thought he was a ghost.
  • His family presumed he was dead when they could not wake him on Saturday night and contacted a private morgue in a rural village in the Eastern Cape.
  • He spent almost 24 hours inside the morgue, the region’s health department spokesman told the Sapa news agency.
  • The two attendants later returned and called for an ambulance.
  • The man – whose identity has been withheld – was treated in hospital for dehydration.
  • The man woke up at 1700 local time (1500 GMT) on Sunday, demanding to be let out of the chilly morgue in Libode village, frightening the attendants on duty.
  • “At first the men ran for their lives,” said Mr Kupelo.
  • Officials have urged the public to contact doctors or the emergency services so they can they can pronounce someone dead before calling an undertaker.
  • “You begin to ask yourself how many other people have died like that in a morgue,” said Mr Kupelo.
  • “We need to [get] the message across to all South Africans that it is very wrong for them to conclude on their own that a person has died,” he said.

• Jaws Jumps into boat… Literally (SM)
  • Have a front row seat to Discovery’s shark week? Not as close as these guys
  • 6 researchers off the coast of africa got the scare of their life
  • After an hour of shark activity, 10 foot great white breached the water and jumped halfway on the boat
  • In a panic and apparently trying to eat a crew member, he thrashed all the way on board and then became stuck
  • Despite the danger to their lives, the scientists eventually rescued the shark after being towed to port, letting it go, being beached, pulling it back out, and finally getting it out to sea

• Mystery Prisoner (udg)
  • A mystery man arrested on minor charges more than three weeks ago remains behind bars in Utah while law enforcement officials try to determine his true identity, which he refuses to reveal.
  • “This is really a strange case,” said Lt. Dennis Harris with the Utah County Sheriff’s Office. “He just doesn’t want to be found.” The unidentified man, who has graying hair, a light beard and is believed to be in his 60′s, was arrested on July 1 for trespassing in a parking garage.
  • He was booked into jail on three misdemeanor charges and has thwarted any chance of release, with or without bail, by refusing to identify himself.
  • “I’ve been trying to think from A to Z why he would want to stay here … why he wouldn’t give us any information,” Harris said.
  • “He either has to be wanted by some other state or he could be on some other registry or database that has not shown up,” he added.
  • Law enforcement officials say the man is “fairly well spoken and educated,” but very guarded about his identity.
  • As a result of several short conversations with him, officers believe he may not be from Utah.
  • Officials gave the man a telephone calling card so he might contact friends or relatives, but he has not used it.
  • “He was very aware of what we were trying to do and he would not give us the slightest bit of information indicating where he was from or anything relating to his family situation,” said Harris.
  • “We’ve had a lot of people call in but nothing has panned out. Nothing,” he added.
  • Officials say in three weeks of jail the mystery man has shown a pleasant demeanor and has communicated that he is being treated well.
  • “He said the food has been great,” Harris said.
  • “I realize that sometimes people want to go to jail because they are homeless, have nothing, they are destitute. I’ve seen that over the years. I just don’t get the impression that’s the reason. He just doesn’t want to be discovered by somebody.”
  • Now in his fourth week of incarceration, the man added another twist to the story recently by hinting he had business of some kind outside prison that he would need to attend to.
  • “He said there was a point at some time that he would need to get out of jail,” Harris said. “That’s the closest I can find of what he wants to do. And that makes no sense to me whatsoever.”
  • I’m surprised I don’t know the guy. I seem to attract people like this.

• RDJ New Hazards: Exploding manholes
  • Imagine if you will, walking down the street
  • A rumble and a roar shake the ground and all the manhole covers explode into the air
  • This isn’t hollywood, welcome to Rio De Janeiro
  • Recently a manhole cover blew up into the air, injured 2 ppl, smashed into a nearby window, and ended in a parked car
  • This was the 130 of these in April alone…
  • Sparks from old transformers igniting “gasses” (read human methane) causing the random explosions around the city
  • Talk about some dangerous crap….

Extra Links

• Navy testing more lasers
• Q&A With The Man Behind The Lego LOTR Tower (udg)

We are LIVE on Ustream.  This week we talk Spotify, finally in the US, Batman vs. Cptn. Kirk in the ultimate cage match, and YES, it is officially confirmed, the Gods want more cowbell.

Intro Natali
Intro Ben

Items of Interest

Just cuz it’s still making me giggle –

• Finally a Good Use For 3D Printers (btm)
• Millenium Falcon Bass Guitar (udg)
• INSANELY AWESOME FInal Fantasy Stop Motion (udg)

• Kid Finds a Piece of History and Gets to View History Up Close (btm)
  • After a 2006 Hurricane struck the North Carolina coast a Durham teen, Kevin Schanze found a piece of metal on the beach from the first stage of Apollo 16.
  • NASA confirmed it was authentic
  • The sheet of metal made a 30 year journey from the Florida coast to an inlet of the Outer Banks and floated into the Pamlico Sound.
  • NASA showed there gratitude by inviting him to see final Shuttle launch last week.
  • He was taken on an all-access tour of the Kennedy Space Center including the top of the Atlantis launch pad and the Atlantis cockpit.

• Turn your IPad into a Trek Pad… (SM)

Gold Sponsors:

Jeb Apps – Today in Geek History, Today in Movie History

• Want to wow all your friends with off-the-wall Movie Trivia?
• Want to know more about Geek History and share them with your friends?
• Today in Geek History and Today in Movie History are for you
• Both have been out on the Android Marketplace for awhile now
• After a long vetting period, Today in Movie History is now available on iTunes!!!
• Go check out both apps, TIGH  and TIMH, now available on both Android and iPhone
• Now As Seen on Wired.com!!

Natali’s Etsy!!!

• Need your noms????
• @UberDorkGirlie’s etsy is the way to go
• Whether it’s Woookie Cookies, Happy Pandas, or Unicorn Treats, every sweet tooth needs to try them out
• Need a present and don’t want to bake? then Natali’s Etsy store is the way to go

Deals of the Week / New Release

• Mtv Geek’s Guide to Manga on the Cheap (udg)
  • Even full price, most people consider manga a pretty good bang for your buck. But, it can be a really pricey habit- especially if you start a long-running series like One Piece.  But, thanks to the folks over at MTV Geeks,  here are their suggestions for 6 ways to get your manga fix for half price or less…
    • Your local library. Yup! Try the YA section as that’s where it’s usually shelved. Popular ones are usually checked out so don’t limit yourself just to your local branch. Most libraries have a swap system of some sort.  If you are looking for a specific volume, try plugging it into WorldCat, which is a mega-library catalog that will locate the copy closest to you.
    • Online swap clubs:  The most popular one seems to be Paperback Swap. It’s pretty easy to use: You upload a list of books you are willing to part with (it’s all done by ISBN so the information goes in automatically) and send out the books to people who request them. That means you pay the postage (usually less than $2.50 for a single volume), but in return, you get a credit to request a book from someone else. Paperback Swap is a general-book site, but you can set your defaults so the newest manga and graphic novel offerings are always displayed on the home page. The selection leans toward older series, but a number of book reviewers use the site, so newer volumes pop up as well, and you can ask to be notified if a particular book becomes available.
    • Freecycle: I belong to my local freecycle and never cease to be amazed by the range of items offered and found through here! Visit their site, find your local group then post a message saying you’re looking for manga and you may connect with someone who is cleaning out their collection.
    • Used book sales: It’s rummage sale time people! Get on out there. Also keep an eye out for libraries cleaning house.
    • Online shopping: Amazon and Barnes & Noble also offer used manga at astonishingly low prices, but watch out for shipping costs. You can find a lot priced at one cent on Amazon, but keep in mind that shipping is $3.99, so you’re actually paying four bucks out of pocket. Given that you can ship a volume of manga for less than $2.50 via media mail, Paperback Swap is a better deal. Ebay is a good bet if you’re looking for multiple volumes of a series, as shipping a number of items isn’t much more expensive than shipping one (and many sellers just charge the mailing cost, not an inflated shipping cost).
    • Digital: Digital manga can be a good way to go if you have a device to read it on, and if you watch out for special promotions. If you have an iPad, iPod Touch, or iPhone, check out the Viz app, which offers single volumes for $4.99, and stay tuned to the manga blogs, because they have a lot of sales.

• So there you go, six different ways to get your manga fix without resorting to piracy or robbing a bank. And don’t forget that most of these channels are good ways to pass on the volumes you are done with as well—recoup a bit of the cost by selling them online, trade up via Paperback Swap, or just get a bit of good karma by donating them to your local library.

• Google Releases own eBook Reader (SM)
  • Iriver – Fully integrated with the google book store
  • eInk display by LG that XGA resolution
  • Faster page turns due to beefier processor
  • full querty keyboard
  • Built in Wi-Fi, 6 weeks battery life
  • chromed buttons on the bottom for nav
  • $139.99 (Target and Target.com)
  • Too little to late?

• Capcom Lists Res Evil 15th Anniversary Collection (udg)
  • Capcom has listed for preorder on its Japanese e-shop a Resident Evil 15th Anniversary box, including the first four games in the survival horror franchise plus Code: Veronica, soundtrack CDs, and extra trinkets.
  • The full listing is as follows:

• Resident Evil Directors Cut
• Resident Evil 2
• Resident Evil 3 Last Escape
• Resident Evil Revival Selection [contains Resident Evil 4 and Code: Veronica]
• Resident Evil Code: Veronica soundtrack
• Resident Evil 4 soundtrack
• A number of Pins & Stickers
  • The first three games are the original PlayStation versions, which run on the old hardware, but the image above shows that the discs’ appearances have been redesigned for the bundle. The early games appear to have received some updated packaging as well.
  • Revival Selection for the PS3 contains HD versions of Code: Veronica and RE4, but it’s up to the player to complete the series collection with their own copy of Resident Evil 5. Thankfully Capcom has left a spacer in the box for you to do this.
  • The package will go on sale exclusively on Capcom’s e-Capcom online store (Japanese link) on September 8th for a price of 7,800 yen ($96 at current exchange rates, but the exchange rate is extraordinarily high lately).
  • There’s no word yet on an American release, but since there’s an equivalent online store for the US market (the Capcom Store) known for selling cool and rare stuff, it’s very possible that this one will cross the pond.

• Video New Releases (SM)
  • Rango – a lizard in the Wild West (first full animated film from ILM)
  • Robot Chicken – Star Wars III
  • Battle Beyond the Stars – If you crave total cheese, cell matted laser bolts, epicly cleavaged ships, and blatant rip-offs of Star Wars and Seven Samurai, this is the show for you
  • Damnation Alley – Get your Post Apocalyptic fix here…  w/ Burt Reynolds

Entertainment Geekly (new feature)

• Do Gods Love Cowbell?? (udg)
  • Gods Behaving Badly is a Fables/Fruits Basket sort of story with just a dash of American Gods‘ theme of washed up deities: The ancient Greek gods are alive and managing in a New York city brownstone, much to the surprise of their neighbors.
  • But then the actual casting is the aweseome!
  • The gods are: Aphrodite — Sharon Stone, Apollo — Oliver Platt, Artemis — Edie Falco, Demeter — Phylicia Rashad, Dionysus — Nelsan Ellis, Eros — Gideon Glick, Hades — John Turturro, Hermes — Henry Zebrowski, Persephone — Rosie Perez and Zeus — Christopher Walken.
  • Christopher Walken as the patriarch of an incestuous, petty brood played by some of the best character actors in the business? That’s worth paying attention to. And who knows- maybe there’ll be some cowbell.

• Boba Fett Movie? Possible? (btm)
  • In a recent interview ‘Captain America’ Director, Joe Johnston was asked if his former boss and mentor, George Lucas, had already seen the movie.
  • His surprising response was:
    • “You know if he wants to see it, I would show it to him. I’m trying to get George to make a feature based on Boba Fett.”
  • Says he would like to direct the Boba Fett movie and thinks it would be a lot of fun
  • Began his career as a storyboard artist for George Lucas and created designs for some of fandom’s favorite characters and vehicles including, Yoda, the Ewoks, The Millennium Falcon, the X-Wing and Y-Wing fighters, Imperial Snow Walkers, Imperial Star Destroyers and of course, Boba Fett.
  • One wonders if Lucas ever decided to hand over the reigns of the franchise to someone else why wouldn’t it be to one of the original trilogies original creators?

• Space Invaders Coming to a Theater Near You? (udg)
  • Space Invaders, the classic ’80s videogame, may be coming to a theater near you.
  • Producers Lorenzo di Bonaventura and Gigi Pritzker have optioned the rights to develop the project, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The two are looking for a writer.
  • For the uninitiated, Space Invaders was introduced in 1978 and became a pop culture phenomenon during the next decade when it was made available for the Atari 2600. The title is the top arcade game of all time, according to the Guinness World Records.
  • Given that brand equity and the track record for other films based on ’80s properties, like Transformers, the idea of a Space Invaders movie has been around for a while. Last March, the L.A. Times reported that Warner Bros. was negotiating with Space Invaders owner Taito about a movie.
  • Additionally, di Bonaventura has brought toy properties to the big screen. He is one of the producers of the Transformers films as well as G.I. Joe: The Rise of the Cobra.
  • Meanwhile, a slew of movies based on videogames are in various stages of production. That list includes an Asteroids movie, a Missile Command flick and one based on Angry Birds. In the case of Space Invaders, though, the cult TV show Futurama seems to have beaten di Bonaventura and Pritzker to the punch with an episode based on the game.

• Wanna Be In The Dark Knight Rises? (udg)
  • The movie is looking for fans to fill a stadium in the Pittsburgh area on Saturday, August 6,” which would seem to indicate Heinz Field as the location.
  • The stadium scene calls for energetic football fans to cheer the Gotham Rogues in a game against the Rapid City Monuments. There will be door prizes, gift cards and autographed items. Go to beinamovie.com for full details.

• Speaking of the Dark Knight, WB has released a teaser trailer (btm)
  • Premiered with the Harry Potter movie
  • Now on Facebook page.
  • Mostly clips from the previous two movies but there’s some added footage from the new movie showing Batman preparing to do battle with Bane.

• Batman: Year One Coming to Video (btm)
  • Based on one of my all time favorite comic story arcs written by Frank Miller and illustrated by David Mazzucchelli in 1987
  • Clips indicate they’ve stayed very true to the original source material
  • Story recounts the beginning of Bruce Wayne’s career as Batman and James Gordons’s in the Gotham Police Department.

Geek Speak

• Twitter Turns 5 (SM)
  • Happy B-day, you text streaming social service
  • How has this little service affected the world
  • Iran Voting Conflict, Japan earthquake, major sporting events, etc.
  • Lets talk about our experiences
  • Outline some of the challenges for this free social cloud

Tech, Gaming, and Geek News

• Spotify in the U.S. (SM)
  • music streaming service that has free and premium subscriptions
  • VERY popular over in the UK and Europe
  • Just barely opened for business in the US
  • How is it different than Internet Radio? You can actually stream selected tracks
  • Most devices supported with players
  • Premium services start around $4.99
  • Is it worth it?? .mp3 (you own) vs. Streaming (you get to listen but don’t own)

• Secret Service onto the Apple Store Spy Cam Artist (btm)
  • 25 year old Brooklyn artist Kyle McDonald installed software on computers in a NYC Apple Store
  • Software would take pictures every minute and capture the faces of Apple Store shoppers as they stared at the monitors of MacBooks.
  • Software would then send the images back to the artist where he was working on using them as part of a project.
  • Woke up to four Secret Service agents who took his two computers, his iPod and two flash drives.
  • Not sure what or if he will be charged with.

• Dear Anon- Pick a Direction and Stick With It. (udg)
  • Hacker group Anonymous has been booted off of Google+. However, the hacker collective is responding by creating its own social network called AnonPlus that won’t put up with “being shut down, censored or oppressed.” Google apparently kicked “Your Anon News” off of the social network because it apparently violated Google’s Community Standards. Google also pulled their Gmail account.
  • So, if  you can’t join em, beat em. As of right now, the only thing you’ll find at AnonPlus.com is a splash page, and there’s not a whole lot of information there. You can’t register, or even click any links for that matter. The only clickable link on the page is to the dev forum at the bottom of the page. The site is in “Revision: 0.5 Alpha” at the moment.
  • AnonPlus’s message on the front page says the site is to be a “new social network where there is no fear…of censorship…of blackout…nor of holding back.” The site is for everyone, and not just for members of Anonymous. Anonymous says the site will go up soon, but it can’t happen overnight.
  • The hacktivist group said in a post on a subsidiary site that activists being banned from sites like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube is the result of “walk(ing) to a different beat of the drum.” The hacker group said on AnonPlus that “the sheep era is over. The interwebz are no longer your prison.”
  • Anonymous isn’t the only one who was kicked off of Google+. William Shatner was also banned after Google believed his profiled to be a fake. Perhaps Shatner will join AnonPlus?
  • Then you’ve got the was supposedly disbanned now back part of Anon Lulzsec out hacking The Sun and redirecting it to a fake Murdock death story.
  • Last week Anon took credit for leaking 90,000 U.S. military email addresses stolen from servers owned by Booz Allen Hamilton. (Which honestly made me PISSED)
  • They need to stop chuggin the dew and snorting the pixie stix and pick a direction. I suggest one that continues to follow the Hacker’s Manifesto. Keep straying from that and you’re going to end up being made an example of.

• Your Next Job May Depend on Your Facebook History (btm)
  • It’s often said what you post online can never truly be deleted.
  • Several new companies are apparently trying to help that be true
  • Recently the FTC gave the company Social Intelligence the go ahead to run background checks on your Internet and Social Media history.
  • While the company doesn’t store 7 years of your history, it looks at 7 years of your online life and makes this available for potential employers
  • Looks for aggressive or violent tendencies or illegal activity, discriminatory activity, and sexually explicit activity.
  • While it redacts any identifiable images of the subject and ignores benign tomfoolery it’s still kinda creepy considering how much information many of us put online and forget about.

• Google’s + Button Already More Widespread Than Twitter’s (udg)

• • They’ve only been out for around a month and Google’s +1 buttons are more common on major web sites than the tweet button.
  • BrightEdge, an enterprise SEO platform provider, analyzed the 10,000 largest sites on the web and found a 33% surge in placement for Google’s +1 button during the past few weeks. The company found that +1 buttons are now on 4.4% of those sites, up from 3.6% in June. Meanwhile, Twitter’s plug-ins are displayed on 3.4% of the sites.
  • Both Google and Twitter trail far behind Facebook though, whose  “Like” button, is on about 20% of the sites’ front pages.
  • Plus runs out of disk space (SM)
    • Their notification system went on the fritz and was spamming ppl
    • Ran out of disk space for 80 mins
  • Already the Contact Export Wars Begin (SM)
    • Facebook has already swung the ban hammer on a company
    • They were exporting first and last names from FB and matching them to contacts on your local machine and on linkedin
    • You then had a free-and-clear contact list
    • Wasn’t much different than you going “Account->Account Settings->Download Your Information” to get a friends.html

• Amazon to rent textbooks (SM)
  • 30 day rentals with 1 day extensions
  • Ability to store annotations in the amazon cloud past rental period
  • Not all roses though
  • Cognitive process “where the information is” broken
  • Some of the illustrations are illegible (who looks at those anyways)
  • No chump change by selling books mommy and daddy paid for
  • John Wiley & Sons, Elsevier, Taylor & Francis and Oxford University Press.
    • Half Price Books is now selling Textbooks (actual paper ones) online now too.

• Netflix Raising Prices by 60% (btm)
  • Starting September 1st Netflix will no longer offer a $9.99 package of DVD-by-mail and unlimited streaming
  • 23 million subscribers will now pay $15.98/month or $7.99 for just one of the two
  • Netflix feels their streaming content is now robust enough that many people don’t want both options.
  • “Given the long life we thing DVDs by mail will have, treating DVDs as a $2.00 add-on to our unlimited streaming plan neither makes great financial sense nor satisfies people who just want DVDs,” said Netflix in its press release.

• Facebook Introduces Vending Machines for Computer Accessories(udg)
  • How many times have you been there? At work, some part of your computer goes kaput? Maybe the mouse is fried, power cable goes bad, you name it. Well, getting a replacement is usually a pain in the tush. I’ve had to write a request, submit to department head who then submitted to IT who then checked stock, and then.. you get the point.
  • Well it seems FB had cut out all the middle people and I can’t honestly think of any easier way than what they’ve done-  After some initial tests with a swipe card system and a cabinet, the social network went ahead and had some custom vending machines made. Each contain all the common accessories that regularly need replacing.
  • All a FB employee has to do to get a replacement is swipe their ID card and ket in the accessory they need. The employee gets quick access to the accessory and can continue working. Facebook gets a record of which employee took what device, and alerts can be put in place when a machine needs restocking. There’s also going to be the option to pull up a summary of employees and the number of accessories they get through in any given time period.
  • According to Tim Campos, CIO at Facebook, the vending machines have cut the cost of replacing such devices by 25%. There’s also going to be another cost saving in both time and money gained from each Facebook employee not having to wait for a replacement device.

• Google+ App finally released for iOS (btm)
  • While the Android app has been available from day one the iOS app took a little longer to get through the Apple approval system.
  • The much anticipated iOS app was released today providing many mobile features to iPhone users.
  • Several iOS users were a little upset that it doesn’t support iPad or iPod Touch devices.

• Family Time Now With Zombies (udg)
  • In The Walking Dead Board game, only the strong survive. The weak turn into walkers, and then turn against their former friends! Fight your way through zombie-infested Atlanta with your fellow survivors. Grab some weapons to clear a path. Visit destinations like the department store, old folk’s home, and the CDC. Find the tools you’ll need to live another day. Take on the role of Rick, Andrea, or one of the other hapless survivors and scrounge for sweet weapons like a Shotgun or Crossbow. Keep your eyes open for new allies, but watch your back! When supplies start running low, it’s every man for himself. If you can make it back to camp with enough gear to defend yourself and those you still care for, you win!
  • Should you fall to the hungry horde of walkers, the game doesn’t end. When a player dies and becomes a walker, they leave the world of the living behind and seek out the remaining survivors. Spring surprise attacks on the living, cause the walkers to frenzy, or contaminate the survivor’s supplies. Put the bite on your former friends and they’ll join you in your pursuit of the living.
  • The fate of the human race is in your hands, either as a survivor or a walker. Join us this September 2011 with Cryptozoic Entertainment’s The Walking Dead Board Game.

