Thursday, February 16, 2012

Its big, its heavy, its wood

Random post, but I had this song in my head today...
From one of the best, stupid shows ever to exist.

The naked girl isn't even the most impressive thing in this picture

As a self-described "Shower enthusiast", this is awesome. This will finally shut up those people boasting about their "shower bench" huh*? Its made by Germany engineering company Dornbracht (this is way above just plumbing fixtures) and unveiled recently at a Swiss trade show. I wonder if the model took a live shower there. This marvel of shower-engineering is what I will now dream about. I guess my 70's blue tile bathroom DOES look a bit dated...

No, I have no idea how much it is, but if you have to ask...

*going on the bold assumption there are people that do that

Source -> http://www.buzzfeed.com/burnred/the-horizontal-shower-281t via http://www.shortlist.com/cool-stuff/gadgets/the-horizontal-shower#image-rotator-1 & http://www.dornbracht.com/en/

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Don't you listen? Nobody camps anymore.

I saw this and had to repost.

Truck conversation
by: grouch

Clickable link -> http://www.xtranormal.com/watch/7339561/truck-conversation

a REAL Expedition -> http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2010/11/i-need-to-polish-up-on-my-languages.html

8 things (possibly) worse morally than Han shooting first

(Which he did)

Pasted from ScreenJunkies.com

8. Using An Army Of Clones

How are the Jedi OK with this? Aside from the fact that no one really knew who made the clones, doesn’t Yoda have any qualms about the fact that these soldiers were raised in pods and have life outside of battle? It’s one thing to raise an army. It’s another to use a bunch of slaves you made in a test tube.

7. Animal Abuse

Killing a savage bounty hunter is totally verboten in Lucasland, but picking off womp rats is just innocent “boys will be boys” fun? That’s crap. Luke Skywalker’s predilection towards killing animals should indicate that not only is he not fit to lead a rebellion, but probably shouldn’t be someone you’re hanging out with in any capacity. And let’s not forget Han Solo’s total disregard for the life of his poor Tauntaun.

6. Mind Control for Petty Reasons

Here, Obi Wan uses mind control to get kids to stop smoking. Wow. I guess that getting them to clean their rooms or turn down that darn space rock-and-roll would have been gratuitous. Jesus, these Jedis sure do feel a lot of moral obligation to interlope in people’s lives. They’re smoking kids. Let them live their lives, Obi Wan. Not everyone wants to be some joyless Jedi.

5. Cheating

Shitty behavior all around in this instance. Qui Gon Jinn used telekinesis to will the chance cube to fall on blue, even though Watto had weighted the chance cube and painted five of the six sides red to ensure that the outcome was in his favor. Of course, no reasonable person would wager on a die pulled out from the pocket of a grifter, and the fact remains that two wrongs don’t make a right. Sure, Watto was cheating, but that doesn’t give the “good guys” the right to cheat as well.
To allow this would be to condone anarchy. Society needs rules to live by.

4. Letting Anakin Suffer After He’s Burned

“Oh, I would love to help you Anakin, but I’ve got this lunch thing I’ve gotta get to. I would stick around, but I’ve already cancelled on this guy twice, and it’s clear across the galaxy, so I have to get going.”
“Can you at least kill me? My arms and legs are burning off, and it’s very painful.”
“Ugh. I would love to, but I’m really jammed up here, because I parked like three blocks away, and I think I need to get gas.”
“Just stab me with light saber or drop a rock on my head. It will take two seconds.”
“You know…Jeez. I would love to help you out, but I’m gonna get going. Best of luck in your future endeavors.”

3. Enslaving Chewbacca (A.K.A. The Life Bond)

Oh, they have a life bond. Since I’m know that Han is into women, I’m guessing that the life bond isn’t a romantic thing, but rather a euphemism for slavery. Chewbacca is beholden to his human master. And you can hear the pain in his voice every time he bellows. It’s terrible. If Roots taught me anything, it’s that slave owners often wear vests, thus making Han Solo a horrible, horrible slave owner.

2. Brainwashing Ewoks to Fight Your Wars

C-3PO passes himself off as a deity to the Ewoks, essentially tricking a bunch of adorable teddy bears to fight in a war they have nothing to do with. It’s terrible. If it had been just c-3PO’s ruse, that would be one thing, but Luke Skywalker is in on it as well, levitating the droid to further sell the lie.
Getting Ewoks to fight your battles is like heaving cute hamsters and bunnies at a mugger to stop an assault. It’s uncalled for and disproportionate.

1. Child Soldiers in Stupid Hats

Oh man. This is bad. Not only recruiting child soldiers, to die at war, which is pretty despicable in and of itself, but putting dumb colanders on their heads to make them feel like they’re an elite team of soldiers or something. Look at them. You might as well pump a couple rounds into their chubby, nubile bodies to save the enemy the trouble. They look like they could be defeated just by hanging a sign reading “Free Kandy” over a hole you dug.
Child labor is wrong, child soldiers are even wronger. Shame on you, George Lucas. Shame on your eyes.

