A letter to Google

Sup Googs,

Of all the letters you get, I'm sure most of them are from fans admiring how awesome Google is. The rest must be from paranoid idiots shouting about the legality of being tracked, privacy control and all manner of conspiratorial bullshittery. I don't belong to either category, but rather I'm sending this letter to give a constructive response of how to make Google a better, more user friendly place for people to conduct business.

After spending a considerable amount of time trying to figure out how to work Google sites, I have come to the conclusion that it was designed, implemented and tested by feces throwing spider monkeys. I suppose the first question I should ask is 'how the hell did this get by a QA department', or better yet, 'was this even run past a QA department?'. This shit barely works and is BY FAR the worst product Google has to offer (which is really saying something, since Google wave and Google buzz sucked so much it could take the chrome off a trailer hitch).

Want to start with a totally blank page and just put in your own html? NO. Want to get rid of the search bar, or place it elsewhere to center a header image? NO. Even creating a splash page is ridiculously difficult. These are basic things that can easily be fixed, I can't even edit the html. it's nice to offer ease of use access to those who know nothing about what they're doing and are a bazillion years old, but it makes things super difficult for people who know even a BIT about what they're doing. $10 for a domain and an easy-to-build website is enticing, I just didn't know THIS is what I was in for. Even if some of those features are there, they're ridiculously hard to find. The process is NOT easily navigable...I'm not trying to steer a trade ship through a narrow canal in the 1600s, I'm just trying to build a goddamn website.

Oh I know, everyone at Google are super geniuses and I can't argue with that, but I'll make this really easy to understand: I can't conceive that the same company that produces the best search algorithm in the world, makes billions of dollars annually, has a $600 price tag for ONE SHARE and that practically OWNS THE INTERNET made this product that, in comparison, looks like it was made out of Popsicle sticks by an eight year old girl with no hands...

Sincerely,
Chief

An Open Letter to BioWare

Dear BioWare,

I have been a gamer for the majority of my life, having spent countless hours plopped in front of some type of screen plugging away at the latest and greatest the industry has to offer for my own amusement and entertainment. While there have been some massive hits, and some massive failures, it has occurred to me that BioWare's offerings give players a unique experience with polish and detail.

That being said, there is one thing I have noticed about your games universally that amuses and confuses, astounds and confounds...and that is the fact that every character you've ever allowed me to take control of cannot jump.

That's right, you can't fucking jump.

In Dragon Age, you play as any of 3 races (humans, elves and dwarfs) that become great warriors and team up with all different sorts of characters using magic, wielding weapons you and I couldn't DREAM of wielding in real life, and set forth to destroy mythical creatures - yet not one person in this world has discovered (or learned) the ability to jump?

Fast forward to the year 2183 AD - Mass Effect is a character-driven, science fiction, action packed space adventure, where you take control of a team of warriors spanning all kinds of races and species...and they still can't jump. what kind of lame universe is this anyway?

Mass effect 2 has come to us, and walking around the environments brings a sense of familiarity as I recall playing the first game. My hand rests comfortably on the edge of my keyboard. I see a small ledge and I press the space bar, expecting my character to jump over the small ledge, but he doesn't, and another familiar feeling becomes apparent - frustration. HOW THE HELL IS THIS THE FUTURE?!

Even in the Star Wars universe characters are vertically challenged...for all the effort put into the lore and mechanics of how this universe should function, in Knights of the old republic (both of them) characters are unable to jump. This, to me, is a bit odd. I've seen the films, the characters jump quite frequently, especially in the heat of battle, yet for some strange reason, jumping is not permitted in the house of BioWare...why is this?

It seems that for all the effort that is put into details making characters realistic, story elements that make characters believable, and creating massive worlds that are meant to let players immerse themselves in universes of wonder and splendor, the fact that you can't jump presents a serious disconnect between the world and the player. Am I really supposed to suspend my disbelief and believe that I care about this world or its inhabitants when none of them are capable of performing a simple task such as jumping? It also makes me feel as if 'exploring' the world being presented is futile because I can't explore vertically, but only along a horizontal plane.

Sincerely,
Chief

The Difference between My Mom and Yours: A Stark Contrast

Note: This was a paper that I wrote for a class that I was never enrolled in. My room mate at the time submitted it annonymously for me. The paper is as follows:

The Difference between My Mom and Yours: A Stark Contrast

In looking at the various differences between humans in nature, the differences are plain to see to those with the naked eye. While the common man can spot the differences between other humans just by employing the thought process, taking two individuals and examining them together produces a stark contrast that may shock and perhaps amaze observers up to the task.

Take for example, the difference between my mom and yours. My mother is a fairly conservative woman who is also independent and has many rewarding qualities. Your mother on the other hand, is a dirty cockmongling whore dependant on her pimp to give direction in her life.

My mother has a job, though nothing that is as disgusting as the employment your mother has chosen. My mother wakes up early for the common 9 to 5 schedule, employs the same tasks day to day to ensure that her given objectives are complete before the day is done. The slut you lovingly refer to as ‘mom’ on the other hand wakes up every day in strange places, and is forced to sucks dick for a ride back into town where her workday will begin. She has a wide array of varied tasks that change from day to day. Whether its sucking cocks, doing anal, or fucking someone in the dirty men’s stall in the local eatery, your mother has all the bases covered for any task her customer might need, no matter how abstract or degrading.

My mother is happily married to a man with a respectable job. He travels day-to-day doing various tasks, employed and paid through the almighty tax dollar. Your mother is not married, but her deadbeat boyfriend does support her seven illegitimate children by selling crack cocaine on various street corners throughout the tri-state area while simultaneously evading local authorities. Though he might not make enough to support all of her children, your mother’s meager income supports the rest of the family needs. After a long day of fucking plunger handles in front of webcams and being bent over various bathroom appliances, your mother returns to her pimp, Dopetastic Bootywrangler III, who questions your mother’s daily take with a firm slap in the face. He then takes his fee, and shoves her out of his tricked out suburban back onto on the streets to go pick up his next big score. These methods are obviously not something my mother would tolerate, as one examining the situation can plainly see.

The comparisons go on and on, but through this simple examination, we have learned that through an examination of both my mother and yours that they are nothing alike. My mother is a kind, independent woman, happily married while your mother is a sick, twisted degraded whore who loves taking it in the cinnamon ring whenever she can get it, and that bitch doesn’t even get PAID. And that concludes my examination of my mother and the filthy, disease ridden cumdumpster you call your mother.

What is LA Like?

I cringe at the edge of the street, watching as self-important twatwaffles walk by with their upscale merch firmly gripped in one hand, while the other is used to hold a cell phone to their faces, spitting psychobabble into it about how their wealthy lives in upper-suburbia are spiraling out of control. From behind me the distinct clip-clop of high heels seizes me with fear as this creature looms over me, artificially heightened by her heels and trussed up hair. Her dull, listless gaze meets mine only for a moment and she attempts a smile, but it is blocked by her botox injected lips, and her plastic, readjusted face does not facilitate such emotions visually. Like soulless dolls they trudge about, touting accessory kits and worthless garbage in expensive bags, doused in makeup ordered from the far reaches of a dreadful cosmetics chain, scooped and applied from an industrial tub caking their face with layers and layers of toxic waste suffocating their own skin to a ghoulish grey tint cleverly disguised with spray on tans. the scent of hairspray and bad perfume assault the senses, even in the street you can smell them. They walk about like hollow shells, too self-absorbed and worry some about the fabricated mask they wear, they spend countless hours in front of the mirror, yet do not realize that they appear more like paintings from a distant past, far from any sort of reality, far from the image they envision in their minds. They appear sub-human to me, abnormal to the fullest extent. nothing relatable springs to mind, thus conversation is mind-numbing on a scale immeasurable.