Intarweb Goldmine

• No Equal Rights for Monkeys (udg)
  • It was a wedding that thousands waited eagerly for since the engagement was announced. Invitations were sent, the details were meticulously labored over, and finally, to the almost-hysteric joy of the crowds, the big day arrived.
  • In the small village of Talwas, Rajasthan, Raju, a well-known cigarette smoking monkey, and his bride Chinki were married.
  • Raju had become a local celebrity after Ramesh Saini, a rickshaw driver, adopted him three years ago when he found the monkey unconscious.
  • He’s been a surrogate son to the childless Ramesh ever since.
  • “I want to enjoy the feelings of a son’s marriage through Raju’s wedding.” Ramesh told the publication. “We will welcome the bride in our house … after the wedding with all rituals.” Raju’s bethrothed Chinki lived with a priest in a nearby village.
  • More than 2,000 guests were expected to attend the pre-wedding feast and to watch Raju ride atop a horse in a procession, Stuff reported. The wedding was planned in accordance with traditional Hindi customs, including sacred fires and fragrant incense.
  • Monkeys are revered by many Hindus, because the deity Hanuman appeared in primate form.
  • But the carefully made preparations were thrown into havoc by government officials who cracked down on the animal nuptials, because monkeys are technically government property. So marrying a monkey, even to another monkey, is illegal
  • Two hundred guards from the forest department flooded Talwas on the wedding day after warning that all guests would be arrested. Hundreds of attendees showed up despite the threats, but Raju, Chinki and their owners had fled.
  • In a final twist, the owners announced that the monkeys married in a secret ceremony deep in the woods. Forest rangers captured the newlyweds, but Ramesh told Stuff that he is confident they will return.
  • “I know my son Raju, with his wife Chinki, will come back home,” Ramesh said. “I will have a big reception for them.”

• JellyFish shut down Nuclear reactor (SM)
  • Japanese reactor has to shut down.. for earthquake? for natural disaster? nope, for JELLY FISH
  • Thats right, the lil buggers swarmed around the coolant intake, gumming it up and forcing them to shut down a thermonuclear device
  • Who says Mother Nature 2 – humans 0
  • There is an upside to this… Free sushi for the whole country for at least 2 months, well nuked
  • This actually happens a lot, A couple other plants have shut down because of this same phenomena

• Who says Chihuahua can’t be guard dogs? (udg)
  • Don’t mess with the little guy with the big bark at the Ace Smoke Shop in Altadena, Calif.
  • The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s office released some amazing surveillance video on Monday, showing what happened when armed robbers stormed into the shop on July 7.
  • They left with some money, but less than “they could’ve gotten,”as the Los Angeles Times reports, because of the owner’s Chihuahua. His “ferocious barking” and lunges at the bad guy’s legs look to have convinced the robbers to clear out quickly. No one was hurt.
  • According to LA Weekly’s The Informer blog, the real tough guy in this tale is named Paco and he weighs about 15 pounds.
  • The robbers are still at large.

• Jet Pack Fail (SM)
  • Fox 5 thought it would be awesome if they had a guy fly via jetpack on the start of their show..
  • So the show starts and the guy jumps to fly… and falls flat in the water
  • What do the anchors do??? roll on the floor in disbelief
  • Guy recovers and flies out of the water

• I don’t know what’s better, this story or the guy’s name (udg)
  • It’s tough finding even an odd job these days.
  • That’s why Utah-area resident Mork Encino, who swears this is his real name, created the oddest job for himself.
  • Encino, 28, on his website, advertises he’ll be human prey for marksmen with $10,000 to spare. It’ll cost you an extra $2k to hunt him in the nude.
  • He says he’s “generally unskilled” and hasn’t had a job in years. In the past, he’s worked in construction, landscaping and cleaned out storage sheds.
  • His greatest skill may be self-promotion: He’s appeared on radio programs and been written up by quite a few websites.
  • Since hunting people is highly illegal, valid hunting offers have been few and far between.
  • “I’ve had a variety of offers, none of which I’ve been comfortable accepting. As I’ve said, this is not my dream job. There’s obviously no longterm in it. This is just something I’ve resorted to in order to make others aware of my situation. It’s a job application, man. And a damn good one if I may say so,” Encino said via email.

• Tune In and Tune Out, i-Dosing with your iPod (btm)
  • Get your bonfires ready America!
  • Kids are downloading MP3s and getting high!
  • According to an Oklahoma news channel reporting on a new trend called i-dosing
  • Kids are putting on their headphones and listening to music which consists of a droning noise and promises to get you high.
  • Local schools have already sent home letters to parents warning of the new threat.
  • Sites are selling guides to how to properly get high on the MP3s
  • How will society react to this new menace?
  • Will politicians be asked if they’ve ever i-Dosed?
  • “I i-dosed, but I had it on mute”?

• Captain Kirk gets booted off Google+ (btm)
  • Joining in the Google+ craze, actor William Shatner accepted an invitation and joined
  • Shortly after making his first post Google took down his account for “violating standards”
  • He had only made one post saying “Hello”
  • This could be related to Google+ trying to prevent fake accounts and pseudonym use.
  • Posted on his twitter account, “ “My Google+ account was flagged for violating standards. Saying hello to everyone apparently is against the rules maybe I should say goodbye?”
  • Shatner was returned to Google+ Monday with the following post, ““I am back plusers! I still do not know what happened but I will refrain from saying hello again for a while just in case. My best, Bill.”
  • Currently there seems to be no verification system for Google+ accounts, unlike Twitter with their check mark and “verified” accounts.
  • Google reps could not be contacted for comment.

Extra Links

• Best Google+ Tips & Tricks (udg)
• Google Declares Nuclear war on Malware
• QR Tattoo spawns animation (SM)

How To Reach Us on the IntarWebs

• On Twitter: Steven is @DarthMolen, Ben is @realityamuck , Natali is @UberDorkGirlie
• email us: darthmolen@thepowergeeks.com, uberdorkgirlie@thepowergeeks.com (yay!) and tovias@racomics.com
• And Become a Fan

We are LIVE on Ustream. Tonight we talk E3, The new Wii Controller, Some Apple Stuffs, New movie releases, and even the surprise average age of gamers…

Intro Natali
Intro Ben

Items of Interest

• Instructables (udg)
  • It occurred to me today that I don’t think I’ve ever mentioned one of my absolute favorite sites on here. I have mentioned Etsy and it’s crack-like ability to suck me in for hours. Well, Instructables is it’s counter-part. It is THE site for anyone that’s ever wanted how to make…. well anything. I’m not kidding! From a PC Case out of a mannequin to cupcakes and every possible thing in between, there’s an instructables for that.

• Bring Me the Head of Green Lantern (btm)
  • Made by Schell Sculpture Studio
  • They design concept art for TV and Movies
  • Creating a Hal Jordan bust based on the DC Comics character

Open Source Flashlight (SM)

• Started by
• 500 Lumen bulb (high end) 350 lumen at the low end
• Fully Open source (you can change how bright, blink, modes, from your computer)
• top end is USB chargeable (about time, most tac lights take expensive batteries)
• On a kickstarter but already exceeded their goal by more than double
• I totally bought the ultra bright one

• The World of Mistrunner (udg)
  • With 28 days to go, I really wanted to mention this awesome kickstarter from our loyal chat room member and friend Naked Hobo again.
  • What is Mistrunner? In the creator’s words it’s a RPG set in world of high fantasy, steampunk and a bit of post apocalyptic action thrown in as well. What I see is an amazing game, ney world, he has crafted out of obvious love. One of the things that makes me most proud to be a gnork is the support that we all give each other. Bound together by the very things that set us apart. Please help us support this project. Times are tough and that’s understandable. If you can give $1, that’s awesome and it will get you listed in the book as a Patron. If you can’t, that’s okay too. What you can do it blog about it, tweet about it, FB it, carrier pigeon it, get it out to everyone you know and help make this dream a reality.

• Wanna iPad laptop? (btm)
  • Nifty device from Crux
  • The Crux Loaded features a clamshell keyboard case, Bluetooth trackpad and external battery to turn your iPad into a more laptop-like device.
  • Available this fall.

• Star Wars Rubber Duckies (udg)
  • Rubber duckies are kind of awesome. Now you can haz Star Wars themed rubber duckies complete with 45 battery life LED lights in them. A rubber ducky you can be proud to bring in the tub or pool this summer.

Gold Sponsors:

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• Want to wow all your friends with off-the-wall Movie Trivia?
• Want to know more about Geek History and share them with your friends?
• Today in Geek History and Today in Movie History are for you
• Both have been out on the Android Marketplace for awhile now
• After a long vetting period, Today in Movie History is now available on iTunes!!!
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Natali’s Etsy!!!

• Need your noms????
• @UberDorkGirlie’s etsy is the way to go
• Whether it’s Woookie Cookies, Happy Pandas, or Unicorn Treats, every sweet tooth needs to try them out
• Need a present and don’t want to bake? then Natali’s Etsy store is the way to go

Deals of the Week / New Releases

• Subway Goes All Out for Green Lantern (udg)
  • Subway has launched a new promo that could have you unlocking awards like free Green Lantern movie tickets and other stuff.  Want in?
    • Download the SCVNGR app for your iPhone or droid.
    • Complete easy challenges
    • Win prizes and rewards.
  • Pretty simple. Oh and grand prize? Tickets to the Green Lantern Premiere in LA.

• New Movie Releases for 1st Week June
  • (SM) Epic Westerns Alert:
    • The Outlaw Jose Waley (clint eastwood) – I <3 The Good, The Bad, The Ugly hardcore, I gotta see this. Characterized as the “Best Mythic Western Ever”
    • the Long Riders – James and the Gang – Best Western Period
    • True Grit – Remake by Coen
  • Superman: The Anthology (1978 – 2006) – Holy Crap…
    • everything you could want including
    • 2 versions of Superman and Superman 2
    • All the 1950’s Superman cartoons
    • Outtakes from the Brian Singer Superman Returns
    • 8 full Blu-Ray Discs – Much Much more… all for under $100
  • The Man Who Would Be King – Sean Connery, Michael Caine, when men were men
  • Burial Ground – Italian Zombies
  • The Stuntman – Real Men, Doing Real Stunts, On real movies back in the day

Entertainment Geekly (new feature) (SM- Awesome Title Natali!)

• Eliza to Star in Torchwood Spinoff (udg)
  • Eliza Dushku has officially signed on to star in a new Torchwood animated spinoff web-series. It’s an animated motion comics series called Torchwood: Web of Lies, and it’s based on Starz upcoming series Torchwood: Miracle Day. The animated series will also include voice appearances by Torchwood stars John Barrowman as Capt. Jack Harkness and Eve Myles as Gwen Cooper.
  • The new series is being written by Jane Espenson, who worked with Dushku on Dollhouse and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. She’s also worked on Battlestar Galactica and Torchwood. Ryan Scott is also a co-writer on the series.
  • The series will consist of 10 three-minute videos, and will be released before the Torchwood premiere on July 8th. The plan is to release a new episode online after each new Miracle Day episode.Miracle Day episode.

• Penny Arcade Strip Inspires a Movie (udg)
  • It started as a comic but Penny Arcade has expanded into video games, a charity, merchandise, conventions and now…. the film.
  • According to the Hollywood Reporter, Paramount is producing an animated movie based on Penny Arcade’s “The New Kid” comic strip. The comic was published this past October and focuses on a young boy who is constantly switching schools because his father’s job takes him to different planets.
  • Gary Whitta, the former editor-in-chief of PC Gamer magazine and writer of The Book of Eli and a number of games (including Gears of War), will write the movie’s script.
  • (SM) when are they going to do “Automata” already?
  • (SM) FYI, they’re doing a boardgame based upon “The Lookouts” – Think Boy Scouts meets D&D

• There Will Be a Full Season 7 for Doctor Who (btm)
  • Kasterborous site reported over the weekend that BBC Wales (producers of the popular Doctor Who series) was planning a truncated 7th season consisting of only 4 or 5 “specials”.
  • BBC officials were upset as this would leave gaping holes in their programming.
  • After watching fans react over the weekend BBC and Doctor Who producers calmed everyone’s nerves by announcing Tuesday that the 7th season would be a full, 13 episode season and current Doctor Matt Smith would be appearing in them.
  • Showrunner Steven Moffat tweeted:
    • “14 eps + Matt DEFINITELY. I’ve got a plan and I’m NOT TELLING YOU WHAT IT IS. Now hush or River shoots you with her Spoiler Gun.”
  • Nerds throughout the Commonwealth sighed in audible relief.

Geek Speak

PSA: CEA trying to sell off free over-the-air HDTV Bandwidth (SM)

• They want to let the “free market” soak up all the bandwidth you could be using for free
• Cite low number who actually use the service.
• (SM) HANDS OUT OF MY COOKIE JAR

• E3 Coverage
  • New XBox Kinect?
    • Youtube coming to xbox live
    • hulu plus
    • Powered by Bing?
    • Minecraft for Kinect
    • Halo 4
    • live streaming TV to boot for international customers

• • Sony Vita Unveiled
    • The world goes meh
    • Plenty of content announced:
    • Mother of all trailers for the new games
    • Fully portable and cloud-ready
    • Specs:

• dual analog controller,
• front and rear camera,
• OLED touch screen type,
• touchpad on the back.

• V4-core ARM Cortex-A9 CPU and a
• 200 MHz SGX543MP4+ GPU.

• • Playstation 3D TV
    • Non-split screen mode where both can play on the full screen
    • 24” 3D TV
    • Good glasses for $4.99

• • New Nintendo Console
    • Wii U, Wii U (btm.. like an amblance)
    • 480i to 1080p, HDMI output
    • Flash based memory + sd card slot + usb for external storage
    • Awesome controller that is
      • touch capable
      • a cross between a ds and a dreamcast controller
      • (think mini-tablet w/ 6 inch screen and motion controls)
      • can play games independent of Wii
      • Interact with games on the screen
      • (SM) I actually want one of these
      • This has SUCH amazing potential it’s unbelievable. I’m seeing people either geeked to get theirs or declaring it the beginning of the end of Nintendo. I am definitely leaning much more toward the geeked side. (udg)

Tech, Gaming, and Geek News

• EA’s Origin Takes on Steam and Games for Windows (udg)
  • Electronic Arts announced some pretty big news with the launch of the Origin game store and social network, a direct-download game marketplace and social service for gamers who play EA titles. It is available now and came out the gate with over 150 EA titles. In the future they will be publishing all their new games, including Battlefield 3, FIFA 12, and games from partner studios in the Origin store.
  • Sound a bit familiar? Add to that an application on your system that will manage installations, licensing, updates, and new purchases for you electronically and keep track of your achievements, let you connect with other people who play the same games, and share what you’re playing with friends. Yeah, I’m guessing right about now Steam and Games for Windows are popping in your head.
  • Back when Steam first launched, the took a huge chance. It was untested and both gamers and publishers were clueless as to whether digital distribution would even really work. Steam is a HUGE success, Microsoft can’t really claim that with their Games for Windows.
  • There is one area Origin is taking gamers that Steam and Games isn’t and that is onto mobile devices. EA plans to give gamers a way to connect with Origin, find their friends, and play multiplayer games with them. They even tipped there’ll be a mobile version of Battlefield 3 that will be playable using Origin. They’re also plannig exclusive content, game releases, downloads, and easy purchasing through the Origin store.
  • The big question that goes unanswered with all of this news however is whether or not EA will pull its game library from other digital download stores because they’re launching their own. Many gamers already have both Steam and Games for Windows on their systems, and Mac users have adopted Steam wholeheartedly. We’ll have to see if EA moves to force people who want their games to install Origin to buy and download them.

• Poor Sony, Still free game (sm)
  • Sony Music Brazil, Russia, and their Internal network were all hacked
  • a subversion repository was released on the Internet
  • a group called “lulzec” has essentially declared war against Sony
  • “We\’ve recently bought a copy of this great new game called \”Hackers vs Sony\”, but we\’re unable to play it online due to PSN being obliterated. So we decided to play offline mode for a while and got quite a few trophies. Our latest goal is \”Hack Sony 5 Times\”, so please find enclosed our 5th Sony hack. Enjoy this 54MB collection of SVN Sony Developer source code. That\’s hackers 16, Sony 0. Your move!”
  • Still no idea what Sony did to become such a target for hackers….
  • Their stock has fallen like 29%

• Steve Jobs Wants to Build Giant Spaceship-Shaped Headquarters (btm)
  • Jobs presented his plans for the new 150 acre property at the televised Cupertino City Council meeting on Tuesday.
  • Currently Apple employees are scattered throughout the city in rented buildings and office space
  • The new campus would place 12,000 or 13,000 employees into one giant 4 story oval shaped complex.
  • Moving parking underground allows for 80% of the campus to be landscaped and filled with 6,000 trees.
  • Company plans to build its own “energy center” to power the complex
  • Jobs reminded the Council that Apple pays more taxes than any other company in the city, and while they would love to remain in Cupertino, it would be a shame if they had to move somewhere else like Mountain View in order to build their complex.
  • Is it just me or is this starting to sound like a Bond Villain’s lair?

• Apple Paying Up to $150 Mil to Music Labels for iCloud (udg)
  • With Universal Music now along for the ride, Apple has officially signed the last of 4 deals with 4 major music labels and will now be able to launch its iCloud streaming and storage service. And they’ve ponied up a healthy sum in return for permission to access their content in the cloud.
  • According to the NY Post, Apple is paying between $100- $150 million UPFRONT to the labels. Business Insider stated “Apple has $66 billion in cash and long-term and short-term securities.” So, basically, spending up to $150 million to avoid any future lawsuits from these music labels is really not a big deal for Apple.” When you phrase it that way, yeah it’s really not.
  • Both Amazon and Google, however, launched their own cloud music services without any sort of contract from any of the labels. Amazon claimed it didn’t need any licenses to store music since its service works pretty much like an external hard drive. A user has to upload each song one by one to be able to access their content in the cloud.
  • Apple defines the iCloud as “iCloud is so much more than a hard drive in the sky. It’s the effortless way to access just about everything on all your devices. iCloud stores your content so it’s always accessible from your iPad, iPhone, iPod touch, Mac, or PC. It gives you instant access to your music, apps, latest photos, and more. And it keeps your email, contacts, and calendars up to date across all your devices. No syncing required. No management required. In fact, no anything required. iCloud does it all for you.”
  • Pricing seems to be up in the air a bit. We know that the first 5gb is free. We know that they’ve talked about a $25 yearly fee. What we don’t know exactly how much storage that $25 will get you.
  • According to Apple’s site, Free Gets You A Lot. When you sign up for iCloud, you automatically get 5GB of free storage. And that’s plenty of room, because of the way iCloud stores your content. Your purchased music, apps, and books, as well as your Photo Stream, don’t count against your free storage. That leaves your mail, documents, Camera Roll, account information, settings, and other app data. And since those things don’t use as much space, you’ll find that 5GB goes a long way.
  • Apple is said to be taking 30 percent of iCloud revenue, whereas the labels will be getting 58 percent. The New York Post said Apple has finalized deals with the necessary music publishers, who will be getting 12 percent of the revenue.
  • Now, I’ve been pretty open about my skepticism about the almighty cloud and I can hear Steven ITCHING to blurt out some “worship at the alter of Apple” comment. But, I’m on the fence. On the one hand, if anyone is going to protect my stuff, it’s gonna be Apple. On the other hand, this is a hacker’s wet dream. In the end, I honestly trust that if this bad boy wasn’t a zillion per cent locked down and safe, it wouldn’t be launched this Fall. Bottom line? I’ll do what I do when it comes to EVERY Apple item- I never jump aboard right out the gate. With this I’ll give it a few weeks for the kinks to get worked out and the hackers to give it their best. When all has died down, then I’ll give it a go.

• MacOS X “Lion” Unveiled at WWDC (btm)
  • Scheduled for a July release.
  • It will be a Mac App Store exclusive download for $29
  • Begins to incorporate some of the better elements of iOS to MacOS
    • Multi-touch gestures
    • Full screen applications
    • Mission Control
    • Auto-Save and versioning
    • Redesigned Apple Mail
    • Better Search features
  • 4GB download

• China Warns Google (udg)
  • Dear Google, I heart you. So, according to an official Beijing newspaper Monday, Google has become a “political tool” vilifying the Chinese Government. In fact they flat out warned that the Internet giant’s statements about hacking attacks traced to China could hurt its business. Of course this all appeared in the leading newspaper of China’s ruling Communist Party.
  • Why exactly does China have it’s cha in a bunch? (btw thank you google translate) Last week Google came forward with news it had broken up yet another effort to steal the passwords of hundreds of Google email account holders, including Chinese human rights advocates and journalists and oh US GOVT OFFICIALS. And that these attacks seemed to come from China.
  • Of course the Chinese Foreign Ministry rejected those accusations, and then whipped out the warning to Google about  playing a risky political game. On the front page no less. According to the paper, by saying that Chinese human rights activists were among the targets of the hacking, Google was “deliberately pandering to negative Western perceptions of China, and strongly hinting that the hacking attacks were the work of the Chinese government.”
  • “Google’s accusations aimed at China are spurious, have ulterior motives, and bear malign intentions,” said the commentary, written by an editor at the paper.
  • “Google should not become overly embroiled in international political struggle, playing the role of a tool for political contention,” the paper added. For when the international winds shift direction, it may become sacrificed to politics and will be spurned by the marketplace,” it said, without specifying how Google’s business could be hurt.
  • A Google spokeswoman said the U.S. firm had no comment on the remarks. If I were that spokeswoman, you know I’d have had some comments.
  • Why is China REALLY upset? Google said last week that the hacking attacks appeared to come from Jinan, the capital of China’s eastern Shandong province and home to an intelligence unit of the People’s Liberation Army.
  • U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates over the weekend warned that Washington was prepared to use force against cyber-attacks it considered acts of war.  Hacking a major US company to obtain passwords to US Govt Official’s passwords could very well fall under that category. And to think I joked about hacking Google probably not being considered and act of war. Thank you China for proving me wrong. And eff you if you think your silly threats will actually have a negative effect on Google.

• France Bans “Facebook” and “Twitter From the Media (btm)
  • Ban goes back to a 1992 French law that prohibits mentioning the services due to it being a form of advertising and preferential treatment.
  • Conseil Supérieur de l’Audiovisuel (organization responsible for regulating French electronic media) says,
  • “Why give preference to Facebook, which is worth billions of dollars, when there are many other social networks that are struggling for recognition?”
  • To get around the rules French broadcasters will start saying “Find us on social networking sites” or hope they will find links to their Facebook and Twitter pages via their web site links.

• Average Gamer Age Surprising!! (SM)
  • Guess the Age (SM- I know, I know!!)
  • Average Game Buyer? 41 yrs old
  • FTC Undercover Shopper program:
  • only 17% of ppl over 17 were able to buy M-rated games
  • contract: 38% under 18 were allowed to buy R-Rated movies
  • All published by the ESA (they regulate the ratings on games)
  • 25 billion dollars spent on games in the last yr / 5 billion online

• Droid 3 Videos Leaked (udg)
  • In case you haven’t heard, a trio of training videos complete with some basic how-to instructions for the upcoming Motorola Droid 3 were posted to YouTube this weekend by “Phonepads.” Not surprisingly, Motorola has had them yanked. Of course, it’s the intarwebs so a number of other YouTube and Vimeo users have re-posted them.
  • So what can we learn from them? Well they give us a a pretty decent tour of the yet-unreleased Droid 3 complete with where all the buttons and ports will all be. Just like the original Droid and #2, the keypad will slide-out but it’s going to have a 5th row of # keys up top so you so’t have to hit Alt and then the combo letter/number key anymore.
  • While the video makes it pretty clear that what you see may not be the final product, it looks like it’s going to come with Gingerbread pre-installed, sport an 8 megapixel cam with LED flash on the back of 1080p video and probably sport a dual-core processor.
  • Some other notable stuffs- they added an HDMI port on the side, the power button is on the center top of the phone now and the screen looks bigger, but they don’t say how large it is.
  • No leak is thorough it seems so there are still some unanswered questions out there. I think one of the biggest is whether this will be a 4G LTE phone or not. Others maybe storage or processor speed.
  • I’m on the side of those that feel Motorola pulled the “controlled leak” card with this (especially with it being on the heels of the big Apple’s big annual WW Developers Conference) so expect to hear more soon.

