Unhelpful

Due to the length of this update, I’m forced to split it into sections. Here’s the rest.

[Continued in the extention.] Read more »

Ahh, the time to move back into my dorm has drawn near. Being a good little misanthrop, I’ve devoted far more time than is healthy into coming up with ways to torture, humiliate, annoy, and otherwise alienate the poor sap who’s getting stuck with me. Here’s my favorite idea so far:

Ingredients: one male model poster (Fabio or someone like that), tape or thumbtacks, roommate with a girlfriend who often visits

Proper use: Hang up the poster above his area of the room, whether it’s his bed or his desk. This immediately serves one purpose: Your roommate thinks you’re either a homosexual or just an odd fellow. Either one is good.

Next, whenever your friends are around, point out the poster and mention how he often stares at the poster with a wistful look on his face. This makes your friends act oddly toward him.

Finally, the kicker: Get friendly with his friends and/or girlfriend. Tell them that he often mumbles the model’s name in his sleep. Tell them (especially the girlfriend) that his eyes are oddly drawn to your body while you’re changing.

Optional: Write “love letters” from him to the male model and leave them strewn about while his friends and family are visiting.

This should ensure that you either have a sullen, withdrawn roommate who never talks to you (good) or no roommate at all (even better!).

Good luck!

EverQuest players, do I have an offer for you! You see, I’m opening up a small sweatshop in the New Jersey area, and I need people used to working under mind-numbingly boring conditions for countless hours for slave wages.

I will pay you 50cents per hour — more than you could get for your account on eBay — and let you yell across the factory floor at each other all day, saying things like “LoL u dont no how 2 mkae Nikes rite! ur lame noob! heheheh.”

And, for the former-PVP players, you can even yell “rofl the stitching on thses shoez roxxors urs! I OWN U!”

Please send a resum

A note to all on-line game players:
“Uber” is not a word in any language.

“Über” is a German word meaning “over” or “above.” It does not mean “superior.” This mistaken impression comes from Nietzsche’s work Thus Spake Zarathustra, in which the “Übermensch” (literal translation: Overman) is mentioned. The closest English translation is “superman.”

So, please stop going on about “uber” this and “uber” that, because you’re only making yourselves sound stupid.

Thanks.

the International Olympic Committee awarded the 2008 Summer Olympics to Beijing.

US officials reacted with what can only be described as elation.

The Olympic Movement was created with specific goals in mind, and follows certain ideals: sportsmanship, camaraderie, and peace.

Where was the sportsmanship in persecuting people for their religion? Will Falung Gong practitioners be allowed to compete? Probably not, because most have either fled their country or been forced into a completely underground existence. Hell, how about Christians? China’s had a history of persecuting them, too. Read more »

It’s 2001, and the clock is still ticking. Soon it’ll be 2002.

Looking back at fiction, it’s fairly interesting how far we’ve come, and how far we haven’t. Most people have access to cellphones smaller and more functional than the original “Star Trek” communicators, on the other hand, as the IBM commercial with Avery Brooks from last year asks, “Where are the flying cars?” Read more »

Last month, there was an item in the news about how Wichita, Kansas area Target stores had decided to halt the sale of FBI-logo t-shirts due to objections of the FBI. They were worried, apparently, of people being mistaken for FBI agents.

That’s wrong-headed. If I were an FBI agent assaulting wrongly accused members of political fringe groups to keep them on their toes, and the targets in question had guns, you know what I’d wish I had?

Decoys.

Comments?

Fresh on the heels of Oni, Rockstar games has announced an upcoming project: State of Emergency.

To cut to the chase, it’s a game about rioting against the “American Trade Organization”, which is to say it’s the videogame version of the WTO protests that have occurred over the last year or so.

I suspect that anyone who feels great sympathy for the anti-WTO movement aren’t eager to have their points of view trivialized. I know I don’t. I also suspect anyone who feels strongly in favor of the latest round of what is laughably called “free trade” probably isn’t eager to have the more extreme acts of the radical minority of the protesters glorified. Who does that leave as actual customers of this game? People who don’t give a shit about politics or who don’t have enough sense to form an opinion about, well … anything.

Given such a vast target audience, I predict Rockstar Interactive will have one hell of a success on their hands. Maybe the sequel will based be the inevitable results of the actions of the WTO, titled “Third World Sweatshop”.

Discuss: Comm€nts?

