(SM) So, Figaro, this show is for you….

(SM) All Right, lets get into some fanmail
(SM) @Prof_Mordarm, a fan of the show, is offering some room at GenCon in case you don’t have a place to crash…It fits 2-3 ppl and he’s promising cheap

(JP)Listener Keith was so inspired by my story about how I got the nickname Zoda, he sent the following in that made me Laugh very hard:
He is the life of parties he has never attended. If he were to punch you in the face, you would have an uncontrollable urge to thank him. Sharks have a week dedicated to him. He is … ZODA!!!

Find of the Week: Star Wars Yoga : (UDG) SHUT UP!!! Sue time

• Listener name: Carrie Small submitted this, you can sue her…
• “Stimulate your midichlorians – Yoda Yoga 4 life”
• collapsed AT-AT, downward facing Wookie… these are great!

Gold Sponsors:

UberDorkCafe

• Will be THE place for Geeks to hang out
• What is UberDorkCafe? It is the brain child and DREAM of Natali, aka @UberDorkGirlie from twitter, and it blends art + science = geek
• Place to hang, eat, have awesome kid parties (if thats your thing), or to get your gaming on
• Kickstarter site for UberDorkCafe, these places just don’t build themselves
• Woookie Coookies – a piece of UDC before there is even a physical cafe

Deals of the Week / New Releases

• Two lucky listeners from the Chatroom with an android phone will be selected by Natali to join the Beta Testers group for my development team (Jebs Apps) first app Golden Pic (JP)
  • Example Screenshot:
• 8 Bit glory… top loading Retro NES game system for 16 Bucks! (JP)
• SC2 Release – (SM) – I’ll talk about my experience so far (Love the single player to death, great storylines, interstitial exploration, etc.)
• (JP) iPhone 4 thoughts experience so far. since we said I would talk about it this week. short bit
  • What I love…. FACETIME Greatest thing ever. 1st FT call, explain
  • Antennagate? what issues? no dropped calls, no problems, better faster web
    • grantedI threw a case on it immediately, but I always do… that’s an expensive investment
  • Batterylife?? Meh… while noticably better than my 3g batery life… it’s still no where near enough for me to use it the way I normally do for a full day…
  • I will be buying an ExoLife Battery case

Geek Speak

• SDCC Chatroom Request
  • Kristin couldn’t make it tonight, she sends her apologies
  • What we want from the chatroom is your experiences, now don’t blurt them out, hold onto them and at the end of geekspeak, we’ll take all the best experiences and read them on the show

• Trailers, Trailers, Trailers
  • DC Online Trailer, Please Make Movie!!! (SM)
    • Features Wonder Woman in her real costume
    • Brace yourself if you really like her though #youhavebeenwarned (grrrr udg)
    • WANT WANT WANT as a movie. Just like SW Republic…
    • Dropping Nov. 2

• • Jack Sparrow Announces Return at SDCC Comicon
  • Penelope Cruz in 3d?!?!?!?!
  • Starcraft 2 Trailer
  • Suckerpunch (coming 2011)
  • New Tron Trailer

• Kick Ass- Cos Players + Bally gots their own message board (UDG)
  • And holy awesome web site
  • Jinkies it’s a whole HUGE underground network!!
  • Are real life superheros a good thing or a bad thing?
  • (SM) I like seeing everybody’s costumes at the con’s but wearing it IRL for me?? no TY
  • (SM) Vigilantism is kinda mixed bag for me. I live in the gun state of the U.S.A. Self protection is something we hold dear. But group dynamics when it comes to actively seeking to protect can get dangerous.
  • (SM) How far do you go? If you go “KickAss” but don’t have training? You’re gonna be dead real quick. Do knife defense at a Krav Magaa school and you’ll see what I mean
  • (SM) Mild demonstrations or patrolling of the neighborhood in a costume to do good deeds? That to me is your prerogative
  • (JP) just a reminder to point out where this all usually goes wrong… “With great power comes great responsibility”

• SDCC – Chatroom and Pics
  • 850 Costumes

Tech,Gaming, and Geek News

• Geeky Counter Protest at SDCC (SM)
  • Super Heroes Vs The Westboro Baptist Church
  • “Odin Is God Read The Mighty Thor #5
  • God Hates Jedi (held up by a red shirt)
  • All Glory to the Hypno-Toad
  • Lo, tho I walk thru the valley of death, I fear no evil for the Dark Knight is by my side
  • (SM) Look, Comicon is a celebration of Geekdom. We are made up of all sorts of ppl: Black, white, yellow, brown, gay, straight. Deal with it folks! We are geek, hear us roar!