• DC Comics Resets to #1 (once again) and Announces Day & Date Delivery (btm)
  • Last week’s big news in the comic world was thought to be the renumbering of DC Comics to #1 and a total restructuring and sometimes redesign of characters in the DC Universe.
  • The “real” big news was the announcement of Day & Date Digital Delivery
  • JLA #1 will be released in print and digital formats the same day and this is the first of many.
  • Many are concerned this will hurt comic book retailers as comic readers will now be able to get their fix digitally instead of driving to the stores.
  • Expect Marvel to follow suit later in the summer.

Intarweb Goldmine

• Friendly PSA For Our FL Listeners (udg)
  • On May 21, 2011, a bronze statue of three dolphins was taken in at Allied Recycling located 3770 Veronica Shoemaker Boulevard Fort Myers, Florida. Allied Recycling contacted Law Enforcement believing the statue was connected to Lee County Sheriff’s Office burglary investigation from North Fort Myers, Florida. Unfortunately this did not belong to that particular victim.
  • Local Law Enforcement believes that this statue belongs to a victim who may not have reported it stolen. If you or someone you know had a 300lbs bronze dolphin statue stolen, please call the Cape Coral Police Department at 239-574-3223.
  • Okay, seriously who the HELL steals a 300lb statue!?!? Of dolphins.

• “Thanks For Taking My Money, A–hole!” (btm)
  • Austin area movie theater has a strict “no talking, no texting policy”
  • Recently they ask a theater patron to leave
  • The upset patron called the theater’s customer service line and left an empassioned, expletive laced message expressing her displeasure at being asked to leave.
  • Theater now plays the uncut message as their “Don’t Talk or Text” PSA before R-rated movies.

• Girls Just Wanna Have Fun (udg)
  • Now, there’s nothing wrong with driving with the top down. Driving with YOUR top down, a whole other story. Especially when you’re drunk and carrying marijuana in your purse.
  • Florida police pulled Keila De Oliveria Leite over for driving erratically, on the wrong side of the road, 20 miles below the speed limit and oh passing a Martin County deputy who tried to stop her.
  • When they did finally get her to stop, Keila was naked from the waist up and had weed sticking out of her purse. A search of her car found a pot pipe too. To top it all off, this classy chick got all kinds of feisty about putting her shirt back on. They did manage to get one on her for her mug shot. Yeah, she failed several sobriety tests and has been charged with  driving under the influence and possession of marijuana and drug paraphernalia. Guess they must have been feeling kind, or appreciative, because no indecent exposure charges were made.

• 51 yr old Lady Charged with Pushing Garbage Full of Body Parts (SM)
  • Police in California strolled up on an older lady pushing garbage
  • Guess what was inside? A fully dismembered decomposing Human
  • Yeah, they’re not sure where he came from
  • Either homicide or disenterment are the two theories
  • The lady ain’t commenting on who her victim in the 30 gallon garbage is
  • (sm) My thoughts? Not only Zombies love brainzzzz

• These Ain’t No Crop Circles (udg)
  • One of the sheer joys of Google Maps is the photos it manages to catch. Some are downright hilarious, well unless you’re the folks at Fairfield College in the North Island town of Hamilton.  Seems while looking for a home in the area, Kiwi David McQuoid spotted a photo from the campus featuring several cartoon-like phalluses in various sizes- some several meters across.
  • The school’s acting principal said it was hard enough to deal with it when it happened back in 2009.
  • It happened over a weekend but it wasn’t until the grass died off bit by bit that phallic symbols started to pop up around the school grounds. Every week another crude image revealed itself, much to the dismay of staff. “There’s not really much we could do about it,” he told a newspaper. “The caretaker took some more weedkiller and tried to camouflage it a bit.”
  • The culprits were never caught and the prank probably would have passed into schoolboy folklore had it not been captured by Google Maps.
  • The red-faced principal said he would be contacting Google to plead for the image’s removal but an internet privacy specialist said it was difficult to get such satellite photographs changed or blurred.
  • Kiwis however, thought the prank was hilarious, with 70 adding mostly encouraging comments to the online story, like “Freakin brilliant!!! Love it!!! Classic piece of adolescent artwork.”
  • One gave the artists an A+, top marks for cunning, planning, chemistry and geometry, while another said their anatomy detailing left a lot to be desired.
  • “I totally reckon it was actually girls,” they wrote. See, if they were made THAT big, yeah it wasn’t girls.
  • Then came a confession: “HAHAHA!!! we did this as our 7th form prank, now it lives on! how awesome!”

Extra Links

• 12 Geekiest Wedding Proposals (udg)

• Apple Releases iOS5 Beta to Developers Monday, Jailbroken by Tuesday. (btm)
  • iOS5 Set For Public Release in the Fall.

How To Reach Us on the IntarWebs

• On Twitter: Steven is @DarthMolen, Ben is @realityamuck , Natali is @UberDorkGirlie
• email us: darthmolen@thepowergeeks.com, uberdorkgirlie@thepowergeeks.com (yay!) and tovias@racomics.com
• And Become a Fan

Sponsors

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• What: Shiny Geek Jewelry, clothing and other bits & bytes, made by Geeks for Geeks.
• Why: Geeks, Nerds & Gamers alike deserve to shine at their very best, on and offline.
• 10% off power rings
• Who: @aDigitalAngel & fellow nerds at ShinyLines.com

Get Shinylines in Gold Sponsors

• ShinyLines Power Geek Rings!!!
  • I’m almost giggly with anticipation!!
  • Check out shop.shinylines.com for more product -OR-
  • Send darthmolen@gmail.com an email saying you want this ring. If there’s enough interest, we are going to make this available to the public

Items of Interest

It’s a trap! (Furious Fanboys)

• Where’s The Tardis? Contest (udg)
  • The contest, designed to challenge Doctor Who fans to a DIY, TARDIS-building challenge, will earn the winner of the contest a private screening of Doctor Who with 50 guests of their choice, courtesy of BBC America. The contest is over now and there’s nothing left to do but judge the winners, but the entries are remarkable: there are birthday cakes, hand-carved TARDIS models, huge TARDIS replicas, and more –like this TARDIS Murphy Bed.

• Amazing Shuttle Launch Photos

• Star Tours Re-Opening in Disneyland
• Hyde N Geek Kids Need To Read Tweetathon (udg)
  • Awesome people raising money for kids to get books? HELLS YEAH! The awesomeness that is Hyde n Geek raised $2000 in 36 hours last year for Kids Need to Read and the 2011 event kicks off tomorrow!! Follow the link in the show notes for the dets and help support this kick ass cause!!!

Gold Sponsors:

Jeb Apps – Today in Geek History, Today in Movie History

• Want to wow all your friends with off-the-wall Movie Trivia?
• Want to know more about Geek History and share them with your friends?
• Today in Geek History and Today in Movie History are for you
• Both have been out on the Android Marketplace for awhile now
• After a long vetting period, Today in Movie History is now available on iTunes!!!
• Go check out both apps, TIGH  and TIMH, now available on both Android and iPhone
• Now As Seen on Wired.com!!

Natali’s Etsy!!!

• Need your noms????
• @UberDorkGirlie’s etsy is the way to go
• Whether it’s Woookie Cookies, Bark Maul, or Hothballs, every sweet tooth needs to try them out
• Need a present and don’t want to bake? then Natali’s Etsy store is the way to go

Contests- Winners??

Giving away 2 decks of Dabong! to whomever hears the cowbell (before the intarweb goldmine) and comment on our Facebook page on the time and why they love card games

• 2 – 5 players take turns laying down cards in a central pile. Instead of the basic suits found in a standard deck of cards, dabong! uses Earth, Wind, Water, and Fire.

• lays down a card is by matching the suit
• Also match the number of the card in the pile to a card in the player’s hand.
• additional options to play the players can play cards of the same suit that add up to the number in the middle. For example, if a 10 of Fire is in the central pile, a player could play a 2, a 3, and a 5 of Water all at the same time.
• A player wins when he/she has used all of his/her cards, or through a dabong! A dabong occurs when a players cards add up to the central card, regardless of suit.

Deals of the Week / New Releases

• Nintendo and Best Buy team up (btm)
  • Starting in June Best Buy will offer free wireless Internet to 3DS users in stores
  • When connected to Best Buy network they can access movie trailers, gaming extras and exclusive content
  • Nintendo is hoping this will help increase the appeal of having a 3DS because while many people replying to polls say they want one, they also say now isn’t the time to buy it.

• Movie Releases
  • 5 Deadly Venoms (BR) – Chop Sockey, action, and puzzle oriented.
  • The Mechanic – Jason Statham. ‘nuff said
  • The Bionic Woman – Season 2 (BR) – Lindsay Wagner, Slo Mo, if that’s your thing
  • BEVERLY HILLS COP (BR) – Classic!!! Definite pick up!
  • Hanna Barbara – Chuck Norris “Karate Kommandos” – buahahahah! (insert jokes here ben )

• Steam Deals -
  • Worms Reloaded for 9.99 (until thursday)

Movie Minute (new feature)

• Say Goodbye To Wonder Woman Mr. Kelley (udg)
  • The train wreck that is David E Kelley’s  ”Wonder Woman”  has officially  been shelved by bosses at NBC.
  • Entertainment chairman Robert Greenblatt has spoken about his decision not to greenlight the series after watching Kelley’s pilot. He told EW.com, “They made a really fine pilot and Adrianne Palicki did a fantastic job. You look at what you have, what you need, and it just didn’t seem to fit in with what we were doing. We did what was best for the schedule.”
  • Now, I know there are some people out there taking the “shame on everyone that raised such a fuss over this and got it cancelled” stance.
  • Bite me.  It was clearly going to completely crap all over my childhood idol and I have every right to rant, rave and fuss my lil heart out over it.
  • Don’t believe me- listen to old Greenblatt himself  ”I was surprised there was such an uproar (about the promotional shots of Palicki in costume), but that didn’t have anything to do with whether the show got picked up. I love that it got so much attention. All that engagement from people, whether it was positive or negative, was good. And she did ultimately have these little hot pants.”
  • Those little hot pants. *le sigh* Thank you Greenboob for at least having the sense to slam the breaks on this before it aired. Somethings just can’t be unseen.

• Look Out Bedrock, Here Comes Seth MacFarlane (udg)
  • After years of super complicated negotiations between 20th Century Fox TV and Warner Bros. Television it looks like Seth MacFarlane is going to be able to realize one of his life’s ambitions after all- to reboot The Flinstones.
  • According to Fox entertainment president Kevin Reilly, production on the animated series will begin production in Fall 2011 for a 2013 premiere on the Fox schedule. In a cross-studio collaboration, The Flintstones will be produced jointly by 20th Century Fox Television and Warner Bros Television. Dan Palladino (Gilmore Girls) and Kara Vallow (Family Guy) will serve as executive producers with Seth MacFarlane who says the very first cartoon character he drew at age 2 was Fred Flintstone. “So it’s appropriate that events have come full circle, allowing me to produce the newest incarnation of this great franchise. Plus, I think America is finally ready for an animated sitcom about a fat stupid guy with a wife who’s too good for him.”
  • In a video shown at the upfronts, MacFarlane shed some light on his plans for the remake: The characters will look the same but he’ll introduce new technology, like “What is the animal version of an iPad?” No doubt the rightholders are a lil bit concerned about how MacFarlane is going to interpret the classic series. It certainly can’t be worse than the horrible films they let Universal put out.
  • I’m interested to see what Seth comes up with.

Geek Speak

• Is a personalized web a bad thing? -
• We’ve lived with a lot of stuff being tailored for our wants on the Internet
• Cross-sell in shopping carts, Likes in Facebook influencing your news stream,  certain articles showing up based upon your interests in the past, Sidebar ads, etc
• now search engines take some of this other information and filters searches based upon what they perceive as your preferences (Dec. 4, 2009 – google opted in)
• Real time bidding in place for placed ads
• Finger printing of your computer (even when you opt out of cookies and tracking)
  • Some of the things that pop on on the Google ads while I’m reading my email make me giggle. I think it’s insane that any company thinks it can anticipate my needs, wants, desires based on previous anything. (udg)
  • (SM) I personally think its dangerous and allows a company too much power to influence the weak minded. Not like Obi-Wan, more like Vader. What will they do with that power? They’re corporate America
  • (SM) Do y’all think it stifles discovery and exploration?? How do you know you will like something until you actually see it?

Tech, Gaming, and Geek News

• Network shows on Hulu safe for a few more years (btm)
  • Good news fellow hulu users, NBC, Fox and ABC are close to extend licensing agreements to continue providing programming
  • the site will continue to offer free, ad-supported programming along with its Hulu Premium subscription package.
  • Likely to change, however, is the window of time between when shows are on TV and when they are made available on hulu.
    • Networks want to increase this time so as to encourage viewers to watch shows when they air.
  • Networks may also negotiate a non-exclusive deal allowing them to stream programming on Amazon and Netflix.

• Facebook under attack from Spammers (SM)
  • Seen an uptake of “see who is browsing your profile” or “see xxx do yyy in this stupid video” lately? So have we
  • Facebook has noticed it too and beefed bp their antispam defense
  • Despite the work, the spammers are finding ways around it
  • It’s an arm race now to see who can trump whom.
  • Word to the wise folks… don’t click on things you don’t know about or are too good to be true, don’t paste thing into your location bar

• Dropbox Lies About Data Security (udg)
  • Online file storage service Dropbox has made my life easier and I’ve been a huge fan of it. Well, now I’m raising a little bit of an eyebrow. Last month it seems it changed its privacy policy to note that upon request, law enforcement agencies would be given access to a user’s Dropbox files. Then they came under fire again when it was uncovered that Dropbox employees had access to user directories. Over this last month Dropbox has quietly been making changes to its privacy agreement and terms of service to both respond and silently acknowledge that some of the privacy concerns uncovered by security researchers last month.
  • Hmmm…Not that I have anything to hide from the law in my box, but I certainly never got a notice that there was any sort of an update.  Seems I’m not the only one.
  • Shortly after some of the changes had been made, researcher and Ph.D candidate Christopher Soghoian (the same Soghoian who broke the story to the media that Facebook had hired a PR firm to smear Google) noticed that what Dropbox was saying in public versus what it’s employees have access to and what they don’t are very different things. He outlined his concerns in a complaint to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and accuses Dropbox of making deliberately misleading and deceiving its customers into thinking their data is more private than it is.
  • For example, Dropbox’s security policy once said that files stored on Dropbox servers were encrypted and were inaccessible without an account password. That statement was amended to say only that the files were encrypted, which quietly put Dropbox on the hook for having a way to access user files without the user’s password.
  • And their terms of service said that Dropbox employees “aren’t able to access user files.” Now it has been changed to “are prohibited from viewing the content of files.” This subtle change means that Dropbox employees shouldn’t access user files as a matter of policy, not that they’re unable to.
  • All the while, Soghoian says, Dropbox has been telling its customers that their data is safe and secure from prying eyes. Dropbox, for its part, says there’s nothing to the complaint, and that they’ve always been up front with their privacy policies. They say the changes in their policies have been a result of clarifying their policy  and that they’ve been very open with who has access to user files and under what circumstances.
  • The complaint demands that Dropbox clarify its terms of service and its website so exactly who can access user files and how is completely clear. It also demands that Dropbox notify its 25 million users to let them know their data is being stored in the clear and that employees are essentially on the honor system when it comes to not looking at it, and offer refunds to Pro users who may have subscribed under false pretenses of security and anonymity. Dropbox says there’s no merit to the claim, that it raises old issues they’ve already clarified, and will respond formally to the FTC.
  • Really Dropbox? Cuz I still haven’t seen any notice from you that changes have been made. Yup, this is me giving you the stinkeye.

• U.S. Navy launching online gaming (btm)
  • The Navy is adding a new weapon to its arsenal, Internet Gamers
  • The Office of Naval Research is rolling out the military’s first online war game open to the public.
  • Project: MMOWGLI (Massively Multiplayer Online Wargame Leveraging the Internet) is aiming to replicate traditional military strategy sessions.
  • Using virtual simulation and social media tools players will work together to respond to made-up geopolitical situations due to private ships being hijacked off the Somali coast.
  • 7000 people have already signed for the $450,000 pilot project.
  • Lacking high-tech graphics, the game provides video clips and storyboards and users are are prompted to envision scenarios.
  • Critics say sifting through the massive amount of junk data may prove to make the system unfeasible but ONR sources say they are aware of possible pitfalls and will be monitoring the game around the clock.

• PSN Network is back! (SM)
  • They did a rolling regional restart where you could check their website for your region
  • (SM) I saw my friends update, it wasn’t that long, prompted for a password reset
  • Japan isn’t too hot about it – they hadn’t “approved” the changes and weren’t sure that Sony went far enough to protect its user data.
  • PSN Outage Deals (NA)
  • Trying to entice users back. -
    • 30 days free access to Music unlimited (30 mr for already subscribed)
    • 30 days free access to PSN Plus (60 for current)
    • 100 items on playstation home
    • Free identity monitoring
    • Selection of videos to rent “on them” over a free weekend
    • 2 free Game downloads / PSP games: LBP, infamous, Wipeout HD, Super Stardust HD, Dead Nation || LBP, ModNation Racers, Pursuit Force, Killzone Liberation
  • Oops, spoke too soon, Password reset page hacked

• Got an Android? Make Sure You’re Running 2.3.4 (udg)
  • If you’re  an Android user with one of the 99% of Android phones running software version 2.3.3 or below, a new study shows you are vulnerable to a security attack that allows hackers to access your Google accounts- including your Contacts, Calendar and Picasa.
  • The way the attack works is that an evildoer would take advantage of a device which is connected to an unsecured Wi-Fi network and snatch up its authTokens — basically secret digital codes used to securely identify you and your device and tell a service that you have permission to access it.
  • Hackers are able to do this because authTokens are not only being stored on devices for up to two weeks, but also sent over unencrypted connections.
  • So what can someone do with your authTokens? He or she can pretend to be you — at least in the eyes of a service such as Twitter, Facebook, or Google — and access your accounts easily.
  • Scary, yes. But, don’t panic.  While nothing is fool-proof, there are steps you can take to protect yourself a little bit. The most important one of those steps: Avoid unprotected, shady, or unknown Wi-Fi networks.
  • One more time for EVERYONE-  avoid unprotected, shady, or unknown Wi-Fi networks.  If you absolutely must use one, at least “switch off automatic synchronization in the settings menu” of your device. Doing so won’t exactly keep you safe, but at least it’ll make a tiny difference.
  • You should also keep an eye out for Android 2.3.4 updates for your devices as those appear to patch up this particular vulnerability.

• Your Stream May Soon be a Felony (btm)
  • Under current law reproducing and distributing copyrighted works is a felony and covers Peer-2-Peer transfers and web downloading.
  • Streaming has been treated as “public performances”
  • New Senate Bill (S. 978) would add streaming to the list of felonies when:
    • They show 10 or more “public performances” by electronic means in any 180-day period and
    • The total retail value of those performances tops $2,000 or the cost of licensing of such performances is greater than $5,000.
  • Offenders could face five years in prison and a $25,000 fine
  • Some critics of the bill are pointing out that having copyrighted material playing in the background during a UStream or Justin.tv broadcast could lead to felony charges against the net caster.

• Yet more content for Netflix, Miramax (SM)
  • The juggernaut keeps rolling
  • look for new content end of the month from Miramax!
  • several hundred in fact “Pulp Fiction”, “Shakespeare in Love”, “Good Will Hunting” some of the titles mentioned
  • There’s even a hint of Amazon and other services but still Netflix beat them all to the punch

• First Skype, now Nokia? (udg)
  • Microsoft has been on a buying spree lately, but this one would blow all the other ones clear outta the water.  According to a post on Twitter by Eldar Murtazin, the Russian technology blogger who’s managed to scoop the media before with his insider sources at Nokia, Microsoft is planning a bid for Nokia’s mobile division. The total cost: $30 billion.
  • Eldar isn’t just some blogger with wild ideas. His sources have been right in the past, and he was the first to break the story that Nokia was going to side with Microsoft over Google for Windows Phone 7 instead of Android. He was also the man who shocked the tech world with the assertion that only 674,000 Windows Phones were sold during the first quarter they were available, calling it a “total failure.”
  • If he is correct, Nokia would leave the mobile phone business entirely, and Microsoft would pick up its mobile unit and start manufacturing Windows Phones using Nokia hardware and technology. If you’re shocked or simply don’t believe it, you have good reason to be skeptical.
  • After all, Microsoft just shelled out $8.5 billion – the most it has for any single acquisition in its history – to buy Skype. They already have a partnership with Nokia worth over $1 billion to provide Windows Phone 7 to Nokia’s next generation of smartphones, when they’re announced. Even so, some people point to Microsoft’s failed bid for Yahoo! last year for $40 billion as proof they’re willing to shell out big bucks if the opportunity is right.
  • Additionally, new Nokia CEO Stephen Elop is largely seen by Nokia fans as a Microsoft “plant” of sorts, softening up the company and giving Microsoft more influence from the inside. Elop did indeed work for Microsoft at one point, but whether or not his loyalties are to his current or former employer are probably less important than the question of how well such a large deal would work in the long run.
  • Naturally, Microsoft and Nokia both refuse to comment on the matter at all.

• They Have the Technology, They Can Rebuild Him (btm)
  • 26 year-old Austrian man has voluntarily had his hand amputated so he can be fitted with a bionic limb.
  • He lost the use of his right hand after a serious motorcycle accident in 2001
  • He regained the use of his arm but not his hand.
  • After operations failed to restore use of his hand he was asked if he wanted to participate in this elective amputation
  • A previous patient who lost he use of his left hand after being electrocuted at work had a similar operation last year and is now able to open bottles and tie his own shoes.

• Anonymous Loses Its Public Face (udg)
  • It would seem the public feud that has broken out between different hacker factions within the infamous Anonymous has proven too much for Barrett Brown, the reporter that had become a media-friendly spokesperson for them.
  • Not only is Brown saying deuces, he told Threatpost that he and around two dozen Anonymous members are forming a splinter group to focus on efforts to root out what Brown has described as “criminality and corruption” within the U.S. Government, U.S. military, corporations and the media.
  • Brown, a journalist and author, has been the public face and chief apologist from the anarchic and leaderless group during recent controversies, including the hack of security firm HBGary. He said recent feuds between different Anonymous factions, culminating in the recent takeover of two IRC chat servers used by the group convinced him that the group had lost its way.
  • “I’m tired of the drama,” Brown told Threatpost in a phone interview  ”You’ve got kids fighting for control of an IRC channel. I’m a researcher. I’m into revolutionary stuff. But there are other people for whom its about exerting power,” he said.
  • Brown told Threatpost he is defecting with what he claims are around two dozen Anonymous members. He said he planned to focus on Project PM – an effort to create an umbrella group that will support other organizations that want to expose pro-government and pro-corporate bias in the media.
  • The parting of ways between Brown and the allegedly “leaderless” group comes at a perilous time. Recent months have seen defectors from the group publish potentially damaging information that could be used to identify active members. Anonymous observers, who asked to remain anonymous themselves, said there’s reason to believe that Brown is being cut off by core Anonymous members worried about having their identities exposed, or wary of Brown’s focus on government wrongdoing. Sources say that ongoing criminal investigations of Anonymous’s previous actions may soon produce indictments and that more than one longtime member has “gone dark” in recent weeks, especially after the group was mentioned as a possible source of the PlayStation Network breach.
  • I was incredibly intrigued by Brown’s new project. It reminds me a bit of Hackers for Charity, and you know that all kinds of screams Natali. So, I emailed him asking for more information and if he’d like to come on the show to discuss it. Guess what? He said yes! So, stay tuned for special guess Barrett Brown on an upcoming show!