This mind boggling display of fakery is not reserved solely for the women, much to the contrary, the men are just as horrendous, if not worse then the gender opposite. They strut about, blissfully ignorant of the laughter that must befall them behind their backs. Designer jeans hug their figure tight at the waist and ankles, leaving no breathing room for any genitals tightly crammed in them, elevating their vocal pitch several octaves. They adorn shirts 3 sizes too small, usually with the collar popped, and hair slicked up and stuck in place with styling gel or something sticky of that sort. They roam in packs, yet they all look the same. They talk about their clubs and friends with an all-important smugness, nose pointed directly north at all times. While they roam the streets often, you can usually find them hanging about the same clothing and cosmetics chains as the females, not hunting for the opposite sex, but shopping for similar cosmetic needs. There is hardly any muscle on them to speak of, or any fat for that matter. These things subsequently blur the line between the genders, and for me, I no longer classify them in that manner, I classify them together as an entirely new species that I can only hope becomes endangered or extinct in the not-too-distant future.

The landscape these creatures dwell in is also foreign in nature. The dense cloud of smog hugs the ground tightly, the sun shines through it painting the world around us a pale yellow color akin to urine. The heat makes the dry, brittle plants shrivel and turn the setting into nothing more than bland shades of brown and grey. It isn't abnormal for it to be set ablaze by the dry heat, and the fires rage very near to the homes of stubborn imbeciles more concerned with their material possessions than their physical safety, and they refuse to move out of the path of the approaching firestorm. The firefighters valiantly control the blaze, burning the mountaintops to ensure the fire doesn't make a second appearance, however the rains, though rare, will undoubtedly spawn mudslides in the same region where homes are built...the same place where people chose to have dwellings built to call their homes. This is nothing compared to the massive rumblings of the earth itself, as the ground quakes somewhat frequently, rocking the surrounding areas with such a destructive force that wrecks everything in its path without pity or remorse. Yet, strangely, through all this danger, devastation, and decimation, people seek to live their lives here, and bring children into the world here, and seek employment here...why any person would choose to dwell here considering the potential destructive consequences is truly a testament to the ignorance of the people that surround me.

When asked what LA is like, this small offering is but a fraction of the horrors to be encountered here, it simply is not possible to properly describe the amount of strange and terrible that has penetrated this place...so please, for the sake of all that is good, keep yourself from this place. The myth of wonder, splendor and opportunity are crushed under the weight of something much more sinister, much more nefarious. If you wish to save whatever scraps of humanity that remain within yourself you shall evade this place at all costs, for the curiosity that will bring you here is nothing compared to the crushing disappointment and anguish at the knowledge of what lurks in broad daylight.

Television? In My Videogames?

Often times when playing a game it becomes easy to lose yourself in the immersive worlds built for us without realizing the extent to which the world is built. I use the TV as a prime example. More often these days, as the technology evolves to accommodate extensive worlds which developers are able to build, sometimes the player is completely oblivious to the efforts of developers to place a TV in the game-world to make the world seem more complete. It’s not just enough to have a TV in a shop window. It has to display something to make it seem real. The ‘TV within a TV’ motif is used for plot device purposes in a ton of games.

This plot device can be explored in the PS3 exclusive game InFamous. Throughout the game, televisions can be spotted on top of buildings and in shop windows and passing by them will initiate News reports on current events spurned by your actions in the game, as well as random interruptions from an underground frequency hijacker spouting messages claiming your character is the root of all evil and that the citizens should be on the lookout. Even though these shows are meant to inform you that the world is watching your every move, and are placed perhaps to illicit a response they aren’t really all that necessary, and they even have text ads displayed on inactive TV’s for fake products like ‘Jamie’s Soda’ (now available in a 4 liter fun size!) and ads for toys (“toys with Lead-based paint now marked!”).
The TV plot device can also be seen in Mega-man 9, when Dr. Wily announces to the world that he is not responsible for the robot revolution and claims that Dr. Light (Mega-man’s creator) is responsible and broadcasts his bank account number on national television to suck funds from the public for his next nefarious scheme, to the shock and dismay of mega-man and his compatriots.

While the TV is mainly used for a plot device, usually involving a news flash informing the player that news crews and/or police are aware of your actions within the game to create a sense of urgency and tension, developers are taking a much more varied approach to the way television is represented in games. In Max Payne 2, walking by a TV will increase the volume to attract your attention to various shows, such as Lords and Ladies, a satire of ‘Upstairs Downstairs’ styled soaps, Dick Justice, a silly self-referential police drama that has a plot that mirrors the player’s experience through the main story of the first game, and Address Unknown, a twin peaks-inspired show. All of these shows are originally written content and serve no other purpose other than to make the world seem more real (and for comic relief in this case).

The game that takes the cake has got to be 2K Games’ shoot-em-up ‘the Darkness’ for X360/PS3. There are news flashes chronicling your misadventures, and at one point Uncle Paulie, head of the Franchetti crime family, sends you a videotaped message displayed on a TV acknowledging your betrayal and instructing the player to check the closet for an explosive surprise. Scattered throughout the game are various TV’s that let you change the channel to flip between news briefs, music videos (from real bands), episodes of the New Three Stooges, Popeye, Flash Gordon, and features not one, not two, not three, but SEVEN full length feature films available for you to watch in-game (to Kill a Mockingbird, Man with the Golden Arm, Nosferatu, The Street Fighter, the Return of the Street Fighter, Sister Street Fighter, and The Street Fighter’s Last Revenge). This has got to be the most in-depth television system in a game, and the appropriate licenses were obtained to broadcast this material without even instructing the player to pass a glimpse at the television set…you could own the game forever and never know this content was on the disc!

So why go through all the trouble dealing with licenses, creating original video content on top of a game that already has an extensive development cycle and making the TV seem real to us? Isn’t it enough to be playing ON a TV? Simply put, because it’s fun. It’s like an Easter egg, something to keep an eye on and appreciate. It is my personal belief that detail is what makes a good game a great game and little touches like this don’t go unnoticed by the veteran gamers out there. While I’ve mainly focused on the television, let’s also not forget touches like GTA Radio in the Grand Theft auto games have brought much-enjoyment, and while it isn’t exactly necessary to include features like that, it makes the world more believable and enjoyable. So the next time you play a game, keep an eye out, you might end up watching more TV than playing games.

Understanding Attraction

It’s no secret that opposites attract, and while most of the world is struggling to contain potential overpopulation, it is important to understand the mechanics of how and why people are attracted to one another and why stupid people breed in the first place. The opening scene of Mike Judge’s film Idiocracy paints a startling picture of the present, ultimately painting an even bleaker picture of the future in which stupid people multiply and those with high IQ’s have more complications conceiving thus resulting in less births spread across high IQs, producing a future population of idiots. Though this is a good setup to the film, one flaw immediately becomes apparent: shit doesn’t work like that most of the time. Sure, the human carnal nature to breed cannot be ignored and this can present some overpopulation concerns across all academic levels, but physical attraction is not taken into account, just the desire to ‘drink beer in massive quantities and fuck anything with legs in the back of my pickup’. It is on this missing area of information that we will focus on.

Understanding how attraction works sets up the problem list immediately. If there is one thing society has taught us it’s that first impressions really DO matter. If you were to attend a blind date you would doll yourself up to look your best right? This is misleading, as it would be more appropriate to show this person who you are on a normal day, and then they can use that as the basis for their judgment on you and whether or not they would like to continue dating you (the result of which will ultimately be a resounding ‘No’ on her part). So you look your best, tell your best jokes and anecdotes, wear that special pheromone cologne you ordered off the internet to seduce her and you’ve strapped a roll of quarters to your dick to make it seem larger…why hasn’t she called? What went wrong?