• Zombie Cookies…not the noms though (udg)
  • Most people will shrug when you mention “browser cookies” Yet they are a huge part of our online life.
  • So why are a group of Americans suing a range of media brands (MTV, ESPN, MySpace, ABC, NBC)?
  • Flash (common browser plugin) stores it’s own cookies.
  • Aforementioned using a technology that reaches in, and revives these dead cookies as “zombies” essentially “remembering” all the stuff you told it to forget.
  • Quantcast created the technology, so they’re suing them too.
  • Raising cookies from the dead=illegal surveillance
  • Article says they shoulda just complained, not sued.
  • Calls them “privacy nuts.” Screw that.

• Street Fighter And Tekken combine to make your head explode in one GAME!!!! (JP) (OMG sooo coool!)
  • Something we all have wished for, but pretty much never thought would happen…. 2 game developers work together

• Gamestop buys Kongregate (SM)
  • Kongregate is a community game place with tons of free games
  • Achievements and chat rooms
  • Now eaten by the corporate monster, but for what purpose?
  • “Kongregate advances GameStop’s digital strategy by providing a gaming platform for casual, mobile and browser games that can be promoted and played by our existing gamers. We welcome the Kongregate team to the GameStop family.” (translation: they want a captive audience to pimp their services 2)
  • Transaction will be done Aug. 1 and the owners promise business as usual

• On to ISPs.. UK’s TalkTalk has turned StalkStalk (UDG)
  • UK’s 2nd largest ISP has been quietly stalking it’s customers scanning what they look at for a new anti-malware system.
  • (first phase) W/o warning, it has started harvesting their URL’S then follows them to the sites and scans for threats.
  • (2nd phase) Data used to block potentially dangerous sites @ ntwrk level
  • 1 poster on their official forums noticed in early July. “I’ve got 2 Opal Telecom IPs following my every move, they follow me to every page that I visit.”
  • Opal Telecom is TalkTalk’s business ISP subsidiary
  • Other posters started noticing
  • Response “We are developing some really exciting new security and parental control services, which will be based deep within our network infrastructure, to provide our customers with greater protection for all the devices they connect to their broadband line with,” the firm said.
  • Don’t worry though cuz Chinese vendor Huawei is the only one to see the data that is collected by the system that customers can’t opt out of.
  • A spokeswoman for the firm told The Register it had not told customers it would be following them online because it is not gathering details of their personal activity, but instead making basic lists of all web pages passing over its network.
  • She went on to claim that the “whitelist” sites are deleted after 24 hours.
  • Basically, this will result in a free optional protective layer that customers can opt-in to. Plan to have it ready the second half of this year.

• What’s missing SC2 Launch? Pirated copies?!?!?!? (JP)
  • (SM) Thank You to the new Battle.NET
  • The Beta code has been available for months, downloads are out there… still no pirated copies. This is a huge win for the Dev’s

• Move only works with RE5 Gold on PS3 (SM)
  • So, to use a deluxe peripheral you have to have a deluxe version of a game?
  • Apparently, when the first game came out, they used up all the memory slots
  • Deluxe game freed one up just for the advent of the MOVE controller
  • Now why couldn’t they modify the code on the disc if you installed it on HD?
  • RE5 becomes more like House of the Living Dead when you use MOVE

• Japan-O-Bus – Could your anime obsession FINALLY be a GOOD thing?? (udg)
  • Finally your worship of anime and obsession with all things Asian could pay off (all things Asain?? hmmm)
  • Folks over at TOKYOPOP are on a quest to find the biggest Japanofan
  • Filming an online reality show “America’s Greatest Otaku” (confuzzled over otaku?? It translates as someone who has an obsessive love for something, here it’s been morphed to that something being specifically anime, manga, super awesome video games, etc)
  • In TP’s words “searching for “the person who best exemplifies a truly unique fervor and passion for all things influenced by Japanese pop culture.” (a badass costume wouldn’t hurt)
  • Show up to the bus and you will get some sweet swag, score the highest and you could snag a trip to Japan.
  • Want in? Schedule here:

• Super Hackers Finally arrested in Slovenia – ring leader only 23 years old (JP)
  • This group was responsible for the Mariposa botnet hack, which was finally disabled a few months ago after a group of security professionals organized a task force just to take it down.
  • Why was it so effective? It changed where it was attacking from, domains, ips, etc and changed it’s code on the fly….
  • It took down the computers of powerful Fortune 1000 companies
  • The mistake that led to their capture… one of these guys used his real name to register one of the domains the attacks originated from