Intarweb Goldmine

• Blame It On The Cheese (udg)
  • When Antonio Hernandez was pulled over, I’m guessing he wasn’t expecting to do 4 days in an Asheville jail. The Buncombe County deputy that pulled him over was stoked, thinking he had made a 91 pound cocaine bust when his portable kit changed colors indicating the mixture Hernandez was carrying was illegal drugs.
  • Yeah, it turns out that an enzyme found in cheese triggered false drug test results. Yup, cheese. Those 91 pounds of suspected coke was actually 91 pounds mix of cheese, shrimp and tortilla and tamale dough.  How the Hell that could be mistaken for nose candy is beyond me.
  • Sheriff Van Duncan told The Asheville Citizen-Times he didn’t know until this case that some foods, like cheese, can give false positives on field drug tests. He plans to have deputies talk to the company that makes the tests. I’d like to hear what he plans on doing to make up for the 4 days in jail Antonio spent.

• What Happens to Your Pets after the Rapture? (btm)
  • With the coming return of Christ scheduled for this Saturday a group is offering to take care of your pets once you have been called to God.
  • Dedicated group of animal lovers and confirmed athiests
  • Currently active in 26 states, employing 40 pet rescuers
  • For $135 they guarantee if the rapture occurs within 10 years of your payment one pet per residence will be rescued. ($20 for each additional pet)
  • Service limited to “dogs, cats, birds, rabbits and small caged mammals” at this time
  • Rescue for “horses, camels, llamas and donkeys in NH, VT, ID and MT”

• German Census Asks The Important Stuff (udg)
  • Seems a fake census form going around Germany has some Lederhosen in a bunch. The forms look like Germany’s current 2011 census forms — which just went out this week — and has questions like “Which drugs do you take?” with boxes marked with options like LSD or marijuana. Another question asks if the respondent has a breast or penis enlargement procedure. And how big your penis is.
  • The forms may look real, but those questions, intriguing as they may be, aren’t officially part of the census.
  • “These questions were all entirely fictitious, we wouldn’t ask anything like that,” said Klaus Voy, Census Project Manager at the Brandenburg-Berlin Office of Statistics.
  • Although the fake census looks identical to the real thing, unlike the real one, the forms are mysteriously delivered to mailboxes without an envelope.
  • Since the real German census has come under fire from privacy advocacy groups because some questions, such as immigration background and religion, are beyond EU requirements, officials fear the questions on the fake census might, at first glance, seem legit.

• SHIELD causes terror alert (btm)
  • Police in Ann Arbor, Michigan evacuated a bus terminal after a suspicious package was found across the street.
  • Michigan State Police Bomb Squad was called to the scene.
  • Turns out it was a promotional tie-in item from Acura advertising the new Thor movie. (in theatres now)

• Sleeping Bandit Strikes Bowling Green (udg)
  • When Bowling Green police caught up to an alleged sleeping bandit Saturday, in addition to drugs, they found all kinds of goodies in the man’s pockets  like several disposable razors, a bottle of Drakkar Noir cologne, a bottle of Adidas cologne, skin cleanser and two pickled sausages.
  • A man called police when he found an unknown, “extremely drunk” man in bed with his mother. The sleeping bandit was wearing blue jeans, a gray shirt and a brown hat. He was bloodied and left blood on the back door and on the woman’s bed sheets.
  • The resident and his mother escorted the man out of their home while he was claiming several times that he was inside “Woody’s house.” The resident called police.
  • Officers were unable to find the man until about two hours later, when he struck again about a block down the road. This time, cupcakes were involved.
  • BGPD officers responded to a home where they found Benjamin Williams, 37, asleep on a couch inside the home. Williams matched the description of the man seen at the other Kenton Street home.
  • Williams was wearing muddy pants that were wet in the front where he appeared to have urinated on himself. He also had black smears on his face and hands. Police determined that Williams had eaten the ashes out of a hooka pipe inside the residence. Police photographed Williams while he slept.
  • The resident showed police where a window screen had been broken. It also appeared that once Williams came inside the home, he helped himself to several cupcakes – valued at $3 – and ransacked the man’s refrigerator.
  • Williams is lodged in the Warren County Regional Jail with a $5,000 cash bond, according to court records. He is charged with second-degree burglary, possession of marijuana, drug paraphernalia-buy/possess and possession of a controlled substance.
  • Pickled sausage, cupcakes, snorting hookah ashes, this guy has more of a wild night out sleeping than I do awake!

• Apple Gives You a Religious Experience (btm)
  • Team of UK neuroscientists scanned the brain of an Apple fan and found that Apple products stimulated the same parts of the brain as religious imagery does in people of faith.
  • They chose to investigate after passing a new Apple store and being reminded of “an evangelical prayer meeting.”
  • The research also discusses the popularity of Facebook, mobile phones and social networks.
  • “Like Apple, mobile phones and social networks offer an opportunity for us to express our basic human need to communicate.”

• Planking gone wrong (sm)
  • Internet weirdness, bunch of pictures of ppl lying on their stomachs flat surface all over the internet
  • Weird position, everywhere from top of fast food counters to top of a grille
  • Well, 20 yr old in Australia took it too far
  • Tried to lay flat on his stomach on the balcony rail and ended up falling and dying
  • When your friend jumps off that bridge, Don’t you do it too! See, your mom was right when you were younger

• “Go the F#$@ to Sleep” Tops Charts (btm)
  • New bedtime book for parents has already topped the Amazon bestseller charts a month before its release.
  • Written by novelest Adam Mansbach after his own daughter refused to go to sleep one night.
  • Book combines cute rhymes with expletive-ridden pleas.
  • Originally scheduled for release in October the release date was moved up to June after a pirated PDF of the book went viral.
  • Film rights have already been snatched up by Fox 2000
  • “It’s definitely not a book to read to your child”, said the publisher, “but it will resonate with anyone who has ever spent, 20 minutes, 40 minutes, four hours reading ‘just one more bedtime story’.”
    • “The cubs and lions are snoring.
      Wrapped in a big snuggly heap.
      How come you can do all this other great s****
      But you can’t lie the f*** down and sleep?”

Extra Links

• Bing adding Facebook likes to searches
• Gingerbread upgrade for Galaxy S
• Buy a car on ebay mobile
• Woman is Allergic to Electricity (btm)
• Only in Vegas – Batman Gets a Beatdown (btm)

• Pirates delay Sony(btm)
  • Earlier this week Vodaphone New Zealand reported that an entire shipment of Sony Ericsson Xperia Play devices was stolen saying via Twitter, “a major security breach” had occured and the launch of Xperia Play would be delayed.
  • Later Vodaphone released “security footage” that looked very questionable
  • Turns out the whole thing was fake
  • Possibly an attempt at viral marketing gone very, very wrong.
• Digital New York (btm)
  • Mayor Bloomberg released a new outline of plans for NYC to form partnerships with social media companies
  • Through partnerships with Twitter, Facebook and New York based Foursquare and Tumblr NYC wants to be the top digital city in America
  • Plans are to offer wireless Internet access in parks
  • Vast reserves of data available to programmers
  • Live chats with 311 agents
  • City will register the .nyc domain
  • @nycgov will be used to provide immediate updates on city news
  • How will the city afford all this? Mayor Bloomberg says “We are going to try to encourage people to make it available”
  • The mayor doesn’t personally update his existing Facebook page, “I’m very old-fashioned. I use email.”

• How to urn a tree (btm)

How To Reach Us on the IntarWebs

• On Twitter: Steven is @DarthMolen, Ben is @realityamuck , Natali is @UberDorkGirlie
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• And Become a Fan

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We are LIVE on Ustream . This week we talk Bin Laden (who hasn’t), Star Wars Day, Plenty of gaming news, and even a Dr. Horrible sequel, this and much more!

Intro Natali
Intro Ben

Items of Interest

• Super Mario All Stars (udg)
  • It’s the 26th anniversary of Mario and what better way to celebrate than with shoes? Not just ANY shoes though- Chuck Taylor Converse All-stars. And holy adorable. There’s lil Marios all over them, the Super Mario Bros’ logo on the tongue and Starman has replaced their usual star logo. These will be hitting the stores in July and I’m guessing only for a limited time, so grab a pair when you can.

• Han Shot First Petition (udg)
  • One thing I think we can all agree about when it comes to the 3D redo and release of the Star Wars movies is this- George has the opportunity to right the wrong. Han shot first damnit! And this guy agrees! Check out his video petition to Lucas.

• May the Fourth be with You (btm)
  • Happy Star Wars Day!
  • Official site had had a countdown timer for weeks promising, “All will be revealed” and counting down to 9AM EDT Star Wars Day.
  • And the revelation was? The Complete Saga on Blu-Ray
  • Interesting marketing ploy, when you visit the site a video begins showing you behind the scenes shots and production art, but only for a few seconds, want to see more? Then you have to share the link via your Twitter or Facebook
  • So now you get to see more? Nope. Now you sit and wait for more people to share the link and when some imaginary threshold is met, more of the video will be revealed.
  • Honestly I’m finished buying the movies. I have two sets of VHS tapes, a set of DVDs and I’m done. But if you want the Complete Saga on Blu Ray, it will be available September of this year. And don’t forget the upcoming re-releases in 3D starting next year. I’m sure there will be yet another release at that time.

• THE POWER GEEK’S 100TH EPISODE (we really need to start hyping this up and nailing out an exact plan for next week)
  • I was told there would be punch and pie. If not, I won’t be appearing. (btm)

• Cheers Ben (SM)
  • Well, if I’m nothing else, I’m a man of my word. I guess I’ll be there (btm)

• Don’t forget Cinco de Mayo is this week & don’t forget the Pepto for the day after (btm)
  • Continuing it’s massive marketing overhaul Pepto Bismol has released a series of Piñata smashing videos on its YouTube channel to celebrate the day.
  • Recently Peto Bismol shifting it’s marketing focus from traditional media to digital media making use of a Facebook page, YouTube videos, and a Twitter feed.

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Deals of the Week / New Releases

• New Movie Releases
  • GREEN HORNET!
  • What Dreams May Come
  • TAPS
  • Hannah Barbara’s – Valley of the Dinosaurs

• Free Comic Book Day is this Saturday May 7 (btm)
  • Comic Book Shops across the country will be sponsoring events and giving away free or discounted comics.
  • Comic companies will be providing “sampler” issues of many of their titles
  • Be sure to drop by your favorite comic shop and wear a costume. Many have bonuses for that as well.
    • The girls are soooooo psyched!!! (udg)
    • I’m putting together my Power Girl outfit right now (btm)

• Sweet XB360 Amazon Deal
  • $50 Amazon Gift Card
  • 1600 Microsoft points ($20)
  • 4 GB and 250 GB Bundles (also same size Kinect Bundles)

• Black Ops “Escalation” DLC
  • 5 new maps
  • Call of the Dead – Features Sarah Michelle Gellar, Robert Englund (Freddy Krueger), Danny Trejo (Machete), and Michael Rooker (The Walking Dead)

• New Fantastic Four Table for Console Pinball Machines
  • Features lots of ramps and goodies, looks really fun
  • For Pinball FX 2 (XB 360) and Marvel Pinball (PSN)
  • This game engine will be the reason I eventually get XB360
  • May 17 – $3

• EA Week on Steam
  • Check back each day for a different deal
  • (SM) I missed the Dragon Age deals

Movie Minute (new feature)

• Thor set to open this week (May 6) in the US (btm)
  • Already pulled in $93 million from international audiences.
  • Rated 95% Fresh by Rotten Tomatoes reviews.
  • As with all the recent Marvel Movies, be sure to stay till after the credits.

• Dr. Horrible Sequel!! (udg)
  • With the upcoming Avengers movie and staying all kinds of involved with the Buffy and Angel comics at Dark Horse, Joss Whedon is a busy, busy guy. Thankfully not too busy to sit down with the NY Times “Art Beat” column and let it slip that a sequel to Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog is coming.
  • “We’ve got several songs near completion and we’ve got a very specific structure.” Whedon said. Doing a continuation of his cult webseries is definitely something he “has his heart into,” but it’s all a matter of having enough time:  ”We’ve just all got jobs. And it’s not like Neil, Nathan and Felicia ain’t busy either. We get together at Christmas and family occasions, and then play each other our partial songs and go, “Yup, that’s still exactly as it was the last time we played it. We’re great.” It’s bad.”
  • He  also joked that the title of the Dr. Horrible sequel would be called “Dr. Horrible and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,” silly silly Joss.

Geek Speak

• The Internet’s New Alternate Reality: It’s Positive and Negative affect on historical events.
  • We are quickly approaching our 100th episode. In that time, we’ve talked a great deal about the affect that the Internet and sites such as Twitter and Facebook have had as an impact on our lives. We’ve talked about how technology has allowed events that would have taken hours to make it’s way around the world now does it in seconds. How with one click of a cell phone camera, the contents of that click attached and tweeted- worlds can be witnessed like never before.
  • Tonight we talk about the impact that the Internet has had and will have on history.
  • Until very recently, if every professional news organization in the nation examined a charge and found it baseless, it was — for all intents and purposes — dropped. Today, the growth of the Internet has drained the noun “news” of its former authority. If you don’t like the facts presented on the sites of established news organizations, you simply keep clicking until you find one whose “facts” accord with your beliefs.

• • • “There are no more arbiters of truth,” former White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs told the Politico website. “So whatever you can prove factually, somebody else can find something else and point to it with enough ferocity to get people to believe it. We’ve crossed some Rubicon into the unknown.

• The main point of topic: The internet’s Positive and Negative affect on historical events. The ease at which a rumor that appears to be completely true (i.e. the now clearly photoshopped photo of a supposed dead Osama believed to be released by the Persian Media that major news organizations ran with as truth) and quite the opposite- 9/11- google it, search it on YouTube and there are thousands of conspiracy sites and videos everywhere that actually appear legit enough to make people think.  The very documents leaked by WikiLeaks last week are being speculated as lighting the match that made the decisions made by President Obama have to occur this past weekend. The saying “don’t like the answer? Keep googling” is so true. How will all of this affect world history for our future generations? What will the definitive source be now? Our high schoolers can now quote Wikipedia – a user edited site and Twitter in papers.

Tech, Gaming, and Geek News

• The Science Behind “That’s What She Said” (udg)
  • We’ve all probably said it once or twice. Steven loves to whip it out whenever he can. I personally kinda suck at it, despite my best efforts. So, ever wonder what exactly makes a good “That’s What She Said”? Well, thanks to research done by Chloé Kiddon and Yuriy Brun of the University of Washington, it turns out it’s all about noun sexiness.
  • Kiddon and Brun, who cite television show The Office as the prime cause behind the repopularization of TWSS, are actually serious, bona fide computer science researchers. Their paper, which will be presented in June at a computer linguistics conference, details their work at improving the parsing and understanding of TWSS jokes, which are a specific subset of the more maturely named double entendre. Mmmm I do love a good double entendre.
  • The intellectually stimulating duo dubbed their method at parsing humor: the DEviaNT approach. They took 1.5 mil sentences from textfiles.com/sex/EROTICA corpus, and 57 thousand non-erotic sentences from the Brown corpus — and then measures how closely-related “a noun, an adjective, and a verb phrase are to the erotica domain.” The end result, if we’re being entirely scientific about it, is a bunch of nouns, verbs, and adjectives with a “sexiness rating.”
  • Because DEviaNT is a learning algorithm, the researchers had to feed it some data so that it could actually learn what a TWSS looks like, and more importantly what a TWSS doesn’t look like. Their choice was positive examples from twssstories.com, and false examples from textsfromlastnight.com, fmylife.com, and wikiquote.org. Then, with sexiness ratings and an accurate linguistic model of what makes up a TWSS, the researchers started feeding sentences into DEviaNT to see whether it could detect TWSSes.
  • The end result, rather surprisingly, was the accurate detection of That’s What She Said double entendres 71% of the time. Qualitatively, DEviaNT was most capable at identifying noun euphemisms like “don’t you think these buns are a little too big for this meat?” and weaker with ambiguous phrases like “yes give me all the cream and he’s gone.”
  • You know this whole article mixes grammar, scientific algorithms and wraps it with a bow of humor on top. It doesn’t get much more perfect than that for me. Hmm…that may account for why DEviaNT is far more successful at kicking out a better That’s What She Said than I am.

• Twitter knew about Osama Raid Before We Did (sm)
  • Obama wasn’t the only person to announce the happenings in Pakistan
  • Twitter user, Sohaib Athar, unwittingly micro-blogged the event on the social network site
  • He tweeted about helicopters noises, explosions, plus crashes
  • even his worries of “something worse going down” and faulty “spy copters”
  • All before Obama’s speech came on.

• Cybercriminals using bin Laden death to spread malware (btm)
  • As with most major news stories criminals are ready with malware
  • Links show up in Twitter and Facebook that lead to malicious sites where you are asked to install a codec to watch a video at which point malware is installed on your computer.

• Osama’s last attack? Your social news networks (SM)
  • CNN Mobile New site crashed because of the load
  • Most news sites were taking 6x as long to process requests
  • Tweets reached 4,000 p/ second
  • Keith Urbahn, “Former Secretary of Defense Chief of Staff”,  tweeted before Obama’s speech “So I’m told by a reputable person they have killed Osama Bin Laden. Hot Damn”
  • Facebook had 200,000 likes of one fan page “Osama Bin Laden is DEAD”
  • How are YOU getting your news nowadays?? The landscape is changing

• AT&T Broadband Usage Caps Go Into Effect (udg)
  • We’ve covered cell data usage caps on here before. Now it’s coming to your home. If you use AT&T as your ISP beware- the data use cap has begun.
  • America’s largest ISP has now become the 2nd broadband carrier after Comcast to start limiting broadband usage to its customers.
  • DSL users will be capped at 150 GB per month. U-verse users will be capped at 250 per month.  Those that go over the limit more than 3 times in 3 separate months will have to fork over $10 for each 50 GB over the limit.
  • AT&T estimates that, with the average customer ringing in at about 18 GB per month in use, only around 2% of their high-speed Internet customers will be affected. However, rising cloud technologies that sync files with remote servers in the background, customers could face data usage issues under such a plan.
  • Some advocates see the move as a potential hindrance to the growth of the Internet and online innovation. Representative Ed Markey criticized AT&T for undermining national broadband goals and making it more difficult for new adopters to access high-speed Internet.

• Square sets new record $2 Million processed in one day (btm)
  • One week after making deal to sell readers in Apple stores, lands “strategic” deal with Visa
  • The Visa deal has led to a redesign of the reader to meet “best practices” standards.
    • Visa wants the readers to encrypt user data
    • There’s no real security hole, redesign is to make Visa happy.
  • (Remember I was told 2-5 weeks to get it when I ordered it free on the Square site? Ordered it on a Monday, got it the same week on Thurs. -udg)

• Superman renounces US citizenship (btm)
  • MSM (esp. Fox News) reacted all weekend
  • Commenters on Fox News site goes bat#%&! crazy
  • Several think this “globalization” is to increase overseas sales for upcoming movies
  • (SM)Next thing you know, Thor is going to renounce his citizenship of Asgard because, well, Norse legends are out of style nowadays anyways

• The App That Turns Your iPhone Into a 3D Scanner (udg)
  • With over 350,000 apps out there, it would seem that every possible idea for the iPhone 4 has been thought up. Georgia Tech researcher Grant Schnidler has proven otherwise. He uses it to create 3D models and now you can too.
  • Schindler’s app, called Trimensional, works by shining light on a person’s face from four directions, and recording the results. These are compiled into a single image that (if you’re using the advanced version of the software) you can export to a 3D printer and create a model of your face, or whatever you’ve scanned. Cleverly, Trimensional does not require any additional equipment to perform the scan, such as a light kit. Instead, it uses the iPhone’s screen as a light source, and records the images with the front-facing camera.
  • Schindler describes the scanning process as answering a series of questions. From the Georgia Tech Digital Lounge:
    • “If I take a scan of my face, the app asks ‘what does the image look like if I shine the light from the left side, what does it look like from the right side,’ and so on. There’s one three-dimensional answer per pixel, and combining all those answers results in the full 3-D model.”
  • I see a wide variety of uses for this app and encourage you to check out the link in the show notes to watch a video of it in action.

• Artists and writers start anti-bullying Kickstarter drive for comic (btm)
  • Original comic produced at a 24 Hour Comic Day event by Charles “Zan” Christensen and Mark Brill.
  • Inspired by last year’s rash of gay teen suicides
  • Art being reworked and cleaned up for a more polished look and to include new bonus pages by Dan Parent, Gail Simone, Phil Jimenez, Carla Speed McNeil, Andy Mangels and Donna Barr.

• Home Gaming Consoles in Apple’s Future ? (udg)
  • For years rumors have flown about an Apple Gaming Console. And for years we all pretty much laughed at them. But, a good look at the A5 processor that the new iPad 2 is sporting may have us at least stop laughing for a bit.
  • Most have dismissed the revised hardware on the iPad 2 as accomplished, but fairly underwhelming. However, underneath the hood of that A5 shows an unprecedented leap in mobile games-playing power.
  • The article I stumbled upon for this item goes into some pretty incredible detail on the iPad 2 as an actual soft core gaming device and is a pretty good read. It gets into the details of things such as fill rates and frames per second.
  • It’s clear this is a hardware design that is about so much more than just a revised form factor and a bunch of cameras. Add to it that Apple also recently added Nintendo’s ex-head of communications Rob Saunders and Activision’s UK PR director, Nick Grange to their UK operations and they could possibly be laying the groundwork for the future of its gaming business.
  • What is that future? Do I personally see Apple coming out with a Gaming Console? While they plead a good case in the article, I don’t see it. What I do see is Apple doing what Apple does. Seeing a way to get in on the booming mobile gaming industry, while integrating it into their already useful products. In short- they see the future potential, it already fits into their product line, now they’re going to bump it up a notch.

• More PSN Fallout (sm)
  • Still! Services are down on the Sony network
  • Where oh Where did my 70 million CC’s go?
  • Sony Denies those were CC’s Stolen
  • Hackage has spread to other aspects of Sony (btm)
    • SOE shutdown their Facebook and MMO games
      • (glad I dropped my Everquest II account 6 yrs ago-btm)
    • (24.6 million SOE accounts have been  breached!!-udg)

• Microsoft Bing now the default engine for search and maps on RIM products (btm)
  • Blackberry phones and tablets will now ship with Bing set as default.
  • Carriers are still free to change the default to anything they want.
  • Microsoft trying hard to get Bing a bigger chunk of the market.