You obviously haven’t taken into account that she is doing the exact same thing (except the male enhancement treatment, unless you’re dating a tranny you dirty fucker). And since you are both opposites, and you’re both putting on a façade to look your best, you are not presenting who you really are and both become disinterested in one another (your inner desire to copulate says this isn’t true, ignore it, that’s just your penis reminding you that you haven’t had sex since 2003…that or the roll of quarters on your dick is cutting off blood circulation). I’ll use myself as an example:

I’m a total fucking asshole and I’m not afraid to admit it. My brain tells me when I’m with a woman that I should act nice to her, lest I scare her off on the first date. I’m subconsciously searching for my opposite. This creates a problem, because there is a woman in front of me pretending to want me to pay the check for her and play rough with her in the back of my Pontiac (a trademark staple of the asshole image). She’s really just a nice, independent girl looking to get verbally abused pretending to be an asshole, and I’m an asshole pretending to give a shit about what she says and pretending not to stare at her tits. So we’re presenting ourselves as something we’re not and failing hard at trying to woo one another because of it. So what now? She hasn’t called for another get together…time for plan B. Break out the liquor and make yourself look like a jackass in front of people you don’t know.

Over the ages, Liquor has been the X-factor, the unknown variable in how people are conceived. There’s no telling who you’ll wake up next to in the morning after a night of binge drinking. A night on the dance floor is no longer what it seems, it has become a hot, sweaty, loud platform in which females gyrate to attract males, and males flail around under flashing lights as a visual mating call. The liquor enhances this experience for both parties here. As the male spots a gyrating female on the floor, he will attempt to woo her not only with the sacred mating dance, but with the promise of more liquor. This intrigues the female, and the more she drinks the more her judgment is impaired, making the male appear more attractive. Inexorably, the male becomes self-confident the more he spends on booze, and finally whisks the female away to attempt to drive her to his home, where they will stumble about naked until thrusting themselves into a messy oblivion where both parties collapse and/or blackout as a result of both intoxication and exhaustion from the dance we lovingly refer to as ‘Tappin’ Dat Ass’.

In the morning, both parties awake suddenly to try and piece together fragments of memory to determine the course of actions of the night prior. The woman will wake to find a man in her bed, and wonder what he must think of her copulating on the first date. The man will wake as well, afraid to turn over and witness the horrors he had brought upon himself the night before. He will also wonder where his money went. The result is a slow and awkward process in which both parties are unsure of how to proceed. If the male turns over to discover that the woman he slept with that night isn’t a monstrous whale, he might regain some of his former confidence and try to exchange telephone numbers. This confidence, and the use of the word ‘baby’ at the end of every sentence, will turn the woman off completely. Conversely, if no exchange takes place the morning after, it is most likely that one of the two parties awoke in the middle of the night to pass out on the bathroom floor, or they awoke to the terror that is the bedroom and decided to flee, but not before stealing something of little or no value to them (but with significant sentimental value to you) upon their departure. One thing is certain, whoever drove there will leave to find their car parked curiously on the front porch, which is never good. 9 months later a child is born, a product of selfish sexual indulgence spurned by the alcohol induced mating ritual of the young adult. All of this because of attraction skewed in the drunken eyes of two people who weren’t really attracted to each other in the first place.

We can go on and on about liquor and its effects on the mating scene, but realistically it’s hard to find advice on putting yourself in the right situation to achieve the maximum potential for finding the proper mate. Sage advice for the ages: Stop being an idiot. Be yourself for real once in awhile, and stick with it. The guy or girl you hated on that first date is a faker, unsure of how to proceed with you. Stick with it and try to break them down and chisel away at that façade. That asshole you nice girls are looking for are probably nice guys underneath it all…find a nice guy instead, eventually he’s going to think you’re a bitch and fuck you up, and that’s what you were looking for anyway right? God you people are retarded…

Real World/Game World

For those unaware, I recently moved to Los Angeles where a wildfire is ravaging the Angeles national park only a few miles from where I’m staying. This is my first wildfire experience, but It’s interesting to watch how things progress. Trying to keep on task, we’ve been taking shifts to ensure we don’t miss any evacuation notices from local authorities, and being a night-owl gamer, I’ve offered to take the night shift watching for updates and notices while everyone sleeps.

While this seems like a tedious task, I find myself unafraid of the wildfire only a few miles from me, but I feel strangely comfortable instead, as if the sights of a wildfire spark up a hint of familiarity, as if I’ve been here before and I think I know why.

The smoke from the fire is making its way down the ridges just up the street, creeping into our neighborhood, and as it does tiny flecks of ash begin to fall all around me. As I sit in the patio chairs outside, the smell of burning wood seems out of place…perhaps that’s because I can’t smell burning woods through a television screen. The ash falling like snow, and the smoke, taking place of the dense fog that shrouds the mythical town of Silent hill, all bring back memories so real it haunts my imagination. I previously stated online, that I’m inclined to reach for a portable radio and a flashlight, and step into what is slowly becoming the familiar town I’ve trudged through before.

Even when I’m not outside, the objects in the house still remind me of the familiar, almost ghost-like environment outside. Taking the night shift, it’s pretty obvious that most of the lights are off in the house, making the rooms I walk into poorly lit, conjuring up more imagery of the town I remember so vividly. Led pipes line the garage walls, easily accessible for my venture out into the unknown. The kitchen has always been a good source of supplies; I could easily grab a kitchen knife instead. Even opening the fridge helps to make the situation even more real. As I peer into the fridge, I spy a plastic container filled with juice, and after reading the brand name and juice type, the label reads ‘health drink’ in tiny letters towards the bottom.

While the burning smell seems to bring the reality of the situation at hand closer, it does nothing to distract my imagination, as I’m instantly thinking about Alessa and her revenge birthed from the fires of Silent Hill in the 2006 film. I would imagine that this same smell inhabits the town, and I think the next time I pick up a controller to play, the scent will be forever burned into my brain associating it with Silent Hill. These things kind of distance me from the real dangers of the fire, but while thinking about where exactly the fire is moving, I suddenly remember that Toluca Lake, a body of water in the town of Silent hill, is a real place located here in California, though Silent Hill’s location is ambiguous (it has references to Maine, New England, and the film stated Silent Hill was located in West Virginia). I’m taking the fire seriously, but the comparison cannot be overlooked when it is so startlingly obvious. As the sun rises over the mountains here in California, the smoke seems to thin out a bit, transforming the scenery from a dark, brooding, fog and ash filled haze into a normal town like any other. Sound familiar?

The Doomtrain Racing Through My Brain

I've traveled to South Carolina at the request of my family for a vacation of sorts. I'm seated at an elongated table, Stars of red, white and blue on the tablecloth signify the coming holiday. To my right is a rigid mousepad, used primarily for competitive gaming. Sitting on it is my Microsoft mouse, hooked delicately via USB into my netbook, next to it a small bottle of Coke, a bag of sunflower seeds and a red plastic cup filled with the discarded shells. As my family stays outside in the hot sun, appearing jovial by the pool with each other, I find myself inside with a plan to write.

I've been discussing a story for the last week or so with a former co-worker who has become a good friend, and as I developed the character which the story will follow I realized how much I was going to enjoy the writing process for this particular story. I've already written the introduction, which is somewhat fast moving and descriptive enough to paint a vivid picture for the reader, this much I am happy with. however, this being the first real mystery story I've written and planned with such ambition, I find myself a bit perplexed at fitting the pieces of the story together. A rough outline has been typed, though I hardly glance at it, as the plot is steadily evolving in my mind. I see the story in a most peculiar way.

