RIAA

Now, we all know about the RIAA. If you ask me, they are just a pack of extortionists who have nothing better to do than ruin the lives of people by placing large settlements on people so they won't have to go to court....or they go to court and get even bigger settlements placed on them.

This is the plight of a MIT student named Cassi Hunt. I know her story may be old news, but I consider it pertinent to now. I will post excerpts from an article here:

Cassi Hunt has recently been accused by the RIAA of being guilty of file-sharing. We all know what happens now: the RIAA will extort her for thousands of dollars (in Cassi's case, $3750) as a "settlement" to prevent her having to go to court. Or, as Cassie puts it in her highly entertaining and witty account: " Let us screw you over gently now, or with chains and whips in court."

Now, Cassi's remark is quite hilarious....and here is the RIAA's response:

But get this. When Cassi mentions she can't afford $3750, being an MIT student already up to her eyeballs in a lifetime's worth of debt, the RIAA helpfully countered: So? Drop out of school so you can afford it.

So the RIAA has shown it's true colors finally. Personally...I say the whole lot of them can go fuck themselves. They can't stop all of us, and they never will.

Here is the link to the full article: RIAA Tells MIT Student to Drop Out Of School To Pay Fines

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Shadow Ryo Nightfall

Apple TV Alternative

OK, last post was about the Apple TV. Now for those of you who know me, I love to visit Hackaday. In fact it is listed in my links over on the right of the page. Well they had this electronics hack that caught my attention. I love the idea and I may consider doing it seeing as I pirate some movies here and there.

The basic idea behind the hack is to take an old Divx player and attach it to a wifi router, preferably running dd-wrt, and hook it into your network so you can host up media files from it. Another added benefit to this setup is that you are able to update the Divx player without having to hook it into a PC. Check out the post on Hackaday for the full write up and links to the site with instructions.

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Shadow Ryo Nightfall

Apple TV

Interesting idea by Apple. I like the concept though, download a movie and put it on your iPod...but what if you could just put it on your flat screen tv instead? This would make my movie watching experience all the better...nothing like watching a move gained by questionable methods on a big tv with hi-def capabilities. What makes it even better is the fact the Apple TV uses your wireless network to get the content. Bravo Apple. We adore convenience here in the tech world and you are on the right track. Oh...and it didn't take long for people to hack it either. Read up on the tv itself here and the website for hacking your Apple TV is here.

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Shadow Ryo Nightfall

All is Well

I am going to work on the podcast myself since Steve and my schedule's make it nearly impossible for us to meet up at my house to record it. I may just have to figure out a decent way of phoning it in, if only my computer was able to run two instances of Skype at once. Ah well.

Let's see...news, oh yes. I heard about this interesting game disc that has it's own operating system, a linux distro for those of you who are curious. It sounds interesting for the fact is that it is trying to be an open platform gaming console for your computer. Apparently it was designed at a Nintendo conference. The system is called Gamix and here is a link to the website so you can request your own copy of the disc.

Other news, well, none off of the top of my head. I do recommend that you go and listen to some of the podcasts done by IGN. They are pretty interesting really. I have my PSP with a gigabyte stick in it set to download each new episode at six in the morning so that I have some form of entertainment during school.

Hmm...anything else. Well I think I have put quite a bit of stuff into this for almost one in the morning. Just think, I have a school day then a five hour work shift to do after all of this. Heh, lucky me and my poor judgement. Nah, it was worth staying up to play some video games and throw a quick post up. See you around on the net.

Shadow Ryo Nightfall

Delay

The podcast has been delayed due to illness (Steve) and some school competitions springing up. Now, I still plan on doing the podcast but I am waiting for Steve and myself to get a little free time in order to do so. Hopefully we will have time this Saturday or so. No promises are being made. I may be able to do crappy sounding podcast recordings on the go with my new toy. I have a Zire 72s PDA that has a built in microphone. The ironic part about this, I found it laying around on the ground. Not a bad find really. I have loaded games onto it and it looks like I can record around half an hour of audio with the small bit of memory left on it. The thing only has twenty-five megabytes of built in memory, but hey...I picked it up for free and it has support for SD, MMC, and I think one or two other types of cards. Not a bad find at all.

Next Podcast

OK, the next podcast's topic hasn't been decided yet. But, my friend Steve will hopefully be joining me in it. I now have a headset so when I record just by myself it will be a bit easier. Back to my friend's participation, he has already been in other podcasts so he has a bit of experience, and I have the tech knowledge to boot. So see you next time.

First Podcast

I finally got around to getting my first podcast done for my multimedia class, assignment is due tomorrow so I was running out of time. It is about Halo 3 and is over six minutes long. Listen in to find out more.

Halo 3

The Net

So, it turns out I get internet troubles right as I am needing it most. I have no internet at my house in other words. This has put a halt to all sorts of projects, including a majority of my school work at home. I am supposed to have the net back sometime around noon or so. Hopefully that will be the case so I will be able to get my podcast finished and posted. Steve won't be joining me in this one since it doubles as a Multimedia project for school.

That is all for now. Till next time.

School Woes and Games

So anyway, back again. I am sitting here during school being really bored. So I decided to post another entry on my blog with my extra time, that should be used doing research for a paper. Being able to e-mail entries in helps a lot just in case the school decides to block the blogspot site.

Let's see...I may do a podcast soon. My Multimedia class has a project going that requires us to do at least a one minute podcast and upload it to the blog they will set up. I am going to make one then link it here so everyone who starts reading will hear how I started out. Later on I may have my friend Steve join in on the podcasts. He used to do one here and there with a mutual friend of ours.

Anyway, back to the podcast. It will be about Halo 3 for the Xbox360. Basically I will just talk about the info released on it so far and spread out my knowledge to my classmates. I may cue up Halo 2's theme song to add into the background. So far I believe that I will use Daft Punk's song Digital Love for the background.

Talking Urinals? The Hell?

OK, I loled pretty hard when I read this on Reuters. In New Mexico, police want to remind drunks not to drive....so where do all people who drink end up? In the bathroom. So they have made talking urinals in order to do so. Interesting way of using technology really...here, read the news post yourself if you don't believe me.

SANTA FE, New Mexico (Reuters) - In a novel move to curb drunk driving, New Mexico is using talking urinals to remind drinkers to not get behind the wheel when drunk.

The state transportation department said on Thursday it has put some 500 talking deodorizers in bar and restaurant restrooms in the state in recent days to remind drivers not to drink and drive.

"Hey big guy, having a few drinks? Then listen up!" a voice chirps in. "Think you had one too many? Then it's time to call a cab or call a sober friend for a ride home."

Transportation department spokesman SU Mahesh said the motion-activated devices were part of an attempt to "think outside the box" to tackle drunk driving in the state.

"We have a big problem here in New Mexico. ... Hopefully this will be a humorous and also serious way to catch men before they go to their cars and say to them 'it's not worth it to drink and drive,'" Mahesh told Reuters.

Mahesh said the devices, which are manufactured by New York-based Healthquest Technologies Inc., have been used elsewhere in the United States, but never as part of a statewide campaign.

If the project is successful he hopes bars and restaurants will continue to purchase the battery-operated gadgets, which cost $21 each and last three months.

Pretty interesting stuff. Here is the link to the actual webpage on Reuters: Talking Urinals