Intarweb Goldmine

• Jersey Town Limits Conjugal Visits (udg)
  • A New Jersey town is cock blocking both literally and figuratively. Hopewell Township has adopted an ordinance that regulates when chickens and roosters can hook up in backyard henhouses.
  • Roosters must show they’re disease-free and they better not crow about their conquests.
  • Hopewell Township residents can have up to a half-dozen hens on half-acre lots. Roosters would be allowed only 10 days a year for fertilization purposes.
  • Mature roosters are not allowed because they’re too noisy. Any roosters that crow too long can be banned from the property for two years.
  • Mayor Jim Burd told The Times of Trenton the ordinance is a compromise between today’s lifestyle and the township’s agricultural history.

• Washington Man Shaves Beard (btm)
  • Has had beard since the 9/11 attacks
  • Vowed not to shave until bin Laden was captured or proven to be dead
  • Middle School teacher in East Wenatchee, WA. used the beard to tell students about the attacks
  • Once story was confirmed he says he wasted no time getting rid of the beard
    • Both he and his wife had wanted rid of it for years, but “a vow is a vow”.
  • His three daughters were in Middle School when he started growing the beard. They are now college age.

• Cow Caper Nets 26 Gallons of Milk (SM)
  • man dons a cow suit and then crawled into a walmart store
  • Goes to the dairy aisle and steals 26 gallons of milk

• Words Every Bride Dreams Of- “Would You Like Fries With That?” (udg)
  • It may not be a royal wedding, but a typical Hong Kong marriage ceremony is epic in scope.
  • It involves a team of handlers, photo sessions, multiple banquets, ancestor worship, more photo sessions, countless costume changes, red packets of money, numerology and a suckling pig.
  • McDonald’s, of all places, has a better offer — and, yes, it comes with fries.
  • Beginning in January, the U.S. fast food chain’s Hong Kong operation responded to what it called strong customer demand and began offering wedding party packages at three of its 225 locations. The “Warm and Sweet Wedding Package” pares the wedding process down to the bare essentials.
  • For less than $1,300, a couple gets a venue and decorations, invitation cards, audio equipment, McDonaldland figurines for each guest, an emcee and $385 worth of McDonald’s food.
  • In addition, the bride and groom can choose among wedding gifts that include a crystal McDonald’s house and a pair of balloon wedding rings inscribed with the iconic golden arches.
  • The themed wedding far from a new concept in Hong Kong but McDonald’s is the first fast food restaurant to enter the arena.

• Robotic French Kiss Peripheral (SM)
  • Guy builds a “mouth communication” device to “mimic” french kissing
  • Records how you move a metal tube on one peripheral and it replicates it to another peripheral.. even over the Internet
  • According to inventor, “It could be a good way for celebrities to interact with their fans” (more like gain stalkers)
  • Not very sophisticated now but plans to also mimic breathing taste, and saliva in the future…

• Sword Wielding + Skateboard Riding is Bound to = Tasering (udg)
  • Poor Deandre Irby! Dude was just trying to enjoy the day like any young person would—hanging out at the outdoor mall, skating around with his backpack on, maybe think about getting a pretzel and oh, swinging his ‘fantasy sword’ with a 26-inch blade around. What the hell?
  • That’s how the police describe the sword Irby was carrying around. They said that when arrived on scene, Irby tried to flee and hide his sword in the dumpster but couldn’t do it in time. When caught, he refused to cooperate with them and “attempted to grab his sword”, which resulted it him getting tased. Ouch. Unfortunately, Irby didn’t have a concealed weapons permit to carry his sword (which begs the question, who the hell has a concealed weapons permit for a sword?) so he’s been charged with that. Next time, you may wanna leave the sword at home hon.

Extra Links

• Sistine Chapel Recreated With Rubik’s Cubes (udg)
• Air Force looks for commercial spacecraft

• Smart Kids Grow up to be Heavy Drinkers? (btm)
  • Two long term studies (1 British, 1 American) have shown that children with higher than average intelligence grow up to consume alcohol more heavily and more frequently.
  • Theories as to why range from evolution to making up for boring childhoods or my favorite, drinking may be the only way to deal with morons.

How To Reach Us on the IntarWebs

• On Twitter: Steven is @DarthMolen, Ben is @realityamuck , Natali is @UberDorkGirlie
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We are LIVE on Ustream . This week we talk social responsibility in a digital age, the intarwebz got broke, big brother is watching you… everywhere

Intro Natali
Intro Ben

Items of Interest

• The iCade Now A Reality (udg)
  • I mentioned during my April Fool’s Day rundown is that the glory of ThinkGeek’s “pranks” is that they often turn into real items. Well, their iCADE from last year is now up for presale. If you didn’t quite catch it from the name- it turns your iPad into an old-school arcade cabinet. You just slide your iPad in and it uses Bluetooth to connect so no cables to hook up.
  • ThinkGeek teamed up with Atari to bring back classics like Asteroids to the market for iCADE support. And to go with your iCADE comes the “Atari Greatest Hits” app with over 100 classic Atari games. You get pong for free right off the bat. The others are available in-app where you can get 3 for $1.00 or all 100 for $14.99.
  • The iCADE uses a unique API, which it will be opening up to developers so that they can add iCADE support to their games. ThinkGeek also teamed up with ION to develop the tabletop cabinet that features full button and joystick control.
  • Available for iPad and iPad 2, the iCADE is on presale now for just under $100 and is expected to start shipping on May 20, 2011. The first shipment that went on sale sold out in a day.

• Lil Thor: Marvel Releases Lil Thor Version of Our Beloved Lil Vader VW Commercial (udg)
  • Note the car’s plate is ASG4RD *giggle*

• Unique Marketing for Samsung Galaxy S2 (SM)
  • Bloggers put to the extreme unveiling and talking about the product
  • Toyota Raps

Gold Sponsors:

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• Both have been out on the Android Marketplace for awhile now
• After a long vetting period, Today in Movie History is now available on iTunes!!!
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• Go check out both apps, TIGH  and TIMH, now available on both Android and IPhone

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• Need your noms????
• @UberDorkGirlie’s etsy is the way to go
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• Need a present and don’t want to bake? then Natali’s Etsy store is the way to go

Deals of the Week / New Releases

• With Kinnect Sports Food Fight has a whole new meaning (btm)
  • New DLC for Kinnect sports available April 29
  • 320 Micro$oft points

• Hugo Nominees You Can Read Right Now… For Free! (udg)
  • The Hugo Awards recognize excellence in the genres of science fiction and fantasy. And because you know you don’t have enough to read, and I’m all about helping you find new stuff to add, I’ve stumbled upon a list of the nominees that are available for free online. Yup, free. And I’m not talking one or two. I’m talking 11 of the nominated Short Stories, Novellas, Novelettes and one movie. So, hope on over to our friends at TheMarySue.com and starting finding out how they earned their rank amongst the Hugo Award Nominees.

• WoW Patch 4.1 hit servers this week
  • trolls are definitely back… (Zul’Gurub, Zul’Aman, etc)
  • Guilder finder (like dungeon finder)
  • Guild Challenges

• Speaking of the Hugos, catch up on the Hugo award winning series Doctor Who (btm)
  • now 61% off on Amazon
  • Series 1 thru 4 featuring Hugo winning episodes:
    • “The Empty Child” & “The Doctor Dances” (are you my mommy?)
    • “The Girl in the Fireplace”
    • “Blink” (Weeping Angels are the single scariest thing to me)

• Dexter Ultimate Prop Giveaway (udg)
  • I hugely heart me some Dexter. And Showtime is handing out the ultimate props. 5 lucky winner will score 2nd place prize packs including one pack of Dexter Collectibles, one Baby Harrison Pack, a Debra Morgan Pack, a Trinity Killer Pack and a Dexter & Rita Wedding Pack.
  • One person will snag the Grand Prize which includes a “Bowl Till You Bleed” Bowling shirt, “Thank You for the Blood” Card, Dexter’s Kill Bag and Blood Spatter Pictures. It’s pretty damn awesome. So, head on over to the link in the show notes and… no don’t I want to win it!!

• New Movies for 4th Week of April
  • Blow out -John Travolta at his best
  • Marvel “The Avengers”: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, Vol 1 and 2 – Disney + Marvel = goodness!
  • The Girl Who Leapt through Time (Anime) – multiple genres, supposedly good
  • Dinoshark- (btm)(take Jurassic Park mix with Jaws and you get Dinoshark, just with a much lower budget and not as great acting but 1000% more cheese)

Movie Minute (new feature)

• Hobbit Updates
  • Ian Holms back on set for Bilbo
• WW Script Rewrite- AKA Your WW Train Wreck of the Week (udg)
  • It’s a REALLY good thing I missed the leaked pilot script for this because it included  scenes of Diana having a sleepover, and eating ice cream (“It’s been a three-scoop day!”), and teaming up with her press secretary Myndi to “scream like schoolgirls” over a Katy Perry video, and maybe even crying herself to sleep over her old flame Steve Trevor.  WHAT. THE. TRUCK. Seriously?!?!?
  • Even though they didn’t listen to us over the costume I guess the outrage over turning our beloved WW into Allie McFreakinBeal must have sunk in because, according to i09, it’s been rewritten.
  • The new script has  her lifting bad guys by the throat, gouging their eyes with her thumbs, kicking them into their air with those go-go boots and making obscene gestures at them. In a flashback, we see her pulling Steve out of a burning airplane, despite being told that doing so will be way too dangerous. Even her cat seems braver: In one scene, we discover it’s bitten her neighbor William Marston (named after the “Wonder Woman” creator), who tells Diana he thinks Wonder Woman is a fascist. And apparently, Diana’s glad the cat bit him.
  • Yup. Do you really need me to say what I think of the rewrite?

Geek Speak

• With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility: Social Responsibility in a Highly Digital Age
  • Sadly there have been story after story in this country of people being beaten, raped, even stabbed to death in broad daylight with many onlookers witnessing the horrendous acts. Fear of getting involved has been the biggest reason that people use when stating why they did not do anything to help. When there is a madman with a gun, it’s understandable why you wouldn’t want to.  When you are outnumbered and the situation is violent and ugly, trying to break it up may get you killed. But, with the technological advances we carry with us on a day to day basis I would hope that more would be done to aid in crisis situations. And when I say more being done, I sure as Hell don’t mean put that shit up on YouTube.
  • By now I’m sure you have either heard of or seen the video of the brutal beating
  • of Chrissy Lee Polis. Chrissy is a trans woman that stopped in a Rosedale, MD to use the bathroom and was told by a male employee there that she needed to buy something first. Without warning, she is attacked by two women, one claiming that Chrissy was “talking to her man”- her man being the oh so friendly guy behind the counter that made her buy something first.
  • Employees of the restaurant not only stood around and watched as the two pummeled her, one of them also stood there video taping the incident. He was also kind enough to stop laughing long enough to warn the girls “Y’all better get the fuck up outta here before the cops come” while he’s zooming in on the poor victim who is now mid-seizure from getting dragged across the restaurant by only her hair and beaten.  Then bitches about the fact she’s having a seizure on “his” floor.
  • If you were there, what would you have done?
  • One of my twitter followers posed “Are they trained to break up fights? What about liability issues?”  My thoughts on that- there comes a time where that simply doesn’t fuckin matter. An older woman (Vicky Thom) didn’t give a crap about that and she tried but got hit. If the person video taping it plus the at least 3 employees seen standing there watching all jumped in to contain the situation, it would have ended.
  • Cyber Bullying Statistics

Tech, Gaming, and Geek News

• The Intarwebs Got Broke (udg)
  • So, remember last week when we talked Cloud? Well, the sky fell last week when Amazon’s cloud network crashed, taking with it  a host of web 2.0 companies – including Reddit, Foursquare, Hootsuite  and thousands of others.  Oddly, two of Amazon’s biggest Web Services’ biggest customers- Netflix and Zynga were not affected by Crash 2.0.
  • Amazon EC2 was believed to be impossible to crash, after hacktivist group Anonymous failed to take it down in December. So what happened?
  • The company said that an early-morning “networking event” caused a cascade of problems that started with a glitch at its East Coast facility. The glitch made its servers automatically create back-ups of themselves which eventually led to crashes in that zone. After roughly 3 days, Amazon had everything under control, with one exception- about 0.07 percent of the data storage in its restored eastern cloud service isn’t fully recoverable. Needless to say this is going to shake the faith that many have in the all mighty cloud.
  • As if this weren’t enough, this rare phenomenon came on the same day as the massive PlayStation network went offline after a then unexplained outage that left 77 million users frustrated to say the least.
  • After going down several times at the end of February and outages throughout March, this is just the latest in a string of problems for the network. And it’s still down as they struggle to completely rebuild it
  • The outage wasn’t the most frustrating thing for PSN users, believe it or not. Instead it was the lack of communication from Sony. To make matters worse, after nearly a week, they finally announced to the public yesterday via the US PlayStation blog that this was indeed due to a massive breach. They stated the “illegal and unauthorized person” obtained people’s names, addresses, email address, birth dates, usernames, passwords, logins, security questions and more. With 77 million users and an estimated $500 mill in annual revenues just from this service,  this makes it one of the largest-ever Internet security break-ins.
  • Sony immediately shut down the network as soon as they learned the information had been stolen. The company said user account information for the PlayStation Network and its Qriocity service users was compromised between April 17 and April 19. Going undetected for several days is a huge red flag and probably accounts for the entire rebuild.
  • While they saw no evidence credit card numbers were stolen, Sony warned users it could not rule out the possibility.
  • “Out of an abundance of caution, we are advising you that your credit card number (excluding security code) and expiration date may have been obtained,” they said.
  • Sony said it has hired an “outside recognized security firm” to investigate. Of course I’m hoping that firm has no links to China.
  • The timing is also rather unfortunate for them. Monday night Sony unveiled its first two tablets. Like most Sony products they use access to its media networks as a selling point. In the case of these tablets, Qriocity, which was also highly compromised and is part of this ongoing outage.
  • The incidents involving Amazon and Sony are believed to be unrelated and Anonymous is claiming they nothing to do with it.

• Apple secretly tracking your Location (SM)
  • Lets not get hysterical now, It’s pretty muddy data
    • precision is lacking, aggregates by week, no personal info really
  • Why you should care that Apple tracks you
    • Its not that they are tracking, its that there’s a unencrypted history on your handset
    • I.E. a beacon for hackers
  • Guess What? Android is a Much Bigger Offender (udg)
    • Haters always gotta be hatin’. According to industry expert Christopher Soghoian, the iPhone reports your location data to Apple twice a day, but Android reports your location data back to Google several times per hour.
  • App to dump your android location information (SM)
  • Yep, they all do it … and that’s the big dirty secret
  • Most apps cache data and then re-use to help speed things up
  • When you connect to their backend db, guaranteed there is logging
  • Not something to declare armegeddon on but why the huge history on the local phone?
  • Don’t forget the file is also located unencrypted on whichever computer you back up your iPhone. Of course you could put a password on your phone and your computer, but that’s kinda complicated to do, right?(btm)

• AT&T Admits it can’t handle the iPhone (btm)
  • (SM)Thats like the pope admitting he’s Catholic… everyone already knew
  • Explains they need to buy T-Mobile to expand their network
  • iPhone produces 24 times the mobile network traffic than a conventional phone
  • Between 2007 (iPhone introduction) and 2010 mobile network volume jumped 8000%
  • They expect the first 5-7 weeks of 2015 will see more traffic than all of 2010
  • (btm) I wonder if putting iPhones on multiple carriers will help reduce the load or will all carriers see this kind of increase as people who avoided AT&T sign up?

• Valve Probably Done With Single Player Games (udg)
  • According to journalist Geoff Keighley’s Final Hours of Portal 2 iTunes app, Valve may be leaving its single player days behind.
  • “Portal 2 will probably be Valve’s last game with an isolated single-player experience. What this all means is something Newell is still trying to figure out,” wrote Keighly, relating a comment made by Valve founder Gabe Newell.
  • Valve’s Portal 2 introduced multiplayer to the Portal games through a two-player co-op mode. Most of their major games now feature some form of multiplayer mode. In fact, the company’s primary single-player-only experience Half-Life hasn’t seen anything new since 2007.
  • Even outside of Valve, single-player-only modes seem to be on their way out. Even Super Mario now includes second-player support. Series like Uncharted or BioShock that launched as solo-only have added multiplayer modes in their second installments. Capcom has been slowly but surely pushing it’s once single-player only series, Resident Evil into a vehicle for multiplayer.
  • The comment from Valve is striking, though, in that it doesn’t sound like Newell and Johnson said they’d probably never ship a game that didn’t have a multiplayer mode somewhere in it. Rather, they told Keighley they “probably” wouldn’t make a game “with an isolated single-player experience.” That would mean no more modes that couldn’t connect in some fashion to other people.

• Samsung / Apple Rivalry Heating Up (SM)
  • Apple slapped a lawsuit on Samsung for their Galaxy S and copyright violations
  • Funny thing, Samsung (South Korean) manufactures a lot of the IPhone parts
  • (SM) I own one and it DOES look like an IPhone plus the interface is pretty slick
  • Lets say they win… and have to pay a “licensing” fee, what does that mean for the rest of the industry?
  • Samsung has since fired back their own set of lawsuits on copyright infringement
  • Can their partnership last through all this litigation?

• Latest update makes Color Nook more tablet like than ever (btm)
  • Android 2.2 support
  • Flash
  • App Store
    • Angry Birds (SM) – this is a must… #srslyaddicted
  • built in email
  • Ability for authors to sign books?

• WikiLeaks at it Again (udg)
  • WikiLeaks has done another dump of confidential government and military documents. This time they focused on the Prisoners being held at Guantanamo Bay. In all 779 classified dossiers on current and former detainees were released.
  • New York Times, Washington Post, NPR and a number of other media outlets have published, either in whole or in part, these classified files. So, will the government pursue them for espionage charges like they are pursuing WikiLeaks?
  • The Obama administration condemned the leaks in a statement: “These documents contain classified information about current and former GTMO detainees, and we strongly condemn the leaking of this sensitive information.”
  • In addition to shedding light on the actions of Al-Qaeda’s leadership before and after the 9/11 attacks, the documents pertain to the treatment of the detainees: While the Times reports that the documents “are largely silent about the use of the harsh interrogation tactics at Guantánamo — including sleep deprivation, shackling in stress positions and prolonged exposure to cold temperatures — that drew global condemnation,” it also notes that many prisoners appear to have been held for long periods without cause.

• Old Republic Expected to turn a profit, But will it? (SM)
  • Old Republic is a Star Wars MMO done by the Bioware folks
  • These were the same folks who did BG and KOTOR
  • EA expects to draw 500,000 subs in the first year and make a profit
  • Investment firms expect a million from the company
  • Puts 12 million (wow) into perspective, right?
  • One big hitch… Free to play MMO’s are here (LOTRO,  DDO, etc)
  • Can a new sub without current user base survive?

• Look Out Groupon, Here Comes FaceBook (udg)
  • When FB launched “places,” first thought was they were trying to compete with 4sqr.
  • Now they’ve launched Deals. And, again, first glance may seem like 4sqr. But, FB’s Deals are actually like Groupon.  See, with 4sqr, checking in to a place may get you a free app or 10% off. With Deals, like Groupon, FB users will be able to buy a certificate for some goods or services at an extremely discounted rate (typically 50% off) for future use. And you’ll be able to use FB credits to buy them.
  • Facebook is starting with 5 cities- SF, Austin, Dallas, Atlanta and San Diego. Any FB user can sign up for Deals notifications and the users in these 5 test cities will be able to see and use Deals now.
  • We suspected Facebook had plans to bring Credits to the real world since around the time of f8, the company’s developer conference, when Facebook announced its ambitious Open Graph. Looks like this is the start.

• Open home Wi-Fi leads to FBI raid on wrong houses(btm)
  • FBI raided homes of those suspected of downloading child porn
  • After its investigation, FBI finds that neighbors using open Wi-Fi were the actual culprit
  • Wi-Fi Alliance says router security is like seat belts, it only works if you use it
  • Set a password on your router, seriously.

• Xbox to Have Streaming TV Service (udg)
  • Streaming TV may not seem like a new concept for the 360. Microsoft already allows it via AT&T’s U-verse service. But, it looks like they are in talks with major TV networks and could be branching out.  Right now they are reportedly working with Australian TV Network, Foxtel, in bringing a wallet-friendly cable package to the 360.
  • Reports also indicate there is quite a heated battle internally at Microsoft over this with many employees believing that the Xbox franchise should remain as a strictly gaming platform. Others argue it already does video streaming and should evolve into more than just games.
  • In a recent interview Ross Honey, head of content acquisition for Xbox, stated “Microsoft Xbox is very interested in delivering great entertainment to consumers, entertainment in the broadest sense. From our perspective, gaming and TV are going to coexist.”
  • Just recently, Microsoft brought Kinect support to the 360 for the Netflix app now allowing for voice or gesture control of the Netflix interface to select any content.
  • Perhaps the days of a console being used simply for gaming will be over. I think we started to see that already before this announcement came.

Intarweb Goldmine

• Tweeting election results in Canada will get you fined (btm)
  • 73 year old Canadian law makes it illegal to announce or send messages about election results until all polls are closed.
  • Carries a $25,000 fine and up to 5 years in jail.
  • Election officials won’t be actively monitoring the Twitter but if there are complaints they will investigate
  • Law originally intended to prevent radio stations from announcing East Coast results and potentially affecting West Coast elections where the polls were still open.

• Kid Not Guilty til he opens mouth on Facebook (SM)
  • Guy stops up sink in library at closing
  • Ppl don’t find the stopped sink until the next day
  • 200,000 dollars of damage later…
  • Kid gets on Facebook and brags about it and subsequently gets caught

• And the Stupid Tattoo of the Week Goes to… (udg)
  • L.A. County Sheriff homicide investigator Kevin Lloyd was flipping through tattooed gang members when he notice Anthony Garcia. Why? Well his tattoo depicted, in great detail, a 2004 liquor store murder scene.

• • Yup, every key detail was there: the Christmas lights that lined the roof of the liquor store where 23 yo John Juarez was gunned down, the direction his body fell, the bowed street lamp across the way and the street sign- all under a huge banner that said “RIVERA KILLS.” Yeah, as in the gang Rivera-13.
  • It even gets creative with some screaming symbolism-  the helicopter shooting down what seems to be Mr. Peanut is a reference to the gang member’s alias, “Chopper,” while the lovable peanut mascot symbolizes a rival gang member, as the term “peanut” is a gang slang term for a rival gang member.
  • Apparently, the tattooed mural on the chest of Chopper–real name Anthony Garcia–evolved over time, with pictures of him taken at various points since the liquor store murder having new additions inked onto the scene. I’m guessing Chopper is now probably regretting his cockiness just a bit.

• Rules of Golfing During A German Bombing (udg)

• Computer opens grocery store, without employees (btm)
  • Grocery store was closed for Good Friday but computerized security system opened the doors on time at 8AM
  • 3 minutes later customers began shopping
  • Many honest customers used the self check-out lanes to pay.
  • Some realized there was no staff and left without paying
  • Owner is asking those that didn’t pay to fess up and pay. All money received will be donated to the Christchurch recovery effort.
  • Owner isn’t pressing charges yet, even though CCTV cameras recorded it all.