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Earlier Star Wars Links: http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2012/02/im-still-going-to-see-it-even-though-i.html & http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2012/01/crowdsourced-star-wars.html & http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2011/02/star-wars-episode-iv-told-using-only.html & http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2011/01/star-wars-to-be-sold-on-blu-ray.html & http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2012/01/chewy-is-my-favorite.html & http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2011/02/they-didnt-have-remote-start-in-1988.html &
http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2011/02/meet-max-page-aka-vader-from-vw-ad.html

..I'm still going to see it (even though I mostly agree)

You've got to admit the pod race was pretty cool too.

Clickable link: http://youtu.be/0sKRRY5tQz8

Source -> http://www.screenjunkies.com/video/honest-trailer-phantom-menace-3d/

Some other opinions about the re-release: http://www.hollywood.com/news/Why_You_Should_or_Shouldnt_See_Star_Wars_Episode_I_The_Phantom_Menace_3D_Review/16618160 & http://screenrant.com/star-wars-episode-1-3d-trailer-three-musketeers-benk-135912/

Showtimes and Tickets (you'll have to put in your zip): http://www.movietickets.com/

Earlier Star Wars Links: http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2012/01/crowdsourced-star-wars.html & http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2011/02/star-wars-episode-iv-told-using-only.html & http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2011/01/star-wars-to-be-sold-on-blu-ray.html & http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2012/01/chewy-is-my-favorite.html & http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2011/02/they-didnt-have-remote-start-in-1988.html &
http://www.dannyfinnegan.com/2011/02/meet-max-page-aka-vader-from-vw-ad.html

Photoshop's new content aware capabilities blow my mind

clickable link -> http://youtu.be/UrlsnQ32YhY

Source -> http://gizmodo.com/5885285/photoshop-cs6-can-magically-move-around-any-object-in-your-photos

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

HP is getting the band back together

"I have no idea what this is"

From Wired:
In 1971, Hewlett-Packard commissioned a marketing study to see if anyone would buy a $395 pocket calculator. The marketer’s verdict? Make it the size of a typewriter, because nobody wants a small machine.

Luckily, Bill Hewlett ignored the marketers, and the next year, the company introduced its HP-35 Scientific Calculator. The pocket calculator was a hit, eventually making slide rules obsolete. In 2009, it was honored by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers as a “Milestone in Electrical Engineering and Computing.”

...and now there is a bounty on porting Android to its recently famous HP Touchpad.

Honestly I'm a fan of this company, they took a chance on an obscure OS (based on Linux however), but then canceled it. A few recent firesales on what remained on the HP Touchpad might have reinvigorated public interest however. Decent hardware specs and a good form factor seemed to be enough. Then once HP canceled development on WebOS (that they had absorbed from Palm*) that sparked a bigger look from the tinkering community on its merits. HP then made it open source which was expected after they decided not to develop it further.

I digress, my point was that this company has made some pretty important milestones in the tech/electronics field, ITS NOT ALL APPLE! When funding for R&D suffers, consumers get cheaply made products that underperform and fall apart, nobody wants that. President & CEO Meg Whitman agrees. Check out the source link for a bit more history and why the Labs division is a good thing.

Source -> http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2012/02/hp_calculator

*Which has its own weird history

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Patent trolls hurt innovation

From Wired:

Patent Troll Claims Ownership of Interactive Web – And Might Win

The city of Tyler, Texas...is the site of a remarkable battle over the history of the World Wide Web — a trial that could affect the future of e-commerce. The federal courthouse downtown is packed to the brim with dozens of lawyers, representing the world’s biggest internet companies, including Yahoo, Amazon, Google and YouTube.
Michael Doyle, a low-profile Chicago biologist, claims that it was actually he and two co-inventors who invented — and patented — the “interactive web” before anyone else, back in 1993. Doyle argues that a program he created at the UC’s San Francisco campus, which allowed doctors to view embryos over the nascent World Wide Web, was the first program that allowed users to interact with images inside of a web browser window. Today, Doyle and his lawyers say he’s owed royalty payments for the use of a stunning array of modern web technologies. Watching online video, having a “search suggestion” pop up in a search bar, or even rotating an image of a sweater you might want to buy on an online shopping site — all are said to infringe on the idea-space of Doyle and his company, Eolas Technologies.

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Yeah, this should turn out well. Honestly, if you owned this technology since 1993, why wait until NOW to try to do something about it? Does it have anything to do with the parties involved at this point? Or is it more to actually protect what you claim is your intellectual property. I honestly think it could be argued by some Patent Attorney friends of mine that the ability to interact with images in a medical environment and viewing videos of cats playing fruit ninja on an iPad really aren't the same thing, even if they both occur in a browser. Another thing, using a set of rules (claiming to stem from 1993) to apply to 2011/2012 uses of a browser doesn't really make any sense on so many levels. Browsers have become the ubiquitous "portals" from the local user to nearly any other service at any other location. Interactive web-based email (including chat/video/voice/etc embedded), software as a service and even 3D map rendering/street view capabilities are all abilities that have only been enabled in the last few years with a browser's ability to "be" the computer. What about devices like the Chromebook? Where the line between the browser. OS and network are blurred by definition? Does that mean he gets a royalty for that? What about the Apple iCloud and Amazon Cloud where all media exists both locally and on the internet (and can be accessed through a browser)?

By no means am I saying one shouldn't defend a VALID claim to intellectual property.

Please feel free to comment.

Source -> http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/02/patent-troll-trial