The story is like a train. The main character is the conductor, and moves the plot from station to station picking up cars hauling new additions to the plot along the way, unraveling the mystery piece by piece with each addition to the train. Characters are aboard the cars, filling their respective purposes in the story, boarding the train at different intervals. As the train moves along, I'm having trouble finding the points in the story that connect the cars together. A car must be linked to another for the train to move successfully along the tracks. I fear this story may be too complex for my brain to handle, effectively derailing the story and passengers aboard this train of sorts. Will I be able to deliver the train to its intended destination, or is this simply a doomtrain, destined to crash and burn?

This analogy, as well as the story arcs and characters, have been swirling in my head the last several days. I've set this time aside for myself to concentrate on this story as a relaxation tool to clear my head, yet the complexities of this massive beast, spitting black smoke into the sky as it increases speed along the tracks, seems to slow the process of actually writing the story down and cloud my mind. No matter, I've already determined that I will finish this story, just how I will approach it seems to be an altogether different affair.

An Annonymous Thesis

The following is a thesis paper I had a friend turn in for me annonymously to a class she was taking a few weeks ago. I'm not enrolled in the class, I just did it for shits and giggles. Enjoy

It’s All your Fault; Why Shit’s Fucked
By The Chief

Throughout the early months of 2009, many Americans are struggling to understand exactly what is going on in our country. A lot is happening in our nation today, and topics that are too complex in nature for the common man to grasp are a nearly common occurrence. It’s no secret: Shit’s fucked. Ask a passerby on the street why he thinks the nation is in a recession and you’re likely to get a blank stare, or recite some long-winded piece they memorized from an article in a publication from their favorite political media assclown parading around as an ‘investigative journalist’. Between the recession, prison overpopulation, overzealous religious fanatics (Read: Idiots), the housing market collapse, the auto industry taking a shit and crime rates unnecessarily skyrocketing, American’s have a lot on their plate…or so they’re told. So it is my intent, here in this thesis paper, to touch on a few of these topics for those who obviously can’t get their heads out of the asses in which they are firmly placed.

The recession plaguing our nation has been in the making a long time, though most really never saw it coming. American’s today seem to be so consumed by their own trivial everyday lives to even bother notice when the economy starts tumbling down like a retarded kid at cheerleading tryouts. The lack of regulation in place signifies two things:

1. Our government was completely happy not monitoring or regulating companies that manipulated loopholes and people for pure profit and

2. The average person is so stupid they couldn’t even question why a family that breeds knee deep in Budweiser cans in the back of a rusty Toyota truck bed 7 times can afford a loan for a $600,000 house and still have leftover cash for a carton of Jacks, a 6-pack and the 200 channel Nascar Super package from DirecTV.

When you attempt to take out a loan, the bank runs through their magic number-crunching process and determines if you are eligible for a loan. This is usually determined by your FICO score, or credit rating. The lower the rating, the less eligible you are for a loan. Those who met the requirements for a loan were ‘prime’ candidates. Those like our aforementioned friend bubba, who do not meet the requirements, are turned away…or at least that’s how it USED to work. Now they’re considered ‘sub-prime’, and even though they are more likely to default on their loan and not pay money owed to the bank, the bank stamps the seal of approval on the loan anyway. This gives people like bubba a better chance at being a homeowner, at the risk of the bank (and now the taxpayer, ala federal bailouts). Oh, but it gets better…

Several years ago after fed chairman Alan Greenspan lowered the interest rate to 1% as a result of September 11th and other factors, investors looking for a safe investment and wanting a better return stopped buying from the fed and decided that it would be a good idea to get connected with homeowners. A mortgage lender would sell the mortgages to bankers, who would sell the individual mortgages to investors who would then get the mortgage payments from homeowners. It was a great deal for them at the time, they had hundreds of homeowners paying their mortgages directly to them and lining their pockets, but they wanted more mortgages. So the mortgage lenders sent out their brokers and let them give loans to consumers considered ‘sub-prime’ because the prime candidates who could afford to get loans and own homes already did.

After some time, the ‘sub-prime’ homeowners would default on their mortgage. No big deal for the investors, they owned thousands of them and were still getting cash flow from other active mortgages. Unfortunately over time most of the homeowners eventually defaulted, and the price of houses began to fall so fast, prime candidate homeowners were left wondering why they were paying for a $500,000 mortgage when the house was only worth $60,000. So they got smart and ditched it for better prospects. The investors stopped buying the mortgages, the banker got shafted with the mortgages he couldn’t sell off, and the lenders couldn’t sell what they had left over leaving everyone with a ton of debt that no one could pay off. The misconception is that it was a good idea in theory. The truth is that you’d have to be a mental fucktard to even think about taking part in a scheme like this. How can you give thousands of dollars to someone you KNOW isn’t going to pay it back? It all backfired and kick-started the recession and our government sat back and watched it all happen. It was only after everything collapsed when talks of regulation started and now the taxpayers are paying for it in the form of bailouts and stimulus packages.

The first question you should be asking yourself is “How did I not see it coming?” The media has been making things so complex that the average American is audibly familiar with the terms ‘sub-prime mortgages’ and ‘default credit swaps’ but have no idea what it really means. You may as well be shouting Cantonese. The second question you should ask yourself is why any person would take out a loan they couldn’t afford. Just because you get approved for a loan doesn’t instantly make it a good decision, especially for people like bubba. No one spoke up, no one read further into it, and no one seemed to mind giving or taking the loans from the start of this sloppy affair. The housing collapse, and the start of what would become the recession, is your fault.

Well now that we’re knee deep in the recession, what of the auto industry? Simply put, we don’t want their shitty fiberglass gas guzzlers anymore. The cars being made now aren’t like the cars of old. Cars used to be built with solid steel frames, solid engines and decent fuel economy. Now we have SUV’s and Hummers made of cheap, brittle fiberglass rolling around like they own the road sucking down 6 gallons of gas per inch, all so some guy with penis envy can feel like a real man again. Even the so-called ‘green cars’ are only green to the manufacturer’s marketing division.

Although you would love to believe that this green revolution in the auto industry has something to do with companies taking bold strides in the right direction for the future of our species, but since we’re dealing with slimy, scumbag corporate types, it’s just profiteering at the behest of demand. Take the Prius for instance. In Japan the Prius gets 66 miles per gallon, here in the states, it gets 42. Even though it’s a hybrid, the fuel economy standards have hardly been touched since recently, as they were last adjusted to 27.5 miles per gallon in 1990. Everyone started buying these cars to save money on gas and get decent gas mileages not even realizing a better, more efficient type of the exact same car was already built in another country. In addition, There was an attempt in California to crack down on the emissions standards for vehicle manufacturers, lobbyists pressured the state emissions board to scrap the idea (and happened to vanquish GM’s precious EV-1, the mildly successful Electric car…though GM would never admit to an ‘success’ the car may have had). Auto manufacturers tried afterwards to push for Hydrogen Fuel Cells, but the facts about the technology make things worse for the consumer than ever before. It’s expensive to manufacture and therefore more expensive to purchase, you have to have a refueling system in place before the cars go out on the market that would cost billions and quite frankly, the technology to mass-produce these vehicles isn’t quite here yet. The cost of the fuel would cost more than gasoline in the summer of 2007, when gasoline reached record prices across the country. Not to mention the corporate heads at the oil companies make too much money to just abandon their flagship product, they are looking for a product that can be sold at the same rate as gasoline, if not higher, instead of just abandoning it (and their profits). Hydrogen cells seem to fit this description.