• Christ is Coming, get Tweeting (udg)
  • Could Facebook and Twitter be the salvation of man?
  • Rev. Franklin Graham, son of Christian evangelist Billy Graham thinks so according to the “prophecy” he gave ABC’s “This Week” host Christiane Amanpour.
  • “The Bible says that every eye is going to see [the Second Coming of Jesus],” Graham told Ammanpour. “How is the whole world going to see [him] all at one time? I don’t know, unless all of a sudden everybody’s taking pictures and it’s on the media worldwide. I don’t know. Social media could have a big part in that.”
  • The 58-year-old cited a verse that says Jesus will be coming on “a cloud and the whole world will moan.”
  • Graham was quick to point out that he is not saying Jesus will come back on Facebook or Twitter himself but instead he could make his announcement on the Silicon Valley social networks, or his arrival could quickly become a trending topic of the likes that no one has seen.

Extra Links

• Your IP address can be tracked to a half a mile
• Good reviews for latest version of MK
• The Little Guy Schools MTV
• Fukushima Reactor Battle Plan

• The original flying car for sale (btm)

• Last flight of the Endeavour (btm)
• Tesla CEO, Elon Musk will put a man on Mars in 10 years(btm)
• Who are you really talking to online? (btm)
  • Los Angeles woman met a Firefighter from Colorado in a message board for fans of HBO’s Deadwood
  • Began exchanging emails, letters, postcards, photos and talking everyday on the phone
  • Woman left her unhappy marriage but as she was preparing to move to Colorado was told that the Firefighter had died from Liver Cancer.
  • 7 months later her friends discovered the truth, the Firefighter, his son and 20 other family members were all characters created by a woman from the Chicago suburbs.
  • Chicago woman allegedly used a voice-altering device to disguise her voice and plotted out entire coordinating shorelines for her characters interacting with the LA woman.
  • Chicago woman had posed as a friend of the firefighter and introduced him to the LA woman becoming her friend
  • LA woman learned the truth while watching TV with the Chicago woman, who was visiting.
  • LA woman is now suing the Chicago woman.

• Hotel linens may have more bugs than you think (btm)
  • Hotels are now using specially designed RFID tags to prevent theft
  • tags can be sewn directly into towels, linens and bathrobes
  • Hotel in Hawaii has already saved $15,000 using the system
  • So far only the Hawaiian hotel and 2 others are using system
    • The hotels are remaining anonymous for security reasons

• Jersey Shore gone Wilde (btm)
  • Takes Jersey Shore transcripts adds Broadway actors and gives us re-enactments in the style of Oscar Wilde
  • Series of videos produced by Playbill.com
  • More entertaining than actual Jersey Shore

How To Reach Us on the IntarWebs

• On Twitter: Steven is @DarthMolen, Ben is @realityamuck , Natali is @UberDorkGirlie
• email us: darthmolen@thepowergeeks.com and uberdorkgirlie@thepowergeeks.com (yay!)
• And Become a Fan
• http://racomics.com

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• Who: @aDigitalAngel & fellow nerds at ShinyLines.com

We are LIVE on Ustream . This week we talk content ownership, lots of new releases, plenty of apple news, and then a very special Chinese Conspiracy theory hour

Intro Natali
Intro Ben

Items of Interest

• Ultimate Mashup: Angry Rebels & Imperial Pigs (udg)
  • A long time ago, on an app far, far away… The Imperial Pigs have stolen the Rebellion’s eggs, so the Rebellion struck back by stealing the plans for the Death Pig. Check out bite.ca for more of this great mashup. T shirts are even available.

• Rebecca Black Star Wars Parody (udg)
  • You’ve all seen the train wreck that is Friday. Most have seen the gazillion parodies running rampant. But, no matter how sick you are of it all, you have to watch this one last one. The words have all been changed and it is sheer awesomeness.

• World’s Biggest Pacman Game (udg)
  • Pac-man fan? Meet your new best friends Soap Creative. They’ve created The World’s Biggest Pac-Man game.  When I say World’s biggest- we’re talking it could take YEARS for one person to complete it. You see, it never stops growing. Users can create their own rooms for free and add them to the board.
  • Originally created to showcase the capabilities of Microsoft’s IE 9, you can choose to start in any room you want and hop over to other rooms even if you haven’t completed the room you are in. And the rooms so far range from simple to damnear impossible. Welcome to user-generated content.
  • Tallies are kept on a personal, regional and global level based on pellets and ghosts eaten and rooms cleared.

• For many April 19th marked the release of the much anticipated game, Portal 2, but for those of us who were fans of the canceled Sarah Conner Chronicles series we know it’s also the date that Skynet was brought online, meaning that April 21st will be Judgement Day. (btm)
  • Many gamer forums have already been asking if game developers chose the release date for this reason.
  • If you’re planning a Judgement Day party on Wednesday to celebrate the Skynet destruction of mankind, just remember, “The cake is a lie.”
    • (our local mall has a cell phone store called “Skynet” maybe I should make signs and protest our destruction?) (btm)
  • If you’re listening to the recorded version of this podcast after the 21st, find John Conner, he’s your only hope.

• Time Lapse Milky Way plus more!
  • Gorgeous video of the Milky way and the clouds over a large span of time
  • I’m such a space nut… the music is nice too

• Top 10 Zombie Music Videos
  • Nothing says loving like zombies, guts, blood, and good music
  • Grouper “Alien Observer” (lesbian zombies ‘nuff said), Kanye West “Monster” (hot zombies), Peaches and Iggy Pop “Kick it”, Aesop Rock “Coffee”

Gold Sponsors:

Jeb Apps – Today in Geek History, Today in Movie History

• Want to wow all your friends with off-the-wall Movie Trivia?
• Want to know more about Geek History and share them with your friends?
• Today in Geek History and Today in Movie History are for you
• Both have been out on the Android Marketplace for awhile now
• After a long vetting period, Today in Movie History is now available on ITunes!!!
• (BTM) Happy BIrthday George Takei- I found this out from my newly downloaded Geek History app.
• Go check out both apps, TIGH  and TIMH, now available on both Android and IPhone

Natali’s Etsy!!!

• Need your noms????
• @UberDorkGirlie’s etsy is the way to go
• Whether it’s Woookie Cookies, Bark Maul, or Hothballs, every sweet tooth needs to try them out
• Need a present and don’t want to bake? then Natali’s Etsy store is the way to go

Deals of the Week / New Releases

• How to Get in On Gears of War 3 Beta (udg)
  • Last week the Epic Game’s latest chapter Gears of War saga, Gears of War 3 beta went live. The early access beta started this weekend and will run through April 24 when the full public beta opens and runs to May 15.
  • The web is rampant with official and unofficial ways to get access to the beta. We’re going to give you the real (and safest) way to get in on it. Most people playing the beta right now are players who got their beta codes with their purchase of Bulletstorm: Epic Edition, which will still get you a code if you can find a copy on the shelves.
  • You can also follow developer and Epic Games Design Director Cliff Bleszinski (@therealcliffyb) and Epic Games Vice President and Co-Founder Mark Rein (@MarkRein) on Twitter: they both have been giving out codes to their followers all weekend, and show no signs of stopping. If you don’t get in on the beta before the 24th though, don’t worry: if you pre-order Gears of War 3, you’ll get a beta code that you can redeem on the 25th to join the fun.
  • So far, reviews on the beta has been impressive and it’s being considered a great update to an already well polished and established series.

• Celebrate Earth Day with Geeky Style. Several companies offering Solar Powered backpacks that charge your hand-held devices (btm)
  • 4 Watts of Solar Power from 1 hour in the sun = 3 hours of talk time,
  • 4-5 hours in the sun will fully charge a typical phone
  • Battery that offers up to 19 hours talk time or 48 hours music playback
  • Prices range from mid-$200 to well over $300

• Win a Copy of The Avengers: The Earth’s Mightiest Heroes Vol. 1 & 2 (udg)
  • Our friends over at Big Shiny Robot are giving away The Avengers: The Earth’s Mightiest Heroes Vol 1 & 2 on DVD.  The contest runs through Friday April 29th with winners being announced on Monday, May 2nd.
  • To enter, just shoot them an email over at editor at bigshinyrobot.com. Make sure you put “AVENGERS ASSEMBLE!” in the subject line.
  • Want some extra chances? Head over to their facebook page and invite all of your friends to like ‘em. Or you can ask your followers on twitter to follow us @BigShinyRobot. Just be sure to mention when you  email them that you’ve done it.

• Beastie Boys New Album: Hot Sauce Committee Part 2
  • May 3rd release date, so pumped
  • Digital pre-sales will be delivered the “day-of”

• Read Eisner nominee for Best Humor Publication, Aphrodisiac, for Free (udg)
  • The folks over at AdHouse were super excited to hear Aphrodisiac was nominated for an Eisner. Unfortunately, they are in between printing. They wanted to make sure that all voters had a chance to read it, so they put it online for free!

• New Movie Releases
  • IP MAN 2!!!!! – Watch this back-to-back with Ip Man #awesomekungfu
  • Goemon – Robin Hood with Ninjas and Kung Fu
  • Mortal Kombat BR
  • Captain Planet and the Planeteers (Season 1)
  • Tokyo Gore Police – Yoshihiro Nishimura and “unbridled horror insanity + fetishism” (You can check it out on Netflix streaming now. udg)

• Irredeemable for $0.99 an Issue! (udg)
  • Now through tomorrow night at 11pm E, ComiXology has their critically acclaimed series Irredeemable for just $0.99 an issue.
  • Like to actually hold the paper? Their physical copy of Irredeemable: Vol 1 (issues 1-4) is on sale for $4.
  • Never heard of Irredeemable? It’s by Mark Waid & Peter Krause and basically about a Superman-like hero that spends a lifetime protecting earth. Until the day he snaps, decides humanity needs a good wake-up slap and begins taking out his former teammates who are the biggest.

Movie Minute (new feature)

• We Were All Wrong- New Dark Knight Rises Roles Revealed (udg)
  • We’ve known for a while now that Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Marion Cotilliard were signed on to The Dark Knight Rises. Knowing that, we made our own lil assumptions about who they’d be playing. We figured Marion would be playing Talia al Ghul (daughter of Ra’s al GHul and Bruce Wayne love interest) and JGL would be Alberto Falcone AKA “The Holiday Killer.” Guess what happens when we assume? Yeah, we’re not so cleaver it seems.
  • After MONTHS and months of us assuming away, Warner Bros & Christopher Nolan have officially announced Joseph and Marion have joined that cast. They’ve also told us who they will be playing. Marion will be playing Miranda Tate, “a Wayne Enterprises board member eager to help a still-grieving Bruce Wayne resume his father’s philanthropic endeavors for Gotham” and Joseph Gordon-Levitt will play John Blake, “a Gotham City beat cop assigned to special duty under the command of Commissioner Gordon”.

• Pride, Prejudiced & Zombies Gets a Director (udg)
  • If for some odd reason you haven’t heard of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, it’s a novel set in the same world as the classic Jane Austen novel, but the main characters Ms. Bennet and good ole Mr. Darcy are fighting off a Zombie infestation.
  • And it looks like it may finally be coming to a theater sometime soonish. Seems third time may be a charm, as Craig Gillespie (known for the new Fright Night) has been officially set in stone to direct the film.
  • “We are so excited to have Craig Gillespie on board this film. His sensibility spans from genre bending horror to elegant character driven comedy, which is perfect for this movie.” glows  Alli Shearmur, Lionsgate’s president of production
  • Hopefully he’s still excited after Criag let it slip in an EW interview that the script he’ll be using came from David O. Russell, that guy who just got a ton of acclaim for a little picture called The Fighter.
    • No, we have a really great script that we’re just going to do a polish on and then get going, really…. David Russell wrote the script off the book, and it has such a great mix of humor and horror.
  • It isn’t clear when production will begin on Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, although with a director finally locked in, it seems they are ramping up to start filming soon.
• Full body shot of new Green Lantern CGI costume (btm)
  • This just confirms my fears about the CGI costume.
  • Put on some freaking boots!
    • (does anyone really need to see Ryan Reynolds toes?)
• Game of Thrones renewed already
  • Series adaptation of popular books by George R.R. Martin “A song of Ice and Fire”
  • First episode got strong critical acclaim
  • 4.2 million viewers on a PPV channel is WAAAY Strong
  • Already committed to a second season

Geek Speak

• The End of Content Ownership
  • the cloud is becoming more prominent as of late
  • Netflix, Zune, Amazon, everyone wants to push the “rent” model for content
  • New services, such as 24 symbols, will offer “streaming” books
  • Is the lack of ownership of for monetary outlay alarming or just par for the course?
  • (SM) Zune and Netflix ownership
  • (btm) What do we really “own” any more? A lot of software you buy seems to write their EULAs in a way that says you’re actually leasing the software vice owning it. Even if you buy the disk and have everything local on your machine it’s not really yours.
    • Blizzard recently banned players for cheating in Single Player Campaign mode in StarCraft II and disabled their CD keys.
      • (I’m totally behind banning cheaters online in Battle.net, but what gives you the right to do anything pertaining to what I do offline?)
    • Two years ago Amazon deleted copies of 1984 from Kindles
      • Big Brother much?
      • Kindle TOS says you’re entitled to keep a permanent digital copy of any digital content you purchase (section 3, paragraph 2)
        • (I guess it’s permanent until they change their minds)
    • What happens when you don’t or can’t pay your monthly cloud access fee?
      • Who controls access? Google and most other cloud providers will turn over your information upon receiving a warrant from the government. Don’t fall for the “If you’re not doing anything wrong you don’t have to worry” myth.

Tech, Gaming, and Geek News

• Rep Jesse Jackson Jr Blames iPad for US Job Loses(udg)
  • Illinois Congressman Jessie Jackson Jr went on an insane anti-technology rant on the floor of Congress on Friday. You see, he thinks “technology gadgets like the iPad” are the reason this country is losing jobs.
  • His rant:
    • “A few short weeks ago I came to the House floor after having purchased an iPad and said that I happened to believe, Mr. Speaker, that at some point in time this new device, which is now probably responsible for eliminating thousands of American jobs. Now Borders is closing stores because, why do you need to go to Borders anymore? Why do you need to go to Barnes & Noble? Buy an iPad, download your book, download your newspaper, download your magazine.”
      • Okay. Let’s stop right there for a moment. Dear Jessie- Yes, that iPad can download your books, newspapers, magazines, etc. But, do you REALLY think the $500 iPad is to blame? What about the oh $100 Kindle? Or B&N’s own Nook? Or the publishers that even format for mobile devices?  Just a thought. Let’s hear what else you got, oh wise one…

• “Chicago State University, in my congressional district, in freshman class, they are not being given textbooks any longer. They are all being given iPads as they enter school. President Wayne Watson hopes to have a textbook-less campus in four years, where at this state university they will no longer have textbooks.”
  • Oh Jessie. When is the last time you went to college? If I could carry one device that stored all of my textbooks in it, in a format I could highlight, copy and paste notes out of, etc., yeah, that would be the way I would go.  I’ll spare you the more economically and environmentally sound dance because you’re clearly not in the mindset to even remotely grasp that right now. And you’ll probably just add out of work lumberjacks to your next rant.
    • “Well, what becomes of publishing companies and publishing company jobs?”
      • Umm, Jessie, people still need to write, edit, format and distribute the books.

• • • “And what becomes of bookstores and librarians and all of the jobs associated with paper?”
      • Okay, I’ll give you a 1/2 a point there. I do fear the loss of libraries in this country. But, it’s not the iPad’s fault. The problem does not solely lie on the manufacturers of any of the devices.
    • “Well, in the not too distant future, such jobs simply will not exist. Steve Jobs is doing pretty well. He’s created the iPad. Certainly, it has made life more efficient for Americans, but the iPad is produced in China. It is not produced here in the United States. So, the Chinese get to take advantage of our First Amendment value — that is to provide freedom of speech through the iPad to the American people. But there is no protection for jobs here in America to ensure that the American people are being put to work.”
      • Jinkies. Look Jessie, 10 minutes with me and I’ll break it down to you how the Chinese are going to take over the entire world via the use of technology. But that craziness is too out there for even me.  Before you get your lil knickers in a bunch and decide to have a case of diarrhea of the mouth/constipation of the brain regarding technology and the Chinese, gimme a call. We’re neighbors. I’ll meet you for coffee and give ya a lil education. Don’t worry, I’ll leave my evil MacBook at home. Well, maybe.

• Adobe Relents, Adopts Apple Video Protocol (SM)
  • Remember how adobe moaned about using Apples video standard?
  • Flash currently uses RTSP (a proprietary format for file transmission)
  • Apple uses HTTP live streaming along with H.264 as its video format
  • It was at least submitted to standards body
  • M$ immediately added it to it’s venerable IIS platform so that when requesting video from iPad, they get that format
  • Adobe now has added it to their Flash media server in a “commitment to develop technologies that simplify broadcast workflows to make it simpler to reach a fragmented lineup of devices”.
  • I.E. They’re tired of trying to convince Apple to include Flash on their platform

• Apple suing Samsung for Patent Infringements (btm)
  • Filed suit last Friday
    • (reminds me of the Apple vs. Windows “look and feel” lawsuit WRT Windows 3 and the Macintosh OS.)
  • Claims Samsung’s Galaxy tablet and S phone are too similar to iPad and iPhone
    • “Rather than innovate and develop its own technology and a unique Samsung style for its smartphone products and computer tablets, Samsung chose to copy Apple’s technology, user interface and innovative style in these infringing products.”
  • If this law suit is successful, what does it mean for other smart phone and tablet makers?

• China’s Silent Cyber Takeover (udg)
  • The Chinese have this game galled Go. One of it’s proverbs is “Play on the Point of Symmetry.” Which means, when right and left have the same shape, there’s play in the center. And it looks like that’s a pretty good metaphor for how China and Russia (*cough Red Dawn *cough*) are leveraging US multinational corporations to accomplish strategic goals that are looking like they include covert technology transfer of intellectual property, access to source code for use in malware creation and backdoor access to critical infrastructure.
  • Let’s take a look at Chinese entity Huawei Symantec. Now Huawei has been reportedly blocked by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the US (CFIUS) in its attempt to acquire 3Leaf and AT&T was said to be officially discouraged from purchasing any equipment from them by the National Security Agency. Both of these events are based on security concerns. Huawei successfully formed a joint venture with Symantec in 2007 called Huawei Symantec Technologies Co. Ltd. (HS). Huawei is the majority partner with 51 percent ownership, with the entity being headquartered in Chengdu, China.
  • If you aren’t familiar with Symantec thereby not so sure what Huawei is, they’re the leading provider of network security and storage appliance solutions to enterprise customers worldwide. Yup, worldwide.
  • Add to this a 2008 corporate briefing of theirs that describes the history, capabilities, and business goals of HS, one of which is to ‘build China’s first laboratory of attack and defense for networks and applications.’
  • This equation pretty much means that Symantec, a major US information security company, is ‘assisting’ China’s cyber security research in computer network attack and defense — research that has high potential for abuse by state and non-state actors in China.
  • The plot thickens. In the last few months, HS has formed two new joint ventures with US companies — SYNNEX and Force10 Networks. Why? With SYNNEX, the goal is apparently to ‘distribute Huawei Symantec’s storage and security products to its resellers throughout North America.’
  • For Force10 Networks, Huawei Symantec said the firm ‘is pleased to establish this strategic partnership with Force10 Networks, and expects the relationship to further drive strong results for our existing North American customer base as well as tap into new business opportunities.’
  • The kicker- both SYNNEX and Force10 Networks currently sell to the US government.
  • Force10 Networks’ website says that they sell their products to ‘defense, intelligence and civilian agencies to advance the bandwidth needs and reliability demands of government IT infrastructure while ensuring the economics and performance of mission critical networks.’
  • Since Huawei’s growth strategy includes financial support from Chinese banks that enable it to offer very low cost bids on key contracts, and since many governments (including India and the United States) have legal provisions that require them to go with the lowest bidder, these partnerships provide an apparently winning strategy for SYNNEX and Force10 Networks to secure government sales thanks to Huawei Symantec’s low manufacturing costs – all without HS’s name likely ever having to appear on the contract.
  • So, even though Huawei is publicly blocked by US lawmakers from selling directly to the US government, they have played on the ‘point of symmetry’ and quietly secured access to US Defense Department and intelligence community customers through collaborative partnerships that no one has so far contested. With their boast of a 30% increase in profit over this last year, Huawai’s business has been really good.
  • It’s not just China that seems to be placing itself in an advantageous strategic position.
  • I highly encourage you to check out the link in the shownotes and read more on the Russians, Intel, a laboratory and how they eliminated the need for espionage.

• Armenia makes Chess mandadory in school (SM)
  • Little Tiny Armenia is making themselves into a Chess power house
  • How? They’re requiring the game as part of their school curriculum
  • Theory: “Fosters schoolchildren’s intellectual development and teaches to think flexibly and wisely”
  • Most chess players are treatest like super stars in the country
  • Already a powerhouse: They won gold in 2006 and 2008 in International competition
  • Levon Aronian is currently ranked number 3 in the world in the WCF

• President says White House Tech is “30 Years out of date” (btm)
  • We’ve all seen the super high-tech equipment the President uses in movies and on TV but apparently that’s all TV magic and special effects.
  • “You know the Oval Office always thought I was going to have like real cool phones and stuff,” Obama said last night, “You know, we can’t get our phones to work!  I’m like ‘come on guys, I’m the president of the United States.’  Where’s the fancy buttons and stuff, and the big screen comes up? It doesn’t happen.”
  • “I mean our IT and purchasing is horrible,” he added, “And this is true across the board. This is true at the Pentagon,  it’s true in the agencies, it’s true in the Department of Homeland security.”
  • (No fancy Jack Bauer phones I guess.)

• Match.Com Now to Check Users Against Sex Offender Database (udg)
  • Following a lawsuit filed against them last week, dating giant Match.com has decided that in the next 3 months, they will begin checking users against sex offender databases.
  • The suit was filed by a California woman that states she was attacked by a man she met on the site. According to her, the first date went fine and the man seemed charming. Second date, not so much. She alleges he forced her to have sex with him. The man has been convicted of sexual battery.
  • Mark Webb, the attorney for the woman, identified in the lawsuit only as “Jane Doe” stated that a check like the one Match.com will be implementing could have prevented his client’s attack.
  • Mandy Ginsberg, president of Match.com told The Associated Press in an email that the company had considered such screenings for years, but “their historical unreliability has always led us to conclude against it.”
  • Ginsberg said after talking to providers and advisers the last few days, company officials decided to make a change. He further warned
  • “We want to stress that while these checks may help in certain instances, they remain highly flawed, and it is critical that this effort does not provide a false sense of security to our members,” she said, adding that members should always plan for a first-meeting to be in public and should tell a friend where they’ll be.
  • I applaud Match.com for taking such an effort. In all honesty, I think that the woman’s case would fail to hold up in court. The fact the site chose to make the huge change rather than fight it is to be respected.