• Now legal to jailbreak iPhones (SM)
  • What this ruling could really mean (not much for consumers)
  • Apple will still make it hard to jailbreak
  • Does not have to provide access to OS
  • The only real thing this means is they cannot sue ppl and devs for jailbreaking IF they can find a way
  • MixVid ppl were protected

• RIM set to launch yet another iPhone killer next week – anyone think it will actually kill the iPhone? (JP)
  • Not me, says I.
  • RIM is expected to announce the launch of the slider 9800 handset at a joint BlackBerry-AT&T Inc event in New York next Tuesday morning
  • Though not much is known about the Bold 9800, it is believed to have a physical, slide-out Qwerty keyboard – a first from RIM – and other beefy specs like a touchscreen, a 5-megapixel camera, 512MB RAM, 4GB of internal storage, A-GPS, Wi-Fi and 360×480 touchscreen display.
    • Not very impressive compared to droid x or iphone4… so what’s the excitement about? Rumor is, it’ll have Blackberry 6 as the OS!!!

• New Battlestar Galactica Series (SM)
  • Don’t get your hopes up, it’s a web series
  • 10 webisodes, 9 mins long
  • Set in the war itself, eyes of the soldier
  • Apparently, they digitized a lot of the BSG sets after completion
  • If it’s liked, then they might do more
  • (SM) Personally, I think trying ideas like this on the web first is a GREAT idea, fraction of the production costs, more targetted feedback

Intarweb Goldmine

• Australian cave offers tours… in Klingon
  • Jenolan Caves is now offering audio tours in Klingon
  • Why? the were featured in an episode of The Next Generation where a ship was named after them- the USS Jenolan
  • Cave Guide & Trekkie Gordon Mills “We wanted to do something a bit obscure and we will now be the first tourist attraction on this planet at least to have a Klingon tour

• • Comicon 2010, Klingons took over the local train station (signs and all)

• US Black Bear “borrows” car for joy ride (JP)
  • Near Larksspur Colorado, just outside denver…
  • a bear smelled a PB&J sandwhich and climbed in after jimmying the door open, got stuck, knocked the car into nuetral and away he went…
  • After hitting a tree, the blaring of the cars horn alerted the family that the 17 yr old son’s toyota was no longer in the driveway….

Extra Links

• http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,2006405,00.html
• Awesome Max Brooks Interview
• SDCC Coverage (Comics)
• Droid Top 60 Apps
• Confirmed! Wolverine is that best at what he does

Contact Info

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

Sponsors

Wow4Cure.com

• Plans to play non-stop to level 40 and raise $10,000 for cancer
• Scheduled to take place Aug. 6th and they will continue playing if the donations keep coming
• Check out their website, we’ll talk more about them in the weeks to come

http://luxurylanesoap.com, @KyleeLane, GORGEOUS, IMAGINATIVE, HANDCRAFTED, GEEKY Soap

• Can I say any more superlatives? You will love her products.
• (We Do! They’re Geekalicious! but don’t eat them… they are SOAP!)

• introed their new phone to the Mobile World Conference -
• Microsoft wants to change the User Experience
• Microsoft out-Apples Apple (Data-centric vs. Function Centric)
• Gizmodo Hands-on
• Flash Will Not be Supported on initial Win Mo 7

• Per gizmodo – why this is sooo different compared to iPhone (iKDR):

  • bright, superflat squares fill the screen
  • live, real-time data seamlessly integrated
  • Live tiles on the Start screen, which you can customize, are updated dynamically with fresh content, like weather, or if you’ve pinned a person to your Start screen, their latest status updates and photos.
  • The meat of the phone is organized around a set of hubs: People, Pictures, Games, Music + Video, Marketplace, and Office. They’re kind of like uber-applications
  • People hub might be the best social networking implementation yet on a phone: It’s a single place to see all of your friends’ status updates from multiple services in a single stream … Facebook and Windows Live. (No Twitter support announced yet)
  • Music + Video Hub is essentially the entirety of Zune HD’s software, tucked inside of Windows Phone 7
  • A piece of interface that’s shockingly not there: A desktop syncing app
  • Microsoft’s vision of Zune is finally clear with Windows Phone 7 with app (like the iTunes/iPhone)
  • Xbox Live on a phone – It’s tied to your Live profile, achievements & gamer points for the games you play on your phone, which will be tied to games back on your Xbox 360. (I do have this on my iPhone right now as well)
  • browser is Internet Exploder, email is Outlook
  • Bing and Bing Maps are built into the phone as the default search and maps
  • (SM) The Hub concept is totally extensible +++ it can still be data centric and launch tradition apps
  • 1GHz Snapdragon proc is impressive as this is running a lot of the iPad wannabe tablets from CES… lots of power under the hood…