Even now, as the auto industry struggles to meet the demand of those wanting green, fuel-efficient cars, we can trace the problem right back to the EV-1. It was a fully-functioning electric car. It was endorsed by celebrities including tom hanks and Mel Gibson, and was driven on the road by commoners until the lease ran out. When the leases were up General Motors, fearing the car was becoming too popular, decided not to renew the leases on the vehicles and took the perfectly good, functioning cars and crushed them to dust at their testing facility in California. Where was the green movement then? Where was the big push for fuel economy and better living and driving standards when General Motors decided there wasn’t enough ‘demand’ for the car and scrapped every last one of them. Where was the talk of our addiction to foreign oil from news networks and political pundits? No one spoke up. After seeing the fuel spike in 2007, most people would love to have electric cars, and the EV-1 debuted in 1996! The technology could’ve been made widely accessible by now. Battery technology has come so far now that the car could have tripled its driving distance and would have been a perfect car for those who care about the environment and their wallet. But, according to GM, the ‘demand’ wasn’t there. Why is the auto Industry failing? Why are so-called ‘Green’ cars unavailable or nonexistent on the showroom floor? It’s your fault.

Not that it would matter much. After buying your shiny new ‘green’ car, some punk at a red light is likely to smash your window and throw your hippie, tree-fucking ass out on the pavement and steal your ride. Our society has its own head stuffed so far up its own ass people can’t see what’s right in front of them half the time, or at least what’s important. Information is distorted and packaged, making cases of fear out of trivial events and spouting opinion as facts. Since the fairness doctrine was abolished in 1987, and since the arrival of the post-September 11th 24 hour news networks, news is biased, packaged, and sometimes blatant lies that media consumers gladly eat up like Rosie O’Donnell at a buffet on half-price Wednesday. No one ever asks where the solid evidence is contained in a news story that is presented to them; it’s just “the news”, it is to be trusted. Now because of the ignorance of the common man, and the will of news media to manipulate them, our country is harshly divided between the right and left, the red and blue. Words like ‘socialism’, and ‘Marxist’ are thrown around on a daily basis, but like the terms in the housing market, people have not the slightest idea what those words mean, just that they are being used to paint a negative picture of political figures and agendas…how can you know if a political figure is doing good for your country if you’re calling someone a term you don’t know the definition of? We could delve further into this particular situation, but it really doesn’t matter. The matter at hand is that the opinion of others is regarded as fact, simply because it’s on the television and people are stupid enough to believe it without looking at the evidence. This makes the masses uninformed, vapid, loudmouthed, mentally challenged twits who think their opinion is absolute and incorruptible when they really only got those opinions from someone else distributing opinion as the truth (rendering their opinion false and irrelevant because it isn’t their own opinion to begin with). A news network is different from an opinion network. How can a network have a slogan like “fair and balanced” or “the most trusted name in news” when there is no system in place to give equal time to the opposing side of ANY story? If police did this, and didn’t look at the hard facts and evidence, you could get locked up at any time or place for doing nothing, just because someone had a negative opinion of you. Scary, isn’t it? Whatever happened to the hard-hitting investigative journalist, out to get the big scoop and deliver ‘just the facts’? They are nonexistent in our society. What does that tell you about the way we handle news in this country?

What’s even worse is that what is considered newsworthy these days is laughable (especially overcompensating loudmouth dickheads like Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly and Jim Cramer). Extended coverage of parades, high-speed car chases, petty thefts and other such nonsense takes up more space than important issues like poverty, laws and bills being passed by the government and especially the men and women overseas dying while at war protecting our right to freedom (as the media likes to say) while simultaneously disregarding the right to know the whole story. They ask for ‘the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth’ in court for a reason, not ‘your side of the truth, it doesn’t have to be the whole thing, and you can throw in a bit of misleading information too’. Wouldn’t you want the same qualities in a news organization?

The fact that those idiotic and exaggerated stories like celebrity breakdowns and vengeful couples take up more time than important events just undermines the true meaning and relevance of more important stories, and because of this the news networks are slowing down the progress of our society. Think about that for a second. The news networks are a roadblock on the path of societal evolution and are blocking the path forward towards prosperity. Is that such a hard concept to grasp? But, I shouldn’t be telling you any of this, it’s my opinion and you’ll take it and spin it around as your own and tell others how things are and should be…naturally it’s all your fault.

I could go on and on about issues infecting our nation with plight and unrest, but the details would make this paper drag on and on about things the common person (yourself included) wouldn’t be interested in hearing. The importance of details has eluded us. We never look at the fine print; it’s always sign on the dotted line. Health care, homelessness, hunger, poverty, education, unemployment, crime rates, financial instability, who runs our government…even the details of our own constitution and bill of rights that details our liberties as Americans are overlooked, guessed, distorted, misrepresented and forgotten by everyday people like you and I. the fact that they are overlooked is troubling, not because people become blissful ignorant fools by just expecting “someone else to fix it”. They are troubling to those who are unaware because the people that are aware take advantage of these people, and to a certain degree those people deserve it. But just like a festering disease, this infection is spreading to the brain of our nation and smothering it. Instead of playing the infinite blame-game, why not admit that everything that is wrong with our country you ALLOWED to happen. Admit that it is your fault; admit that you’ve done nothing until now. Don’t settle for what others tell you, stand up and be counted. Demand solutions, our elected officials are at your command. Become aware, make others aware. There are many issues that require the attention of all people in our country, and as it stands things look like shit. But it can be fixed, you can fix it…after all, it’s all your fault.

Film Critics and Social Perception Over Time

After re-reading the classic graphic novel Watchmen, I decided to give it a shot at the theatre with Zack Snyder's recent film adaptation of the aforementioned work. To a certain degree, I came in with mid-range expectations expecting the film to be nothing more than a special effects extravaganza (which it is). Suprisingly, the film pulls it off wonderfully. I won't go into much detail here, but the film tries to mirror the book almost perfectly, pulling references in every shot. It's a fan's dream come to life. As of this writing, I've seen it 3 times. Granted, a lot of content was cut out, but the movie is already almost 3 hours long, so in the interest of a reasonable moviegoing experience I can forgive that (plus I hear a lot of that content is going in the DVD release, so don't despair fans!)

Having said that, I've been reading reviews of the film left and right, watching as critics bash Zack Snyder's style and cardboard performance of Malin Akerman (Silk spectre II in the film), and while those accusations are true to a certain degree, my personal opinion is that Jackie Earl Haley's performance as Rorschach was perfect and well-rounded, and other characters like the Comedian add depth to the story and make up for its shortcomings. The soundtrack seems oddly placed, but critics obviously won't understand that the music is a direct reference to the book (which they keep referencing as a masterwork, though i'm doubtful they've even read it). Songs like All Along the Watchtower, The Sound of Silence, and The Times They Are a' Changin seem perfectly placed to me, a break of pace from the somber orchestrated melancholy a composer would have filled those auditory spaces with. I get it, critics won't get the book to film translation. I suppose I can respect that, I think what I'm getting at is that they don't expect a film like this from Zack Snyder, director of 300 and Dawn of the Dead, but Critics' words DO have influence (as evidenced by Watchmen's 60% decrease in ticket returns the following weekend after opening).

As I think about this, I urge consumers to think for themselves. I remember a time, when 300 first came out and you weren't a MAN if you didn't like that movie. Not literally of course, but the movie in HD is a moving painting, and while the color palette doesn't range very far, the crimson red of a spartan uniform stands out. It spawned internet Memes left and right (some still ongoing, I'm looking at you Annonymous!). And while it seemed like everyone loved 300, now I'm hearing people say 'what a crock of shit', seemingly because critics are quick to pan the film NOW when it's irrelevant and they need to prove a point pertaining to the film they are reviewing (in this case, relating 300 to watchmen through their director).

why are we so quick to put off our favorite things just because someone else says it's bad. I think it's a social problem myself. If all your friends said eating dog shit was all the latest rage and that food from Ruby Tuesdays was terribly put together (even though you all ate at Ruby Tuesdays without complaint last week), would you shovel dog shit into your mouth? This is partially why I don't like to follow critics. I've had a longstanding 'invisible war' with Roger Ebert over his opinions on video games as art, and I enjoy the challenge of debate enough to continue it whenever the subject arises. I won't get into that here (that's another article altogether), all i'm saying is stop shoveling dog shit into your mouth and go see watchmen, who knows, you might actually like it (watchmen, not eating shit)

Recession, Depression, and Why the Bailouts Won't Work

By now I'm sure most of you are aware of the current economic downturn in the United States that began to show itself at the end of 2007. 2009 is here and the problem still has not been fixed, leaving Americans scratching their heads in confusion. It would seem that the end of the Presidential race took the focus away from the economy as Obama Mania set in, and McCain supporters scrambled to catch up. There was a short burst in-between when McCain suspended his campaign to go help fix the economic downturn with bailout negotiations in Washington, but not only did that do little to no good, but it was made to look like the bailout would solve the country's problems, when it was really only sweeping our problems under the rug. What it really did was make investors look at how much free money was being given out 'just because the economy is bad' and make them beg like hungry dogs for the government to give them money to pull them out of the slump.