• Portal 2 Early Release Program, Genius or Crass? (SM)
  • Anybody remember the Humble Bundle 1 and 2 (pay as much or little)
  • Kickstarter for games: Creavures (game rewards for donating)
  • Pay $40 for an Indy Bundle (13 games), win a possibility to get early release of P2?
  • Buy and it adds to the processing for a faster reboot of GLaDOS, the original evil computer in the old game
  • Whats the point? Is that a worthy goal to spend double for a game that will come out anyways?
  • (btw, the promotion was a failure,

• Samsung developing a 2GHz, Dual Core Smartphone (btm)
  • “This product will have the data processing capabilities of a regular PC”
  • Considering separate sales of the CPU units to other companies (btm.. I’m guessing not Apple).

• Square Credit Card Reader Now Available Via Apple (udg)
  • Jack Dorsey is a busy guy. Not only has the Twitter co-founder returned to Twitter as its CEO, he still remains CEO of Square, his mobile payment company.
  • Square, in simplest terms, allows anyone with an Android or iPhone to process credit card transactions. No fees, no monthly contracts. Square keeps it simple with a 2.75% charge per transaction. It works through a free downloadable app and a small device, shaped like- you guessed it a square, that plugs into a smartphone’s audio jack and reads the credit cards. To put their fee in perspective, Paypal charges 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction up to $3,000 in month and then goes down from there.
  • As you can imagine, VeriFone, a company that offers businesses traditional credit card terminals, was none too thrilled with this. It accused Square of offering a free credit card reader that could easily be used by hackers to steal credit card info. Square responded by pointing out that the vulnerability was no different than someone simply writing down your credit card information on a piece of paper. Yet, even with that bit of bad press courtesy of VeriFone, Dorsey’s company got a huge boost recently thanks to a new partnership with Apple.
  • Apple is now offering Square’s credit card reader through its online and brick-and-mortar stores. Customers will pay $9.95 for the credit card reader which includes $10 of Square credit. While the credit card reader is available for free through Square’s website, the immediate availability of it through Apple retail stores and the notable placement of the reader on Apple’s online store is sure to spur adoption. Apple’s endorsement of Square also minimizes the security concerns VeriFone attempted to raise last month in its attempt to derail adoption of the service since it greatly threatens VeriFone’s current business model.
  • I can wait. So, I went to the site and ordered mine for free. And, it did require giving them quite a bit of hefty personal information to obtain. I’ve got the app downloaded and ready to go. The site said 2-5 weeks so as soon as I get it, I’ll make sure to review it.

• Next Mars Rover to use Rocket Crane to land (btm)
  • Mars Rover “Curiosity” lands via being lowered from flying platform
  • Set to launch late this year for arrival on Mars in August 2012
  • Equiped with laser for examining rock samples found on Mars.
  • (btm…once it lands it looks like it has a lot of interesting new tools, but getting it to land scares the crap out of me. There are so many possible points of failure that it seems to me that NASA has forgotten the KISS principle, Keep It Simple Stupid)

Intarweb Goldmine

• Man Bursts Into Flames at Porn Store (udg)
  • For seven years, Roger Huang, a pastor who runs a rescue mission in San Francisco’s Tenderloin district, has been trying to shut down the sex shops there. This week he may have seen a sign that his efforts are working
  • On Wednesday, a man burst into flames while inside one of those porn shops, police said.
  • Could this bizarre incident be attributed to a higher power?
  • “I believe so. I definitely believe so,” Huang told AOL News, adding that he hopes the unidentified man is recovering from the burns.
  • The police aren’t ruling anything out.
  • “We don’t know what caused it,” Lt. Troy Dangerfield of the San Francisco Police Department told AOL News. “It’s still under investigation.”
  • Witnesses reportedly saw the burning man running out of the Golden Gate Adult Superstore in the city’s South of Market neighborhood at about 6:20 p.m. Wednesday. The man ran past stunned onlookers and collapsed at the corner of Mission and Sixth streets, police said. A private ambulance crew happened  be driving by and extinguished the flames.
  • The man, whose name has not been released, was taken to the burn center at St. Francis Memorial Hospital, where he is being treated for first-, second- and third-degree burns that reportedly cover 90 percent of his body.
  • According to KTVU, an employee said the man had been watching a film in the back of the store when he suddenly ran out screaming and on fire.
  • San Francisco Fire Department spokeswoman Mindy  Talmadge said a fire investigator is still looking into the case. Oddly, she said authorities have found “no damage to the inside of the building at all.”

• Social Security website releases new series of ‘spacey’ PSA messages (btm)
  • Series stars Patty Duke and George Takei
  • Intended to raise awareness and help aging Boomers feel more at ease when using socialsecurity.gov to file for claims & benefits
    • (I love that the website actually says, “These Social Security public service announcements (PSAs) are pre-recorded video messages that can be viewed online” sometimes it’s easy to forget that not everyone is as tech savvy as we are.) (btm)

• Not the Brightest Car Thief (SM)
  • Guy comes in for a free gas voucher from the police
  • Presents his paperwork for the car
  • Police run it and find out the car is stolen
  • This isn’t the only one, criminals are constantly nabbed for winning sweepstakes

• The National Institute of Standards and Technology needs your help (btm)
  • In its 110 years, NIST has made many innovations in the way we measure things, from basic quantities like the volt and nanometer to specialized questions like the purity of sugar.
  • Website shows images of many devices in their care
  • Many look almost SteamPunk in nature
  • For many, their original uses have been lost to the ages. Do you know what they were? (btm… my favorite is “wooden box with multiple terminals and dials”

• Put Your Hands in the Air and Back Away From the Potatoes (udg)
  • In Jacksonville, Fla., don’t try breaking into someone’s home with potatoes on the stove.
  • Eighty-one-year-old Bobby Smith said his caretaker came out of his home and informed him an intruder had broken into the home.
  • Smith said he entered his home and found a man with a gun in one hand and items he intended to steal in the other. The intruder than shoved Smith to the ground and took his wallet.
  • Not a good idea. Smith then got up and hit the man on the head with frying pan full of potatoes, The (Jacksonville) Florida Times-Union reported.
  • “I grabbed the frying pan and hit him upside the head,” the feisty octogenarian said. “I knocked his teeth out … and he went to the floor.” Then, for a bit of emphasis, “There was a pitchfork about 6 feet away … [and] I stuck him.”
  • Get down with your bad self Bobby Smith. And don’t ever, ever try to steal that man’s taters.

• YouTube Copyright School (btm)
  • Provides “Happy Tree Friends” video to educate users on copyright rules
  • Copyright violators required to watch video much like the old driving school videos for traffic violators.
  • Hopes that requiring copyright violators to watch video will help them to understand what they did was wrong and prevent future violations.

• Dammit! Swearing found to help increase pain tolerance (btm)
  • Keele University study shows swearing can produce painkilling effect
  • Volunteers placed hands in bucket of ice water while swearing repeatedly
  • Repeated the test but this time used non-swearing phrase to repeat
  • Volunteers were able to keep hands in ice water longer when swearing.
  • Study found that volunteers who normally didn’t swear were four times as likely to feel painkilling effect.
  • May be a reason why swearing developed and continues to today.

Extra Links

• Lucas’ New Sandcrawler Office (udg)
• Droid X WoW

How To Reach Us on the IntarWebs

• On Twitter: Steven is @DarthMolen, Ben is @realityamuck , Natali is @UberDorkGirlie
• email us: darthmolen@thepowergeeks.com and uberdorkgirlie@thepowergeeks.com (yay!)
• And Become a Fan
• http://racomics.com

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Intro Natali
Intro Matt Kramer

Items of Interest

• If you have an item that is epicly awesome that should be featured in this section, contact the show at darthmolen@thepowergeeks.com and we’ll see about getting it on the air
• April Fool’s Day Items From Across The IntarWebs (udg)
  • April Fool’s Day is a favorite day for many. For me it marks the day I actually found out I was prego with lilest and yes the ex thought it was a prank. I pretty much completely missed it this year and if you did too, here are a couple of great things the IntarWebs had to offer this year.
  • ThinkGeek was at it again this year with Playmobil Apple Store Playset, Angry Birds Pork Rinds and Minecraft USB Desktop Nether Portal.

• • • Google always shows up to the April Fools Party and this year included Google China claiming to have invented teleportation and Gmail unveiling Gmail Motion- where you can email using body gestures. That one may be kind of fun. >;-) And Chromercise- an exercise regimen for your hands and fingers you know so they can keep up with Google’s “Lightening Fast” browser.
    • YouTube showcased the top viral pictures of 1911
    • World of Warcraft showed up too- Blizzard has announced the advent of a Dungeon Helper, affectionately called “Crabby,” who will give you tips when you’re stuck and encouragement no matter what.

• • • Toshiba announced the Toshiba Spectacle, the world’s first and only 3D monocle. “Ready to take movies and games to the next level? Imagine being right in the middle of an action movie scene, or right on the basketball court during the playoffs! With the Spectacle, you’ll experience one-eyed 3D so real, you’d think you were using both eyes!”

• Jar Jar Gets a woopin’ (yeah, it’s fake) The awesome folks at Improv Everywhere staged a very real looking video where Jar Jar gets his ass wooped on a subway. People cheered all over for that one.

• Thundercats HO!
  • Saw the new trailer and its an interesting blend of old and new…
  • (who you callin’ a ho? -udg)

• First 14 minutes of “Game of Thrones”

• Stephen Colbert & the Roots covering Rebecca Black’s “Friday”.(MK)

Gold Sponsors:

Natali’s Etsy!!!

• Need your noms????
• @UberDorkGirlie’s etsy is the way to go
• Whether it’s Woookie Cookies, Bark Maul, or Hothballs, every sweet tooth needs to try them out
• Need a present and don’t want to bake? then Natali’s Etsy store is the way to go

Deals of the Week / New Release

• Acoustic North Concert Live on UStream
  • Includes Marian Call and other Alaskan musicians
  • Friday, April 8, 2011
  • Sign up on Facebook for a reminder

• Blu-Ray / Movie New Releases
  • Tron Legacy / Tron Classic / Tron 3D / 3D + BR + Classic + Digital
  • Little Fockers
  • Fiddler on the Roof (BR)
  • A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) BR – Huge tear jerker
  • Kung Fu Panda (BR/DVD)
  • Favorite Peter Pan (BR – 2003) (Jeremy Sumpter, Jason Isaacs, Olivia Williams)

Movie Minute (new feature)

• New Superman Movie Updates- WTF?!? (udg)
  • So, we covered the confirmed casting of Amy Adams as Lois Lane for the new Superman movie last week. Well, there seems to have been some more activity this week. Howard Stern, you know the “King of All Media” has said that Lex Luthor and Miss Teschmacher will have roles in the movie.
  • And it seems the pretty much unknown Adam Harris is confirmed as having auditioned several times for the part of Lex Luthor and will be reading again with Lindsay Lohan. Wait? What the ??
  • Yup, frakkin Lindsay Lohan has been rumored to be reading for a role, quite possibly that of Miss Teschmacher. Course that means she’s gotta stay out of jail long enough to show up to the start of shooting in Vancouver in August.
  • Despite all of this, everything should still be considered a rumor until the story comes from Warner Bros themselves. There’s a chance that Luthor may still not appear in the film, and if he does, he may not be the main villain. Stay tuned. And yeah start praying this doesn’t turn into a total trainwreck.

• The Hobbit Casting – http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0903624/
• Wonder Woman Live Action Shots

Geek Speak

Hacker vs. Cracker-

• • Modern day Hackers have managed to rack up a rep for piracy, sabotage and leaking sensitive secrets, but an authoritative Vatican publication appears to rehabilitate them and traces parallels between hacker philosophy and the teachings of Christianity.
  • The surprisingly charitable view of hackers was expressed by the Jesuit priest Father Antonio Spadaro in an article for the fortnightly magazine Civilta Cattolica, the text of which is gets a once over from the Vatican Secretariat of State prior to publication.
  • “Hackers should not be confused with crackers”, Spadaro wrote, citing a definition penned by tech writer Eric S. Raymond: “Hackers build things, crackers break them.”
  • Hacker philosophy is playful but committed, encourages creativity and sharing, and opposes models of control, competition and private property, Spadaro observed approvingly.
  • The Jesuit priest, a literary critic and technology expert, also cited Tom Pittman, a member of California’s Homebrew Computer Club, as an example of someone seeking a creative fusion of Christianity and technology.
  • “I as a Christian thought I could feel something of the satisfaction that God must have felt when He created the world,” Pittman wrote of his work. Christian hackers, Spadaro said, viewed their work as “a form of participation in the ‘work’ of God in creation.”
  • Hacker mentality implies a joyful application of intelligence to problem solving, rejecting the concept of work as repetitive, burdensome and stupid, Spadaro wrote. Hacker ethics rejected a capitalistic, profit-oriented approach to work, eschewing idleness but favoring a flexible, creative approach that was respectful of the human dimension and natural rhythms, he said.
  • “Under fire are control, competition, property. It’s a vision that is … of a clear theological origin,” Spadaro observed.
  • He went on to emphasize hackers’ ingrained distrust of authority and praise the collaborative knowledge-sharing model of Wikipedia.
  • The debate reflects a growing attention within the Catholic Church to the evolution of modern communications technologies, which Pope Benedict XVI has encouraged his followers to harness for the dissemination of the Catholic faith
  • It’s a really interesting article that I highly encourage you to read through.

Digital eBooks vs. Real Books

• Michael Stackpole’s X-Wing Series out of Print
  • Surprising reveal that a good chunk of change comesfrom his digital novels (In Hero Years… I’m Dead)
  • Considers the electronic vs. Paper war already over with and done
• When is the time that the scales will tip? (nook, kindle, sony ereader, ipad,etc,etc)
• Nook Color eBook reader the most sold tablet
• California Library doing away with books

Tech, Gaming, and Geek New

• Set Phasers to Stun!!! For Realz! (SM)
  • Researchers have now come up with a system that stuns by using only light
  • The device is a 75 watt lamp focused and sent at a certain frequency into the retina
  • Researchers claim that the stun can last seconds or even minutes
  • Tasers work at 12-15 feet, this can work up to 150 ft away
  • (guess they never heard of sunglasses or turning away)
  • One step closer to Star Trek…

• Epsilon Hacked- Yup, It Probably Affects You (udg)
  • Hackers struck gold late last week when they tapped into the customer database for marketing services giant Epsilon.  Why should you care? Well odds are it affects you.
  • So- who is Epsilon? In short, they are the peeps that send out more than 40 billion emails annually for their clients. Clients like Target, Capitol One, Kroger’s, JP Morgan Chase, Best Buy, TiVo, an array of major hotel reward programs, Walgreen’s and MANY more. They are, in fact, the world’s largest “Permissions-Based” email marketing company. And now millions of email addresses and names have been stolen from their company’s 2500 client customer data base.
  • How do you know if you’ve been affected? Well laws like the California Database Breach Act require that customers have to be informed if their data is compromised. I’ve already received word from Best Buy’s Rewards Program and Target. Chances are you’ve already received one of your own from one of the clients. If not, it may still be coming.  Epsilon also won’t reveal how many of its customers were affected; only that it is 2 percent of its clients.
  • What does this all mean? The Hacker(s) have names, e-mail addresses, points balances in certain cases and now knows who all of Epsilon’s clients are. You may be thinking “eh it’s just my email address, so what?”  Well, it’s kind of a big deal. Give me 10 minutes and I can snag the official logos of every major company they serve. I can set up a anonymous gmail account to sign up for all the company’s programs and receive official emails from them. Then, go into photoshop or hell even Word and construct an email that looks exactly like the official email and before you know it, people are clicking on them thinking they are from the legitimate source and I’m snagging passwords, addresses, maybe even bank account information. This is the start of a potentially huge phishing operation. ESPECIALLY when banks and credit cards are involved.
  • I encourage everyone to pay VERY close attention to the emails they receive over the next year from anyone associated with Epsilon. MAKE SURE  THEY ARE LEGIT OR DON’T CLICK.

• IPod Production Troubled Halt Over Earthquake Interruptions (SM)
  • We’re all device jun
  • Lithium Ion batteries use a  key ingredient, Polymer (PVDF), to bind the different elements together
  • Used to bind the different elements together. It’s a small percentage but vital
  • Kureha Corp., based near the epicenter in Japan, owns 70% of the market
  • Its not as easy as changing manufacturers either or a different polymer, chemistry is weird that way
  • The WSJ is claiming only IPod manufacturing is affected… but a lot more stuff than that is Li-Ion.
  • Yet another way the earthquake has affected our lives
  • (It also has led to production disruptions for the PSP2- udg)

• What’s Up With Sony? (MK)
  • Sony Closing 3 Game Studios & Cutting 205 Jobs
    • Earlier rumor that Sony Online Entertainment was about to make some big cuts has turned out to be true. 205 jobs total will be lost and the Denver, Seattle and Tuscon studios all closed down. Sony has also decided to cancel the online game The Agency that has been in development for several years now.
    • All existing titles will remain live so you may continue to play them as normal. As for future game development, two MMOs will now be the focus. The first is based on the PlanetSide IP, and the second on the always-popular Everquest IP.
    • Fewer projects mean less people required and ultimately fewer studios have work, hence the closures. As far as an impact on gamers is concerned, the only noticeable difference is that The Agency will no longer be appearing on store shelves.
  • Meanwhile they manage to piss off Anonymous
    • If you’ve been following the saga between Sony and George “GeoHot” Hotz, you know that Sony is kinda ticked with him for cracking the long uncracked PS2 and has been publicly targeting him with legal action. Then they turned around and offered a job to another prominent hacker who turned them down based on their treatment of Hotz.
    • Well, all of this has now gotten the attention of the infamous hacker group Anonymous and not in a good way. They’ve now officially declared war on Sony:
      • “Congratulations, Sony. You now have now received the undivided attention of Anonymous. Your recent legal action against our follow hackers, Geohot and Graf_Chokolo, has not only alarmed us, it has been deemed wholly unforgivable. You have now abused the judicial system in an attempt to censor information on how your products work. You have victimised your own customers merely for possessing and sharing information, and continue to target every person who seeks this information. In doing so you have violated the privacy of thousands. This is the information they were willing to teach the world for free. The very same information you wish to suppress for sake of corporate greed and complete control of the users. Now you will experience the wrath of Anonymous. You saw a hornets nest, and stuck your penises in it. You must face the consequences of your actions, Anonymous style. Knowledge is Free. We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not Forgive. We do not forget. Expect us.”
  • Playstation Relief Efforts Raise 1.3M for Japan
    • Sony has announced that donation efforts for the Japan tsunami and earthquake from PlayStation Network have raised over $1 million.
    • Over ¥109.6 million (approximately $1.3 million) has been raised from the effort, which has allowed PlayStation Network users to donate through the PlayStation Store.
    • All of the money raised from the drive, which has been in effect in over 40 countries, will go to the American Red Cross’s Japanese relief fund, the British Red Cross in Europe, and the Central Community Chest of Japan.

• Algebra II Closer to Being Mandatory (SM)
  • Studies are showing that out of all the classes in High School, Algebra II is the leading indicator on success later in a career
  • Indicators: 84% of ppl in top-tier jobs took Algebra II, 50% in bottom tier took it
  • Whether this is just purely “more education” or actual math skills that translate, ppl are still debating
  • (SM) My thoughts: Math stimulates thinking, your mind grows as you do it, only good things can come from exercising your brain
  • Thoughts?

• Woah! Adobe Demos PhotoShop for iPad (udg)
  • Just when I thought I couldn’t possibly want the iPad 2 any more than I already do…
  • Adobe and Apple may have had issues in the past over Apple refusing to allow the iPad to run Flash, but that hasn’t halted their relationship. In fact Adobe has been hard at work developing a pretty kick ass version of Photoshop for the iPad. They currently offer an app for iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad called Photoshop Express. But, this new app is so much more.
  • Check out the video taken at Photoshop World 2011 and you’ll see Adobe didn’t just try to port over the features of the desktop version, but that it knows and behaves like it’s a touchscreen app. And it’s not some dinky toy either. No word on when this will be released or what they are planning on calling it. And I’m sure that there are hardcore graphic designers that will scoff at it. But, it will definitely make it hard for the naysayers to continue to state that the iPad is devise for consumption, not creation.

• Gamestop buys Impulse (SM)
  • Impulse was owned by Stardock and is a little brother to Steam
  • Originally created to distribute their games but was opened to other 3 years ago
  • Why is this important? Gamestop has already said their future hinges on digital distribution
  • last month, Digital downloads accounted for 40% of the revenue in the gaming industry
  • Gamestop did 300 million last year alone, 1.5 billion 4 years from now is estimate
  • Impulse gives them ready-made technology to effec that plan and challenge Valve in that arena
  • Gamestop also aquired Spawn Labs, a peer-to-peer gaming service

• GM Cows produce Human-like milk (SM)
  • The chinese have created genetically modified cows that produce “human-like” milk
  • Human milk has a nutrient and protein mix that is very unique for infant consumption
  • These cows, are created through cloning processes where human genes are injected into the embryo before being re-planted into the mothers
  • The Chinese have made 300 of these bovine and are physically identical to regular cattle
  • Scientists insist that genetically modified food poses no threats but there are tons of debates on the matter
  • Bladerunner anyone???
  • (Seriously freakin’ creepy & I have a tiny rant. I’ll keep it relatively bleep free for ya though – udg) (and its by the chinese )

• PopCap Launches 4th & Base (udg)
  • If you’ve ever played Bejeweled or Plans vs Zombies, than you get why PopCap has a reputation for releasing polished games.  The formulas behinds these games may seem simple, but the development cycle is incredibly time consuming. Which is why we haven’t seen Plants vs Zombies 2 yet.
  • Guess what though- PopCap has announced an initiative to get us games quicker- welcome 4th and Battery, a self-proclaimed indie label within the company dedicated to rapidly prototyping and releasing smaller, less full-featured games.
  • “4th & Battery is a pressure valve intended to keep our heads from exploding,” explained Ed Allard, executive vice president of studios at PopCap.  4th & Battery gives us a way to quickly try really strange or marginal ideas, and to give our designers a safe area to hone their chops.”
  • PopCap’s describing these games as being like short films, or B-sides, and they are launching with a game called Unpleasant Horse, in which players become a horse with wings that, as you probably guessed, kills birds. Maybe not full-game material, but it should be available free of charge on the iOS App Store later this month.

• Playstation Tablet in the Works (Matt, you can have this one)

What major electronics company doesn’t have a tablet?  You guessed it, Sony!  There have been rumors of one since 2010 when Apple announced the iPad, but there was nothing confirmed until mid-February.

While skeptical over their software capabilites, Engadget been assured that Sony’s work is cutting edge stuff created by a talented engineering team spanning Sony’s VAIO, Reader, PlayStation, and Sony Ericsson product groups.

The team is lead by the VAIO organization but will probably launch as a Sony product without VAIO branding, according to one source. The tablet itself, we’re told, is 100 percent focused on Qriocity, Sony’s music, games, ebooks, and videos on demand service that’s just been launched in Europe. It comes preloaded with Sony PS One games, a Bravia Media Remote, and yes, PlayStation integration

The tablet’s “wrap” design is meant to remind the owner of something personal in the way that it mimics an open paperback stuffed into the back pocket, or a magazine folded backward upon itself such that only a single page is visible to read. Even though the S1 is about the same size and weight as Apple’s iPad, we’re told that it feels lighter since most of the weight is shifted directly into the user’s hand and over the wrist.