Looks a little (to me…) like an iPhone and a Droid had an illegitimate kid… and he’s going to prove that he’s the best to both families that don’t want him! hahahaha

DARPA to build Real Life C3PO Translation Droid (JP)

Darpa, the military’s experimental research agency, is launching the Robust Automatic Translation of Speech program to streamline the translation process. (That’s “RATS,” for short. Ouch.)

• L4D2 getting DLC (we need to buy you the pc version jeremy. either that or buy me friends…)
  • Cameo by L4D1 chars (with possible DLC for L4D1 to explain why they are in georgia)
  • New infected, new arenas for survival, versus, and scavenge
  • Late March
• MW2 Getting DLC
  • No specifics yet but it will be time exclusive to X360
  • Was first broken by an energy drink box… hah
  • (SM) Have I ever told you how much I hate FPS on a console? blech
• Other announcements
  • Alan Wake finally hitting store shelves in May
  • Fable III announced
    • still in albion
    • Play as the son or daughter of your char in Fable II
    • Much more akin to kingdom management stuff
  • Halo: Reach discussed (full version upgrade w/ all the bells and whistles – 4 mil more polygons plus re-written animation and AI)
    • Beta only for ODST owners… (way to drive a sku!)
      • I Can’t Wait!!!
  • FF XIII trotted out. X360 special edition console for $399 (SM – me wanty!!!!)
  • Another zombie game: Dead Rising 2!!! – more of a sandbox type game, build weapons and destroy zombies
  • Alien vs Predator (players can take on the role of either an Alien, Predator or a Space Marine and jump right into a species-specific story campaign)

Tech,Gaming, and Geek News

• Borg coming to STO in free update (GGN source) (iKdr)
  • New Hub world where you can pick up high-level “episodes” to battle the borg
  • Lvl 43+
  • First update to the newly minted game it will be “free”
  • Read background real quick

• Vodaphone selling cheap phones in developing Countries (SM)
  • $15 and $20 handsets to be sold to developing third world countries
  • Light on features but they will support and the high end ones will have color screens and FM radio
  • Mobile Plans included
  • Some of the areas targeted: Turkey, India, The Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Mozambique, Qatar, South Africa and Tanzania.

• TellTale Games releasing their Catalog to MACs (JP)
  • Starting with the Monkey Island series, but will include everything… Even StrongBad’s Cool Game for Attractive People
  • You can visit the link in the show notes to visit their site and vote for which game gets ported next!

• NERD Barbie! (iKDR)
  • Mattel announced that Computer Engineer Barbie won the online contest
  • she has a Bluetooth headset, a pink laptop, a smartphone, and hot-pink glasses
  • sparkly black leggings and a neon green shirt patterned with binary code
  • hits stores in the Fall (GEEK GIRLS are taking over *evil laugh*)

• DVD Releases this week
  • Small Wonder: The Complete First Season (1985)
  • HALO Legends DVD released this week – 7 animated stories to take you deeper into the HALO ‘Verse

• Foot Long Surgical instrument found in woman 5 MONTHS after surgery…
  • Can you even begin to imagine something like this… a FOOT long… not like some tiny thing…
  • OOOpppps… didn’t see that foot long spatula like instrument…
    • Note to self…. Never have surgery in Czech republic….

• How many oranges does it take to charge an Apple? (iKDR)
  • 2380 slices! video created by Imperial Leisure, the company that executed a new iPhone-centered advertisement aimed at raising awareness for Jaffa oranges
• Woman charged with DUI after demanding a conjugal visit at a jail….
  • She arrived late for a scheduled visit and was turned away….
  • she returned a short time later demanding a conjugal visit (which the prison does not allow)
  • suspecting she was drunk guards called road patrol… they found her sitting in her car…
  • BAC was .256 more than three times the legal limit of .08

Extra Links

• 3D w/out 3D Glasses
• Aaron Ristau’s mechanical sculptures are lighting modernities

Contact Info

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