I went to the first day of the Detroit Electronic Music Festival on Saturday. This series of impressions may not be in any logical order. I got there in the early afternoon, and wandered around without much of a schedule, as I was there to see Autechre playing at nine. In fact, every other band could have been playing ska-bluegrass polka and I’d have waited through it to get a chance to see Autechre. Read more »

According to ABCNews.com by way of Yahoo, Albanian girls are being sold into the sex trade.

Unfortunately, they’re not on ebay yet so I won’t be able to provide a review of how this arrangement is turning out.

Today’s article-thingy is about “booth babes.” Now, in case you don’t know, a “booth babe” is a girl hired to stand around in a bikini or other skimpy clothing at the booths of game companies during conventions (E3, in this case) in order to promote… uh… breasts, I guess. The reasoning is that breasts sell games. I guess when you’re talking about lonely computer geeks, it’s not that far off.

While these poor women are being ogled by a bunch of fat, sweaty losers, some people choose to take it to the next level of humiliation. There are guys who walk up to these poor women and have their picture taken. I think it’s pretty humiliating, moreso for the guys than the girls. I assume they have their picture take in order to show their friends and say, “LOOK! Here’s a girl who isn’t repulsed by my presence, you owe me a Coke!” but I may be wrong. All things considered, it’s a pretty sad scene.

Now, if I had my own game company, I would hire post-op transsexuals to be my “booth babes.” After each lonely, horny geekboy comes up to have his picture taken, I’d have the girls hand each one a card that says, “Congratulations! You have just had your picture taken with a transsexual!”

For maximum enjoyment, I would have to video tape their reactions upon reading the card, of course.

[Edit]
Someone gave me this link to illustrate what I’m talking about. Weep with me.

Comments?

Aphex Twin is apparently getting rather popular. I just noticed that his song “Blur” played over the credits of the season finale of “The Sopranos.”

No complaints here.

Background information for those outside the gaming community:

Ultima Online is a swords and sorcery online game with many different servers. On any given server, literally thousands of players can be logged in and playing concurrently. Ultima Online is a product of Electronic Arts through its Origin Systems division (now ea.com). Part of this subscription based service included “volunteer” support staff. On May 9, 2001, they were all summarily dismissesd as the volunteer program was disbanded by Electronic Arts.

This while playing tourist in the official (now ex-)Counselor channel:

{Jane_Doe} I’m not ready to give up helping those in need just yet, so I’ll probably join one of the guilds being formed.
{Counselor_3858} That is inspirational of you Jane :)
{Counselor_3858} They can pull of our robes, but they can’t pull out our hearts, right? :)

(The names have been changed for privacy.)

Allow me to translate:

“I’m not smart enough to realize when I’ve been discarded after years of being used. They can fuck us once, but they can’t stop us from begging to be fucked again!”

You’ve heard of vigilante justice? Get ready for vigilante counseling. Read more »

Not that I care, but I think Electronics Arts just likes firing people — even if they aren’t paid employees. If you didn’t see that coming months ago, then you’re probably sufferring from blind faith and devotion syndrome (BFDS), which is commonly found in followers of most major religions.

There’s been a lot of controversy recently surrounding the use of cellphones while driving. I’m against doing so. I’m also against other distractions while driving, such as eating extremely messy food, and rowdy children (for god’s sake, pull over to the side and spank them).

I’ve recently been issued a company cellphone, and decided to be fair, and try it myself to see if it’s such a distraction. Traffic was light as it always was (I leave work before rush hour starts), so I busted the thing out, and went at it.

Now, I can’t speak for all models of cellphones, but the model I have has buttons so small that it’s rather difficult to push them accurately without paying close attention to the phone, instead of the road. I was lane-drifting already and hadn’t even made a single call yet. Based on that, I’ve decided that doing so again is probably a bad idea. I’m not going to speak for everyone either, I’m sure there are people who have gotten quite adept at dialing their cellphone by touch. I’m also sure there are people who have just been damned lucky so far.

Laws against using cellphones shouldn’t be necessary. I personally am capable of determining whether or not doing so makes me an unsafe driver - it does, so I’m not going to do it. Unfortunately, I live in a world where just about everyone else thinks driving is a right, not a privilege, and following some basic safety practices is infringing on that “right” to drive.

I do have the right to put pictures of Hitler at the top of my page. I do not have the right to put others’ lives at risk.