Archive for the 'Random Rambling' Category

Quote of the day

It’s been a while since I blog anything. To all my loyal readers (however few you are), I apologize ;)

So let me start off with quote of the day from my fellow co-worker Brandon: “[Regarding corporate hierarchy] We can’t start shaving off management layers, because then the top dudes could eventually talk to guys doing the actual work…”

Hopefully with all the layoffs that’s been going on and Carol Bartz as our new chief, we can put a stop on redundancies and start launching cool products again.

The level of honesty on eBay

I continue to be surprised by what people would say to list their used item as new. I recently looked into buying a game and there was this guy who was selling one “new”. The description was a bit lacking, so naturally I emailed him to make sure that the item is indeed brand new, sealed/never opened. Here is the response I got:

“By new I mean It has never been used. I bought it when it first came out. I opened it out of excitement but nevered installed it into my computer. So the disk is untouched. thanks for checking it out.”

I think a two-year old can read into this. “Oh, I got the game! I am so psyched! Let me rip it open and stare at it!” I am curious if he could say this in real life and not considered a fraud.

Indonesia bans YouTube and MySpace

From MetaFilter:

“As a result of the Dutch film Fitna, Indonesia has blocked several websites including MySpace and YouTube. This follows hot on the heels of a new bill which could see people face six years of jail time or a 1 billion rupiah fine for being caught sending out porn, “false news” or racial or religious slurs on the Web. The Indonesian government will start censoring the Internet next month with specialised software. Very disappointing for a country which had a reasonably free press.”

I grew up in Indonesia and although the government is one of the most corrupt in the world, and most of the populations are uneducated fanatics (aka idiots), I never thought censorship would ever come to cyberspace. Very sad indeed, I hope whoever decided this is a good thing realizes that it’s no longer the 19th century.

Dreamhost down again…

It’s a shame that any good popular hosting service seems to be doomed by their popularity. Dreamhost has once again disappointed me. The day after I discover my site’s newly gained popularity, the server went down for 5 hours! Argh! That’s it, I can’t take this anymore, goodbye Dreamhost, I’m looking for a replacement!

On a lighter note, check out this hosting service: http://www.nouptime.com/

Yahoo! Music design stolen

Apparently a lot of people like how Yahoo! sites look like. The latest string of copycat: Nhac360 is a Vietnamese music site which design clearly resembles that of the new Yahoo! Music site. What surprised me was why they didn’t just use Yahoo!’s CSS to do their site, instead they resorted to their own code that looks like something from the late 90s (tables, image map, etc). Here is a screenshot, click on it to go to their site:

Nhac360

And here’s Yahoo! Music:

Yahoo! Music

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. I guess Yahoo! should send them a thank you note.

Cloverfield: A spectacular disappointment

We just got back from watching Cloverfield and we are still feeling a bit queezy from the shaky amateurish camera that is the entire movie. I get the art direction that the director is trying to get to, but I feel ripped off spending $10 watching something that looks like a Youtube video but less entertaining. It’s basically a sci-fi take on Blair Witch Project. Note to self: next time, wait a week and read the review…

And here I present to you the Cloverfield monster. Go watch it on DVD.


Cloverfield Monster