It features a 1,280 x 800 pixel resolution.  It also features both front- and rear-facing cameras as well as a USB-A port that plays host to USB thumb drives or media devices. The only physical buttons — volume and on / off — are located on the edge of each indented side.  There’s an IR port built-in allowing you to control devices other than your Bravia TV.

Price and ship date?  The target for the WiFi-only version was meant to match the iPad, but the price has been bumped to $599 with a September ship date.

• Bike to the Future (udg)
  • If you’re listening to this, odds are when you go to buy a new gadget- it’s gotta be the best, most advanced one out there. You know- fastest PC, skinniest highest res TV, deadliest robot butler (you know they bring you your slippers AND the heads of your enemies!)
  • Well, I’ve got the next bike for you. We’re talking hybrid electric from M55. Their first mechanized monster is so badass, it’s named The Beast AND it lives up to it. Exercise isn’t your thing? Not a problem- The Beast takes the “work” out of working out. Its motor doesn’t throttle on like a motorcross dirt bike. It churns into action as soon as you start pedaling, giving your feeble legs a bionic  boost.
  • The motor on this badboy is so bad, you can tear up hills without having to stand while pedaling. In fact, the drive system is powerful enough that if you’re really jamming on a straight-away, you can travel at almost 50 mph. Yeah, I said it: 50 mph. On a bicycle!
  • If you decide to grab an M55, do us all a favor and remember that sometimes life sucks and so do uneven paved surfaces. Wear a helmet. If  my calculations are correct, when these babies hit 50 miles per hour, you’re gonna see some serious shit.

Intarweb Goldmine

• Man Takes Down Armed Robber With Fake Leg (udg)
  • A Massachusetts man who used his prosthetic leg to take down a robber says he didn’t have time to think, he just reacted.
  • Stephen Cornell peered through the window of his neighborhood convenience store in Middleton on Wednesday and saw a man pointing a gun at the owner.
  • He tells The Salem News he intended to tackle the thief when he left JC Grill & Pizza, but instead stuck out his artificial leg and tripped him.
  • Only thing that would have made this more awesome is if he would have actually beat him with the leg.

• Lucky Mother Trucker
  • Trucker eating an apple on buy Penn. freeway
  • Everything’s calm, he starts to choke
  • Passes out and crashes through center divider
  • When woken up, found that apple had been dislodged by steering wheel
  • Guy used up all his 9 lives

• 75 Year Old Lady Cuts Entire Country Off From the IntarWebs (udg)
  • Elderly people and the Internet are the root of many jokes and headaches. A 75-year-old lady from the Republic of Georgia scored a point for the geriatrics when she cut off the entire country of Armenia from the net last month.
  • According to the AFP, the woman was scavenging for scrap metal around the village of Ksanai on March 28. She came across a fiber-optic cable linking Armenia to Georgia and she cut it up to sell the copper. Unfortunately, that cable provided the majority of Armenia’s internet service, and the poor Armenians were cut off from the Internet for “hours” that evening. Now she faces up to three years in prison.
  • Hey, Armenia, maybe you shouldn’t rely on a single, fragile cable to connect your entire country to the Internet? Just a thought

Extra Links

• Google Product Boss Leaves, Co-Founder Returns
• TI to buy National Semi-Conductor
• the new Commodore 64 >> Pics
• Curing Hair Loss by Accident
• Gamestop sees digitial game sales exploding
• Water-Cooled, Wall-Mounted Wii Mod (udg)
  • I don’t care who you are, even if you hate Wii, this is sexxeh.

• On Twitter: Steven is @DarthMolen, Jeremy is @jpuent, Natali is @UberDorkGirlie
• email us: darthmolen@thepowergeeks.com and jpuent@thepowergeeks.com and uberdorkgirlie@thepowergeeks.com (yay!)
• And Become a Fan

Sponsors

Shiny Lines

• What: Shiny Geek Jewelry, clothing and other bits & bytes, made by Geeks for Geeks.
• Why: Geeks, Nerds & Gamers alike deserve to shine at their very best, on and offline.
• 10% off power rings
• Who: @aDigitalAngel & fellow nerds at ShinyLines.com

Get Shinylines in Gold Sponsors

• ShinyLines Power Geek Rings!!!
  • I’m almost giggly with anticipation!!
  • Check out shop.shinylines.com for more product -OR-
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Intro Natali
Intro Kristin

Items of Interest

• If you have an item that is epicly awesome that should be featured in this section, contact the show at darthmolen@thepowergeeks.com and we’ll see about getting it on the air

• Welcome to Wookiee Week!!!

• Meet Pica Pic: One of the Coolest Sites Ever (udg)
  • Remember when every game had a handheld version too? They may be long gone but Pica Pic is bringing them back on your computer screen.
  • The folks at Hipopotam have recreated the look of the devices and emulate the games for you to play.
  • Each game maps the controls on the device to your keyboard and gives clear key mapping hints. Then you play the game as normal and have your highscore logged.
  • At the moment there are 17 playable games (some you’ve heard of, some you haven’t) but it looks like the site is set to expand with 3 other titles, including Zelda, listed as coming soon.
• GranataPet Billboard (udg)
  • Why on earth would a billboard for a German dog food company be an item of the week? Well, because it’s brilliant.
  • The best way to get people, or in this case our lil canine buddies, to buy a product is to give them a lil taste for free. GranataPet, whose foods are made around the use of pomegranates, are no strangers to thinking outside the box.
  • Their  newest campaign is a billboard that, when you check into it on Foursquare, shoots out a free sample of dog food into a bowl for your best friend to try. There’s a little black box that controls the food dispenser. It checks with the server once roughly every second to see if someone has checked in. When it the server returns a “yes” then the dispenser is triggered to release the sample. The technology is simple, the cost is minimal, the concept is genius.

• Happy 80th B-Day Leonard Nimoy!!!
  • Leonard Nimoy, the man who played Spock the space elf, turned 80 this week. 80!!!!
  • (SM)Despite being an avid Star Wars lover, ST and TNG were near to my heart
  • and also happy almost birthday to KatieDoyle!! (kdr)

• Can I talk Spiderman Turn off the WTF (musical) (kdr)
  • Most of us have seen Spiderman the movie, some have read the comics, and an unfortunate few have had to bear witness to the musical abomination that is Turn off the Dark.
  • Before I explain what this show is about, I thought long and hard about how this script must have been developed. And I can only imagine that a few writers and whatnots got together drank and smoked, watched bits and pieces of the movies, took a nap, drank some more and then wrote out a script on some bar napkins.
  • Okay here’s the breakdown…and i am so not making ANY of this up:
    • Peter Parker is a nerd and gets beat up in school, hearts mary jane, gets bit by a spider…blah blah blah
    • and while all this is going on…Arachne, the great mortal weaver from Greek mythology learns about Peter Parker and decides to become his guardian, and also want to jump his bones…and this is made REALLY REALLY apparent
    • then Peter decides he doesnt want to Spiderman anymore and Arachne is furious and plans to get him back into the red and blue by calling all her spider minors to create a city wide black out so they could steal all the shoes.
    • not.even.kidding.
    • then Arachne makes it to earth and delivers the most unforgettable line ever “I have descended from the astral planes with the help of humans shoes” I cant even facepalm hard enough
    • it gets kinda like someone put something in my drink after this scene, some fights, puppets and flying over the crowds, and then i guess everyone made it out okay. honestly, my head was so spinning from the redonkulous storyline, boring and drawn out dialogues and forgettable songs that i may have just blocked most of it out.

Gold Sponsors:

Natali’s Etsy!!!

• Need your noms????
• @UberDorkGirlie’s etsy is the way to go
• Whether it’s Woookie Cookies, Bark Maul, or Hothballs, every sweet tooth needs to try them out
• Need a present and don’t want to bake? then Natali’s Etsy store is the way to go

Deals of the Week / New Release

• Amazon Cloud Drive
  • 5GB Free / Up to a 1000 GB paid
  • Allows you to stream music to any PC or android device from the files you store on their server
  • Good news? If you buy from Amazon, it doesn’t count against your quota

• Kindle subscription to the New York Times will net you free web access as well (kdr)
  • a subscription to the NYT will also grant users access to the paywall-protected NYTimes.com online portal. No complex rules or conditions, you’ll just be one of the insiders who get unfettered access to all the fine old school journalism practiced at Times towers.

• Dont Blink Tee (kdr) for fans of the doctor and one of the most memorable episodes, this tee is ready to be can has for only $25

• DVD Releases
  • SECRET OF NIMH!!! B/R
  • Sherlock Holmes: Complete Blu-Ray Collection – Old b/w, Basil Rathbone, Nigel Bruce
  • Black Swan – Natali Portman, Dancing, ‘nuff Said
  • Tangled Blu-Ray (3/d,DVD,Digital D/L)
  • Soylent Green (charleston Heston at his finest)
  • Imax: Hubble
  • Scream 1,2,3 on Blu-Ray
  • Teen Wolf Blu-Ray!

Geek Speak

• All your remakes are belong to Hollywood
  • Tired of Hollywood’s moral bankruptcy and them stealing your childhood? So are we
  • (Talk Point) Name 1 already done remake that has and has not worked
    • karate kid – i didnt even see it, thats how bad it was (kdr)
  • (Talk Point) Name the remakes that you’ve heard are coming:
    • (SM) Heman, The Never Ending Story, Mortal Kombat, The Last Starfighter
    • (UDG) – Smurfs coming this summer, was scared but NPH is in it and yeah, I <3 NPH, WOLVERINES!! Red Dawn- My one complaint- FU for swapping the Chinese out for North Koreans cuz China pitched a fit. But after meeting Chris Hemsworth I’m less worried cuz I’d watch him in anything it also stars the new “wonder woman” hmm….. , Child’s Play- nope not a 4th movie, it’s a remake of original, Adventures in Babysitting and Jonah Hill is now playing Shue’s part WTF!?!?, Teen Wolf- now a shitacular MTV series, Fright Night starring Colin Farrell,Total Recall starring, yup, Colin Farrell. One I am excited about- A NEW Muppets movie done by Jason Segal slated to hit theaters Nov 23, 2011.
    • (KDR)Here’s the maddening list of remakes actually in the works:

• • • • • ARTHUR – now starring Russell Brand. fucking russell brand. i hate that guy
        • DROP DEAD FRED – my favorite movie of all time, starring russell fucking brand
        • PLAN 9 FROM OUTERSPACE – one of the best/worst scifi movies is being “re-imagined” and going straight to DVD
        • Live action AKIRA – The Hughes Brothers are negotiating with WB…somebody stop them  (Testuo is now Travis- WTF? Shooting is scheduled to start in August. Actors sent scripts for Tetsuo- Andrew Garfield, James McAvoy, and Robert Pattinson. Those sent scripts for Kaneda are Michael Fassbender, Garrett Hedlund, Joaquin Phoenix, Chris Pine, and Justin Timberlake.- udg)

• • • • • SHORT CIRCUIT – rumor: Dimension Films has signed Steve Carr to direct “Short Circuit,” the remake. Carr is coming off the Kevin James hit “Paul Blart: Mall Cop.” (LEAVE MY NUMBER JOHNNY FIVE ALONE!!!! UDG)
        • I’d like to take this moment to quote Patton Oswald in saying “Leave the stuff i love alone!“

Tech, Gaming, and Geek News

• Ubisoft Looking to Hire a Fan to Help Write Assassin’s Creed Encyclopedia (udg)
  • Everyone’s second favorite Ubisoft franchise, Assasin’s creed is going to get an official encyclopedia. Yup, not a wiki, but an actual encyclopedia.
  • A posting on UbiWorkshop states that they are making an official job offer and “not some petty human crowdsourcing trick.” Beginner’s need not fear and can apply to the job as well, as Ubisoft says they “wouldn’t want to miss out on someone passionate and talented just because he or she doesn’t have a five-year experience,” further endearing them to fans across the world.
  • To apply, head on over to the UbiWorkshop posting, check out the job recommendations and duties, take the writing test they provide, and send your information to the email provided in the post. You probably shouldn’t mention if you have real-world assassination experience.

• It’s a video card throwdown, Put or Shut Up! (SM)
  • (I personally prefer Nut up or shut up! Zombieland FTW~ udg)
  • (Yeah yeah, you would know all about that )
  • For years, we have heard from AMD and NVidia that they each are the best and fastest
  • Usually, the impartial review sites actually have to do the competition
  • Now AMD is challenging NVidia directly, through a blog post no less by senior public relations manager Dave Erskine
  • He wants to pit the HD 6990 against the GTX 590 from NVidia
  • Both are lightning fast and can magically appear in my computer anytime…

• • • • iPhone 5 Delay Rumors: Will Apple Hold Out Until After WWDC? (kdr)
        • WWDC 2011 conference in June will be all about the future of iOS and Mac, and with the rumor mill in full swing, speculation suggests that the iPhone 5 is more likely to arrive some time this fall, or even in 2012 ??
        • Apple said the focus will be on software at WWDC, including the iOS5
        • But if Apple does not release or announce a new iPhone at WWDC (or shortly after), does that mean the iPhone 5 is delayed until fall, to arrive with iOS 5 preinstalled?
        • Somebody get me some answers!!!

• Amy Adams to play Lois Lane in New Superman (udg)
  • Well, the Daily Planet now has its ace reporter and Clark Kent his love interest. Zack Snyder has official cast Amy Adams as Lois Lane in his upcoming Superman reboot.
  • While he wouldn’t comment on the plot over the weekend, Snyder did imply that Lane would be important in the story:
  • “What’s important to us is making [Superman] relevant and real and making him empathetic to today’s audience so that we understand the decisions he makes. That applies to Lois as well. She has to be in the same universe as him [in tone and substance],” Snyder said.
  • Adams joins a cast that includes Henry Cavill as Clark Kent/Superman, Diane Lane as Martha Kent and Kevin Costner as Pa Kent.  The Superman reboot will be produced by “Inception” and “Dark Knight” mastermind Christopher Nolan
  • Due out December of 2012 (you now if the world doesn’t end before that)

• Paramount in Netflix Canada (SM)

• • Well over 350 films are now on the service from that Studio
  • Includes “exclusive subscription television rights for first run films”. That’s before HBO, Showtime, etc.
  • U.S. has some of these through the EPIX deal, but not all of them
  • It’s messed up but movie rights are divided per region and have to be negotiated separately
  • They might lose some stuff too. Showtime is thinking on pulling Dexter after the deal expires in the Summer

• Showtime adapting the ultra-weird, super-gross comic book Chew for TV? (kdr)
  • Thank you showtime for always delivering bloods and guts
  • John Layman and Rob Guillory’s comic Chew is getting its own TV series.
  • “federal agent Tony Chu, a “cibopath” able to get psychic impression from the things he eats who is assigned to the most usual and bizarre crimes.”
  • Stephen Hopkins (24 and Californication’s) to direct the pilot episode

• Canadian ISP Rogers Throttling WoW (udg)
  • Canadian ISP Rogers Communications last week admitted that it is throttling activity on Blizzard’s “World of Warcraft” gaming platform due to a “problem” with its traffic management.
  • When are they planning on fixing that problem? Well not until June. I the mean time, they suggest turning off all peer-to-peer connections while WoWing.
  • Rogers said it made a change to its software to fix the problem, but a recent change to the game “created new problems” and a second software modification is necessary. That, Rogers said, “will not be ready until June.”
  • The admission from Rogers came after the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission wrote the company in late Feb about complaints it’d received from WoW users.
  • Canada has open Internet regulations that prohibit ISPs from blocking specific applications. An ISP could slow down all of its traffic during peak times, for example, but could not discriminate against specific services or apps like World of Warcraft.
  • In one complaint received by the CRTC, customer Teresa Murphy said she had experienced slow downs since at least November, and was not connected to a P2P network while gaming.
  • “I’ve been affected by this (along with MANY other Rogers users) because Rogers’ filters are picking up several very low bandwidth-intensive games incorrectly as P2P activity,” Murphy wrote. “I don’t use P2P at ALL, and yet I’m still affected by this issue because Rogers sees my gaming traffic incorrectly as P2P.”
  • Blizzard did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

• Java Founder Joins Google (SM)
  • James Gosling, a notable programmer who founded Java, has jumped ship to Google
  • His home at Sun Microsystems became untenable after Oracle purchased the company
  • Called CEO Larry Ellison, “Larry, Prince of Darkness”
  • Notable switch because the android OS basically on Dalvik, which is similar to Java
  • Yet again, Google getting some good mindshare

• STEVEN – please let me do the intro for this
• I dont care if it’s in the dictionary, if you say “LOL” outloud, I’m gonna punch you in the mouth (kdr)
  • The Oxford English Dictionary has announced the latest batch of words and phrases called initialisms including LOL and OMG and “heart”
  • I feel they should also add, WTF and #Facepalm at this point
  • “They help to say more in media where there is a limit to a number of characters one may use in a single message,” says principal editor Graeme Diamond on the dictionary’s website.
  • And this KILLS me, here’s Diamond’s eloquent reasoning: ““The intention is usually to signal an informal, gossipy mode of expression, and perhaps parody the level of unreflective enthusiasm or overstatement that can sometimes appear in online discourse, while at the same time marking oneself as an ‘insider’ au fait with the forms of expression associated with the latest technology.”

• Cheezburger Network Buys Know Your Meme (udg)
  • There’s money in hazzing cheezburgers and for buying other Internet meme sites it would seem.
  • The Cheezburger Network, home to hit sites like I can has Cheezburger, the Fail Blog, the Daily What, and many others, has bought Know Your Meme. The deal closed last Monday, Cheezburger CEO Ben Huh told CNET.
  • The deal was first reported by Tubefilter, which said that Know Your Meme, which was a spin-off from Rocketboom, is getting a low seven-figure payday.
  • Know Your Meme has become famous as a place where people can go to learn about the origins of some of the Internet’s most beloved time-wasters. And that’s exactly why Cheezburger bought it. “Right now, we’re an entertainment destination,” Huh said of the network’s many sites. “A lot of the stuff we show doesn’t have a lot of content…People require context, history, and origins [which] helps them understand why this is funny or why this isn’t funny. And Know Your Meme was probably doing the best job of that out there.”
  • The Cheezburger Network has grown rapidly in the last couple of years, and scored a $30 million round of funding in January that Huh said is intended to be used to “figure out how to grow the business.” And while he doesn’t know yet precisely what that means, it’s actually the point. “A lot of it is going to be wasted on failures,” he said, but “that’s what’s fun and great about this company, is that we can test” ideas.
  • Know Your Meme brings four employees to the Cheezburger stable, all of whom are in New York. That means, Huh said, that Cheezburger now has Cheezburger West–Seattle, where the company is based–and Cheezburger East. He also said that he intends to use some of the recent funding money to staff up the larger company in New York.

• Sprint Vows to Fight T-Mobile / AT&T acquisition (SM)
  • 3rd smallest company is dead set against the new acquisition possibility
  • claims it will “alter the structure of the communications industry (duh) and affect innovation”
  • The gauntlet was thrown down during a roundtable discussion at CTIA 2011, a wireless trade show, where the heads of verizon, t-mobile and AT&T were present
  • The deal would make AT&T the largest carrier at 130 million subscribers
  • Verizon, not so much concerned but they’re the other big player in the market
  • The two of them would own 80% of the market

• Wonder Woman Costume Update (udg)
  • So, it seems Kelley was bright enough to listen to how much his choice of costume for the new WW was hated. He’s made some changes. Pants are a darker matte blue and sans camel toe, the boots are now red and have a more “sensible” heel and the hookah make up is gone.  Guess what? I still can’t stand it. And her right nipple is seriously almost popping out while she’s running. Double Sided Duct Tape FTW I guess.

I actually like her Stunt Double, Shauna Duggins, more!

Intarweb Goldmine

• Pole Dancing for Jesus (udg)
  • In Old Town Spring, Texas there’s a group of pole dancers blurring the line between strippers and Scripture.
  • On the second Sunday of every month, former exotic dancer Crystal Deans leads a pole dancing course for church-goers dubbed “Pole Fitness for Jesus.” The class empowers women and helps them get in shape — all to the sounds of “upbeat contemporary Christian music,” Deans told Fox 26.
  • The instructor says she knew exotic dancing wasn’t for her, but realized she could use her experience performing to help other women connect with the teachings of Jesus Christ.
  • There’s no nudity, but there are high heels — shoes that Deans insists help tone the legs.
  • There’s a place here called Miss Pole I so want to take a class at, you know for the fitness and all, so I can totally hang with the concept. But, saying it’s for Jesus, heck even I know that’ll get ya cussed out.
• Sign Up for Dish, Get a Free Gun. Thanks Radio Shack (SM)
  • (SM) where do I sign up???
  • Montana Radioshack, Owner puts up a sign – “Protect yourself with dish network sign up now get free gun”
  • basically owner wanted to generate foot traffic and the offer of a gun is real
  • Ppl who sign up for dish have the choice between a 380 pistol and a 20 gauge shotgun
  • Those that don’t qualify for the gift certificate / get a $50 pizza hut gift card
  • Literally tripled his business, Next month it will be DirecTV

• Old Tattooed Biker Dude Makes Quilt Out of Ladies Panties (udg)
  • Picture a creepy old biker guy all tattooed up, long hair, wife beater bent over a quilt covered in woman’s underwear and that would be Louis Garret of Louisiana, Missouri.
  • Louis  told the Hannibal Courier-Post about his bizarre hobby, explaining that he only started quilting with unmentionables after he began dressing his mannequin collection in lingerie. Which of course makes perfect sense, right?
  • But don’t get the wrong idea about Garrett, whose nickname is “Shovelhead.” He’s a panty quilter with standards. He told the paper exactly what kind of underwear he’s looking for: “No polyester. I don’t want those cheap, dollar-store, not-sexy, farm-girl panties. I want classy — silk or nylon. You know, sexy. Victoria’s Secret.”
  • He added that he will never sell his kinky quilt because he has personal relationships with most of the women who give him their underwear. “That’s kind of a weird sentimental value right there.” Yeah, it sure is.
• Give the woman her Cupcake geeeez (kdr)
  • A woman in South Wales ravaged a bakery upon learning they were out of her favourite cupcakes
  • The woman reportedly ran around the counter, grabbed the owner by the hair, and proceeded to smash all the glass display units, causing more than in $600 damage
• Dont nom on the train (kdr)
  • Cant a woman just her her spaghetti on the subway in peace?
  • Apparently not – another woman on the train was so annoyed that she couldnt help her mouth diarrhea and spouted out fightin words like “What kind of animals eat on the train like that?”
  • The two women continued to share words, then eventunally knuckle sammiches, while the entire event was caught on tape.
  • And did our anonymous cameraman become the good samaritan and break up the fight? NOPE. he put that shit on youtube as soon as he got home!

Extra Links

• What Bill Gates Could Learn From Chris Rock (udg)
• How to Make $30 Pair of Headphones get $300+ Quality (udg)
• Marvel vs 30 Rock “Feud” (udg)
• 5 Important People That Were Screwed Out of History Books (udg)
• Nook Color approaching 3 million sales
• Disturbing Chinese KeyChains
• Homeless Man Builds Car Out of Scrap

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