For one to understand exactly why our country is in a recession, you have to understand how the system works. Sure, we know the buying/selling of debt by banks and other financial institutions put them in the position they are/were in, but if you ask a normal American citizen on the street why our country is in a recession, you'll probably get a blank stare or a general statement about how money just wasn't well spent in some areas, or that the government just didn't act swiftly to rectify the economic situation. In some cases you may not get an answer at all. It's important to understand why the country is in such financial disarray so that once it's fixed we can ensure it doesn't happen again.

The reason the bailout will fail is simple. Money isn't just created out of thin air. when the government says they're giving out free money to save an institution, such as Banks or Automakers, what they are saying is that they'll order newly printed money to supply those companies with. The money is ordered from the Federal Reserve. Don't be fooled by the name 'federal reserve', it is neither a financial institution, nor does it hold reserves of money. It is a private bank, the only private bank in the country allowed to print the country's money. Because it is a private bank, when the money is ordered the Federal Reserve treats it like a loan. for every dollar printed, an interest rate is applied and over time this amount must be paid back to the private owners of the federal reserve. That means that every single last dollar in the country automatically has debt attached to it. how does the government pay the loan back? Tax dollars of course!

the current bailout plan is aiming dangerously close to $7 Trillion, which means that when the federal reserve wants its money back, it will cost MORE than the original $7 trillion ordered to begin with, and YOU will have to pay for it with your tax dollars. what startles me is that no one in this country seems to care. Doesn't it bother you that companies are getting your hard earned dollars, and not just a small amount of it, but SEVEN TRILLION of it? It bothers me...it bothers me a LOT.

Most of the companies involved in the bailout are financial institutions that made bad financial decisions and as a result were forced to ask for money. The resulting economic downturn forced consumers to tighten their budget, forcing auto manufacturers to make massive layoffs (they aren't the only ones though, we're down several million jobs as of December 2008) and subsequently ask for money, for fear of complete collapse of their respective companies. If I don't pay my electric bill, the lights get cut off. If a small business owner can't make the payments on the lease, the shop gets closed down. You can't just appeal to the government to hand out taxpayer dollars to help you out "just because". These companies made terrible financial decisions, bought and sold debt, gave multi-million dollar bonuses to CEO's, flew in expensive private Jets and spent money all over the place. they couldn't sacrifice any ONE of those things, or at least adjust their budget from the approaching problems they must have foreseen?

Companies folding is how our system works. If you don't make enough money to pay the bills, you close shop. It's that simple. If you spend money unwisely, eventually it's going to catch up to you. This is the system flushing itself out, and needs to take place. the system is clogged and unable to clean itself now that the government has decided to bail out these companies, and supply the country with a stimulus package to keep these companies afloat. It's a temporary solution that needs closer examination and restructuring, and I'll tell you right now friends, it's going to be a HELL of a lot worse later on. When the country has fixed itself, the money is flowing freely, and everyone is finally happy, the reserve will call on you to return the trillions of dollars, plus interest, and it will come from your paycheck.

And who said the bailout was going swimmingly? Some aren't even disclosing how they are spending billions of your dollars already!. According to this article executives at Insurance giant AIG spent almost $500,000 dollars of the bailout money they received on a vacation to a spa in California! This is how your money is being spent, and the sad part is, you're not even doing anything about it. Doesn't that make you angry? If it doesn't, it should.

-The Chief

Reverse Porn

it takes a lot to be a total douchebag, but I pull it off rather nicely. I don't think it's been mentioned on the show, but I began making what I lovingly refer to as 'reverse porn' (taking a pornographic picture and making it 'work safe', or non-pornographic'). Since I'm a sick, twisted fucker (and i'm sure most of our listeners are as well) I put the photos up on my personal Deviantart page for mass consumption. The internet is a strange place, i'm just here to help

I took these photos to Walgreens and got them developed and I'm going to start keeping a scrapbook of all of these for those who get curious at my house. The pictures are pretty funny, and I'm an absurdist at heart. Comments are appreciated.

-Chief

Why I Am Becoming a Dick

Pardon the title, this is primarily about Ebay.

I've been going a little nuts lately, I'll admit, buying up everything I see on Ebay. It's not too bad, as I tend to search for exactly what I want and watch a whole bunch of auctions, searching for the best price rather then doing general searches and buying a whole bunch of things I didn't even want in the first place. Nevertheless, I still manage to spend quite a bit and I've just started selling a bunch of things to get money into my Paypal account so I don't go spending my entire checking account.
But this isn't about my online spending habits, this is about shitty sellers. I myself, when I sell an item, am very descriptive and cover ever loose end I can think of. I detail my policy on bidding, packing, shipping and feedback and make sure to mention every defect pertaining to the listed item.
Some sellers however, if not many, choose their words carefully in order to mislead buyers. They make the listing look better than it is so the item will sell for more. Additionally, they will offer flat rate shipping, which will often be more than parcel or first class because chances are, they are selling off single items they initially purchased in lots. There's nothing wrong with re-selling, especially in the online market, but a few cases I encountered recently are worth mention.

All My Gameboys Have Battery Covers

For whatever reason, I decided that I wanted to collect Gameboy Colors. I wanted to have one of each initially released color and maybe a few special editions. My only prerequisite for such a purchase was that it would have to be an official GBC in decent working condition and have all of its original parts, including the original battery cover, or same colored cover.
For some ungodly reason, the majority of Gameboy owners in the world have managed to lose the battery cover for their GBC. Nearly half of all auctions I found stated that the Gameboy was missing its battery cover, so I would move on to another which either pictured the back of the system with the battery cover or stated that it had the battery cover.
I came across one particular auction for a red Gamboy Color. I was not aware that a Red GBC was made (only a Red GB Classic and GB pocket) so I was intrigued. In the picture of the system it definitely looked to be a deep, rich red and it came with a Gameboy Camera. It had a Buy It Now! price of $24.99 so I figured why not.
A few days later I received the system in an unpadded envelope. When I opened it up, the GBC, with GB Camera inserted into it, was wrapped only by a folded piece of corrugated cardboard with tape around it. I let this slide, then carefully removed the cardboard to find that the system did indeed have a battery cover - a yellow one.
Logic would insist that when listing an item, especially a piece of electronics, a replacement part should be mentioned, more so if that part differs to some large degree from the original. This auction simply stated that all of the systems included battery covers, neither mentioning nor hinting towards the fact that they include unofficial, mis-matched, replacement covers.
Long story short, I sent a message to the seller stating that I would like a refund or a replacement battery cover since they failed to mention this in the auction. Initially, the seller told me there was nothing they could do. After I mentioned the possibility of opening a dispute and a few more messages back and forth, the seller magically found an official red GBC battery cover, complete with 800 number for Nintendo Customer Service. And on top of that, it was not red at all, it was Berry Pink, which I had already ordered and received from another seller.
I suppose I should have done my research and known that there was no such thing as a red Gameboy Color but that wasn't my issue.

Will You Please Send Payment for $22.22

This one really boggles the mind.
I won two auctions from the same seller. The listing for each item quoted a $9.99 flat rate fee from Canada to anywhere in the U.S., however, in the auction description was stated that shipping would be $5.99 to anywhere in the U.S. for each game.
Most sellers will combine shipping, especially when they offer a flat rate box, which will cost them no extra to throw in a few more items.
Both of the items I won were Super Nintendo games: Killer Instinct and Starfox. I won KI for $0.99 and SF for $1.25 for a total of $2.24. Add in the flat rate shipping and you got $12.23, and that is exactly what the invoice in my email said.
I clicked the pay now button as I always pay immediately following an auction (or directly after the last auction won from the same seller who combines shipping) and was taken to Ebay, where I found an invoice for $14.22. I paused, since it didn't match the initial invoice, then figured that they were charging the $5.99 for each game, as by weight. Fine, I thought, that was in the auction.
When I moved on to the next step, I found the final invoice which requested a total $18.22. Now I was beginning to wonder. Apparently, between the time I viewed the last invoice and this one, the seller had sent a new invoice charging me a $9.99 flat rate shipping fee for one game and the $5.99 shipping for the other. Since this made absolutely no sense, I decided to send the seller a message asking what was going on. No sooner than I was able to compose a message did I find a message from the seller in my inbox. I opened the message to find the following:

Hi,

I would ask you to please pay separately for the 2 items you bought which means pay 11.24$ (cost of the item and shipping cost included) for StarFox and 10.98 for Killer Instinct (cost of the item and shipping cost included)for a total of 22.22$. Thank you

I didn't know what to think anymore. Between the email I initially received, the invoice on Ebay, the statement on Paypal and this message I was quoted four different prices for my auction, all amounting to a ten dollar difference!
Needless to say, I replied to this message. But I didn't think that was enough. I first contacted Ebay to alert them of this particular seller and their shady shipping practices. After a few messages, the seller agreed to a total payment of $12.23 and within a week I had the games, but still...

When I Bought It I Was Told That They Were Real

This happened to me today.
I won an auction for a Sega Dreamcast, which included the system, a/v cable, power cord, two controllers, two memory cards and 33 games. Great deal, I thought, when I won the auction for $51.
Today I received the package and the very second I opened it I stopped - every single game in this lot was an illegal copy, and not only were they copies - they were horribly made copies. It was almost as if they didn't even try to make them look good.
First off, they were copied on to CD-R's with blue bottoms, which I haven't even seen available for purchase since 2003. Currently, most rewritable cd's have silver bottoms. Secondly, the center of each disc was clear, with no graphic on it whatsoever, a clear sign that the disc was not inscribed professionally. Additionally, there were clearly printable labels on the discs, printed from shitty resolution images in even shittier quality and I could see the bands from the print head which apparently was running out of ink at the time they were forged. They didn't even bother using printable cd's, which I use for my own music and they look pretty convincing.
And if that wasn't bad enough, the graphics themselves, including titles and text ran right off the edge of the labels. Pitiful.
Essentially, not a single aspect of these fakes was remotely convincing and this seller still claimes that he had no idea they were copies. He said he bought them from someone who told him they were real, which after you think about it for awhile you have to wonder further how, if he thought to ask if they were real, did not inspect them closer which would have inevitably brought him to realize that they were not. Not to mention, half on the games work poorly, if at all. One of the games, Dead or Alive 2 to be exact, has an image scanned from the original game disc printed on it, and its horribly mis-aligned with the label. I honestly have never seen anything like this before.
I lost it. I was a little bit of an asshole to the other two sellers but this one I full on threatened to contact the Internet Crime Investigation Department (or whatever they're called).
As it stands now, I asked him to propose a solution before I contact ebay, Paypal and whomever else I find necessary to contact. Before I sent my last message he had yet, after 3 messages sent, to offer a solution, so I decided to make my own. I told him to refund me half the amount of the auction and send $10.00 for shipping. In the end he will have made only $15 from the auction and I will have gotten a Sega Dreamcast, a/v and power cables, 2 controllers and 2 memory cards for $25.50 plus shipping. I still feel swindled but I will get some level of satisfaction knowing that I was not fooled, rather simply lied to.

Whatever you, the readers, choose to draw from this, I hope it helps you all to avoid situations like these that I have mentioned or at the very least, helps some of you deal with them in a way to be most beneficial to you.

Letter to anyone interested in setting up local rock shows.

Dear Friend,

I live in a one-horse town and I have done lots of shows here and in the surrounding waist land. You can do shows at community centers, firehouses, through schools, at parks (summer is a great time for outdoor show), community theaters etc. Out here we do what we call barn parties. Find someone with a big open field set up like a make shift stage, run electricity out from the house or barn, set up your PA system. People love barn parties and they usually get a pretty good turn out as long as they’re not to far out of the way. I got involved through an open mike here in town. Most business (including Starbucks) will let you host acoustic “shows,” which can provide a great opportunity to meet and network with people who are interested in music. There are lots of possibilities.

Don’t let the fact that you don’t have a local nightclub stop you from setting up shows. Sometimes those places can be very selective, and dominate the scene with one genre, and making introducing new music into the scene that much harder.

Rock, Punk, and Metal have never been well expected by the mainstream. The DIY attitude is an integral part of the underground scene. Creating alternatives to mainstream out lets is part of hardcore. Everyone involved in the hard rock subculture that has sprung up since the Harlem Renaissance is proud to be deviating from popular culture. Defying the bureaucracy of the establishment is part of our collective identity. If we weren’t the innovators of the music industry we wouldn’t be on the cutting edge.

If you want to read a great book about the origins of the hardcore scene in our area, read: “Get in the Van” by Henry Rollins. You can buy the book here at InterPunk or on Amazon:
http://www.interpunk.com/item.cfm?Item=47768&.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Get-Van-Henry-Rollins/dp/1880985764

If you’re not into reading, there is a documentary out on the history of hardcore music (based on the book) called “American Hardcore” You can watch the trailer and buy the DVD from the website:
http://www.americanhardcoremovie.com/

It will give you some great insight into how this whole crazy thing got started.

Sincerely,

-Dara

Dr. Uwe Boll To Stop Making Films?

According to an article posted on JoBlo.com, Uwe Boll, maker of some of the worst movies ever made, stated in an interview that if the petition for him to stop making movies reaches 1 Million signatures, he will stop making movies. I myself have already signed this petition. Why? I had to sit through 'House of the Dead" and it is without a doubt the worst movie I have ever seen in my entire life. I wish that film upon the eyes of no one. So I urge you, Sign the petition!

This Will Be Boring or Useful

So at my job (and at does not pertain to a where, since I do not go anywhere for my job, I work from home) I optimize websites for search engines. To some of you, that may sound interesting, others will not know what that means nor will they care. Regardless, this is more commonly known as Search Engine Optimization, or SEO.

Try as I might to practice this on my own website, or at least all those crazy sites like Myspace, deviantART and Fickr to which I contribute samples of music and art that I create, it's difficult to do without spending money.

Ever wonder why you can type a search term into Google's search engine and find something that seems much less related to the thing you're looking for?

How It Works

Google has become such a successful website because the algorythm they use is very complicated, measuring nearly every last possible piece of information on the internet to determine which pages show up first on their searches.

The first step is measuring key word relevance. Based on what was typed in, Google searches its database for those words or that word. These keywords are found on the websites themselves as the following:

1) Title Tags - text which will appear at the top of the browser window and on searches
2) Header Tags - those which are denoted as titles of sub-sections (H1, H2, H3, etc.)
3) Body Text - as pertaining to the header and title tags, words in the body that relate
4) Links - those typicially blue and/or underlined words that take you to other pages
5) Meta Tags - hidden tags that do not show up on a rendered html site

It should be noted that meta tags are not as useful as they once were. This is where Google shines. The google algorythm is key in discarding meta tag information on web pages. The reason being, too many people were abusing the ability to add lots of keywords to a page that could not be seen by viewing the page in a browser. This is called keyword stuffing.

The rest of these, however, are very relevant to Google's searches, as they point to actual information on the page.

The second step is to measure the importance of the page itself. If any of you have the Google Toolbar installed in your browser, you will find a little green bar that measures page rank. This is how Google assigns importance. How do they decide? They have a cock measuring contest!

No, seriously...think about how we measure the importance of people in the world. Basically, it's by who they know, how important the people they know are, what they can do, how useful they are to the rest of us, how good looking they are, how much money they make, what they wear, what car they drive, etc. While this may not be applicable in every case, it should serve as a decent analogy to help you understand how Google decides which pages are important. This is also where the line between ON-site and OFF-site SEO is drawn.

In A Nutshell

Joe Shmo creates a personal website with information about videogames. He mentions a lot of useful things, has a well designed site, properly uses header tags, and his body text is rife with information relevant to videogames. Even his title contains the text 'Video Games'. However, no one else on the internet thinks highly enough of his website to link to any of his webpages. Real world comparison: he has no friends, no professional references and a small dick. Poor shmuck.

Now let's look at IGN.com. They are ranked 7/10 by Google. I don't have the exact statistics for their site, but you can imagine how many blogs, websites, myspace pages, partners, etc are linked to them. Not to mention, many of the websites which link to the site have ranking websites. Real world comparison: they are informative, relevant and have lots of friends, including many famous musicians and actors - like me, see, I just linked to them and I rule!

Google ranks itself 10/10. How selfish, but how appropriate. The main reason for this is...well, let's be honest, there should be no question as to how the most well known website in the world is the most important. But on top of these things, Google has set up a vast network of advertising tools that billions upon billions of companies, professionals and single people use to improve their own relevance on the internet. This is Google AdWords, which I also use from time to time.

However, SEO has to do with the natural search. This is the main list of results that shows up after you type in your keyword and click the little button that says "search" on it. AdWords results show up on the right side of the natural search results, under "Sponsored Links". Sponsored!? Yeah, because people are paying for them :-P

Making Friends

SEO isn't exactly free. So what better way to gain popularity than by buying it! There are a few ways to do this:

1) Buy Links - many websites will put a link to your website for a one-time, monthly or yearly fee, of which a one time fee is the best and buying links from higher ranked pages is optimal, however more expensive.
2) Submit Press Releases/Articles - websites like PR.com, PRweb.com and PRleapfrog.com have relatively high page ranks. For a fee of $100 - $600 one can purchase a corresponding level of online visibility. Sites like eZine.com and ArticleDashBaord.com are free, however some require a setup fee or something minimal for using the service. Both are good options, but the key is to vary your submissions and the keywords written into each one.
3) Buy Blog Posts - thats right, for all you know, I'm writing this for my own firm! But no, I don't get paid to perform SEO on my own companies site, I get paid to do it for our clients' websites. But there is one site imparticular, PayPerPost, which connects professional bloggers and SEO related professionals in order to provide an easy exchange. With these sites, I offer money to bloggers to post about the topic I choose, using a link to a website I specify, with as many words as I decide, etc. Basically, i set the parameters and the price and the bloggers are free to choose. I also set the restrictions so, for example, Blogger.com in ineligable. Sorry!


One last thought here. One more thing that Google serves as is the Internet Police. That's right, if they find some webmaster getting out of hand with their SEO practices and such, key word stuffing, etc., they will not hesitate to punish them. How do they do this? By penalizing their page rank, of course! You might be thinking, how mean! Well, this only helps ensures a safer, more relevant internet. Suck it up. Google PWNS you!



Anyways, now that I've officially bored and/or informed you, I'm out!

Also, don't bother clicking any links in this post - they all go to my Myspace page :-)
Happy late April Fools! (I'm a dick, I know)

Economy not a Problem for Gamestop

While American consumers find themselves wondering what will happen after the current housing crisis, or when gas prices will drop, they sure aren't wondering about how to entertain themselves. According to this article posted on CNN, while the economy seems to be in a slump, video game retailer Gamestop is seeing growth like never before.

The company says the growth can be attributed to consoles like the Wii, reaching out to more than just the hardcore market by offering simplicity to the casual market, and upcoming blockbuster releases like Grand Theft Auto IV, which could net the company $100 million....in the first week. Other big titles in the pipeline this year, including a new Metal Gear Solid game for the Playstation 3, and another World of Warcraft Expansion, bode well for sales in the coming months. In turn, bidders on Wall Street have been buying up shares left and right, pulling the company's shares to $55 a pop...they expect the shares to jump to $70 in the next year.

U.S Dollar vs. In-Game Money

The folks over at Maxim have thrown together a somewhat detailed look at video game currency, and its actual value against the U.S Dollar. The list takes the value of objects in-game and weighs them against their real-world counterparts to calculate value. For instance, In Grand Theft Auto III, one hundred bucks will buy you a Colt .45 pistol, in real life a Custom model 1911 A1 pistol made by Springfield Armory costs $2,500...that means that one GTA3 dollar equals Twenty five U.S dollars.

Of course their isn't really a way to generate actual currency from collecting things in-game, but the idea is very interesting. Other items looked at include the gold coin from Super Mario Bros., The Rupee from The Legend of Zelda and the Gold Ring from Sonic the Hedgehog.

Take a look here!

April Fools and the Internet

Naturally, April 1st is a day of fun on the Internet, where absolutely NOTHING is taken seriously. While radio stations across the nation pulled pranks planned weeks in advance, Websites announced their closure or fake products, and the average individual claimed they had brain cancer or confessed to being pregnant or something just as mundane and average, the Internet was ablaze with tom foolery.

IGN released a fake trailer for a 'Legend of Zelda' film, which actually supports some decent special effects, though everyone and their mother knew it was a hoax, it was still brilliantly executed. Google and Virgin Announced project Virgle, a 100 year plan for Mars colonization. They also announced they were accepting applications for individuals to become pioneers of Mars and travel with the assembled team to start a new life on the red planet.

Destructoid.com, a hilarious yet informative video game blog, redesigned its website to look as though Fox News had taken the website over. They posted ridiculous and outlandish claims, humorous photos and updated consistently through the day. Speaking of video games, World of Warcraft makers Blizzard told people about the new class for the game, which rocks out guitar hero style to damage opponents. Ubisoft and Konami also collaborated, showing a kick ass video of Assassins Creed lead character Altaïr mysteriously placed in Metal Gear Solid 4, which was later revealed to be Solid Snake in the Assassin's garb! This joke was also the first game play footage revealed of MGS4, which was a welcomed treat.

Perhaps the most clever prank pulled, was from acclaimed 'fake news' website The Onion, which simply posted REAL news instead of the fake news they come up with every day. While simple, it didn't stretch to the over the top retarded nature of most pranks and was pulled with dignity and grace (which is the beauty of the prank as most of the fake news posted on the onion, while hilarious, usually IS over the top).

Over at the viral websites for this summer's blockbuster Batman Sequel "The Dark Knight", a different April Fool was playing about. The Websites, made to look like the Joker's secret websites, showed an envelope that opened on April 1st. Inside was the locations of places around the country with locker numbers and combinations for people to travel to. Lucky participants got a free bowling ball and a cell phone (with a cell number etched into the ball for them to call) for a chance to further participate. April Fool indeed.

Lots of fun was had on April 1st, and while many are left out of this article, almost every active community website had some type of prank up their sleeve. Want to share your April Fools day prank? Have another noteworthy prank to mention? comment on this article below, or join the Earjack Forums!

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