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Thursday, 30 November 2006
Fighting The Power (Adapter)
Per Cult of Mac:iPod Chargers Outselling Zune on Amazon
No, that's not a typo. According to CBS MarketWatch, Zune is the 75th best-selling electronic product on Amazon, while the lowly Apple USB iPod Charger is a lofty no. 66. Yep, a power cord was beating down the latest iPod Killer.
But since that article has been written, a large group of people, likely represented by Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer, have begun to pump up Zune's Amazon sales, and the mighty iPod Power Cord Killer is now ahead of the power cord, sitting at 67 while its rival is down to 69. What a world.
uDon't iPod
So apparently Bush is considering putting an embargo on sales of iPods and some other stuff to personally annoy Kim Jong Il.My favorite part of the story, though, has nothing to do with the iPods, even though that's what made it ATWorthy. My favorite part is the following line: "[Kim Jong Il] also is said to own an extensive movie library of more than 10,000 titles and prefers films about James Bond and Godzilla..." No kidding! Where can I get those? I want movies about James Bond and Godzilla! Does James Bond fight Godzilla? Or, better yet, maybe it's like a buddy cop movie. "... The other is a hundred-foot-tall lizard who just can't follow the rules." Heck, they should do some of each. Each movie is a different genre. I'd even watch the BrokeBond 'Zilla movie about their forbidden love. Or the high school flick where Godzilla is an ugly misfit until Bond shows him how to reveal his inner beauty.
STS-116 Update
Per SpaceflightNow.com:NASA managers today wrapped up a two-day flight readiness review and officially set December 7 as the target launch date for the shuttle Discovery on an unprecedented mission to rewire the international space station.
If all goes well, Discovery's countdown will begin at 11 p.m. EST Monday, setting the stage for a launch attempt at 9:35:45 p.m. EST Thursday. This will be NASA's first night launch since 2002.
But space station engineers are working two issues that must be resolved for Discovery to get off the ground next week.
Sad Sack
It's Thursday, so there's a new strip over at the Hatbag site.As always, please vote Hatbag. Thanks.
And, since apparently a bunch of ATW readers don't follow the weekly Hatbag link, I thought a brief explanation might be in order -- Hatbag is a weekly webcomic Lain and I create; following two old college buddies as they adjust to sort-of grown-up life. If you read ATW, take a few extra seconds to go read Hatbag. Please? Please?
Monday, 27 November 2006
Will To Fly
Per All Headline News:
Oddly enough, we may just have the "Fresh Prince Of Bel Air" leading us into the vast universal space sometime in the future.
Will Smith recently said he wants to boldly go where only a few people have gone before... space!
The handsome actor - who is a follower of Scientology, a sci-fi cult based on the belief that people descend from aliens - thinks it will be easy to fulfill his ambition of becoming a space shuttle pilot because somebody has already written down the instructions.
He said, "I know how to learn anything I want to learn. I know that I could learn how to fly a space shuttle because someone else knows how to fly it and they put it in a book."
Will and his wife Jada Pinkett Smith were guests at TomKat's wedding in Italy over the weekend. Tom is also a devout Scientologist.
During the Scientology ceremony, the "Top Gun"actor promised his bride a comb and a cat, while the "Dawson's Creek" actress was told that "young men are free and may forget their promises."
Sunday, 26 November 2006
Back To The Futurama Update Again
I was reading an article last night about an interview with Al Gore, wherein he mentioned that he was following up his big Hollywood star-making Inconvenient Truth with a role in a Futurama movie, which inspired to me to try to figure out what's going on.First, there was word that there was going to be new straight-to-DVD Futurama movies.
Then, there was word that maybe the movies were dead, but there were going to be new TV episodes.
So, now, here's what it looks like the situation is -- the movies are being worked on like right now, with a target release date for the first of Christmas 2007.
The new TV episodes, which are supposed to come out in 2008, may not actually be new episodes, per se. First, it's sounding like there won't be a new season necessarily, even though they're making a new (short) season's worth of episodes. Instead, they'll just be added to the re-run rotation with the old episodes. Not sure about that, though.
The other thing I've read is that the episodes will actually be the movies, cut into the episode-length sections for TV-viewing.
So, the TV thing is a bit disappointing, but the movie thing is cool, so it all works out, I guess.
The Golden Egg
And congrats to Ed Orgeron, who managed to lead the Rebs to a 4-8 record in 2006 slightly better than Vanderbilt (more than State can say), and better than his 3-8 of last year. (And, hey, almost as good as the 4-7 season that got David Cutcliffe fired.) At the end of the year, even the one good thing he was supposed to have done failed. Despite the great recruiter's great recruit, Brent Schaeffer, the team was once more trying to figure out what exactly to do in the quarterback situation, the problem that has plagued it for three years now.
As Orgeron said after the LSU game (during which he pulled Schaeffer out of the came during the third quarter when Ole Miss was ahead), "I thought we'd go undefeated and he'd take us to the Sugar Bowl and be the hero. That's Ed Orgeron style-thinking." Or, as they prefer to call Ed-Orgeron-style-thinking in some circles, stupid.
Here's more Ed-Orgeron-style-thinking from yesterday: "It's definitely a big victory to win the Egg Bowl," Orgeron said. "But let me say this to you: A big victory to me is winning the Sugar Bowl, but we understand we have to beat Mississippi State first to get there."
Sure, you know, managing to avoid last place in the conference is a good start toward the Sugar Bowl. In fact, why stop there, Ed? Why not aim to take Ole Miss to the Super Bowl? The way your tenure has been going so far, that seems like an equally reasonable goal.
The biggest congratulations for yesterday, though, go to Pete Boone, since the consolation-prize Golden Egg will likely distract some from the Ed-Orgeron-style-thinking he engaged in two years ago that put the Rebs back on course to being the laughingstock of the SEC.
Saturday, 25 November 2006
Regular Richie Feature
Recent search strings on Alltheseworlds.net:Friday, 24 November 2006
Broken Triad Update
OK, I've made my latest addition. Didn't plan on getting this detailed and complicated this early, but Joe kinda threw down the gauntlet with his last post. He's suggested adding a list of characters again, like we did last time, and I may also put together a timeline.In the meantime, though, somebody else can take a shot at it.
ATW On D
Went and watched the Tenacious D movie yesterday.
To be honest, kinda disappointing. Enjoyable, just not all I was hoping for.
Thursday, 23 November 2006
cS ISS Tee
OK, collectSPACE has posted something on YouTube for the first time, so I'm embedding a YouTube video on my blog for the first time.
Used tags: collectspace, international_space_station, nasa, space, youtube
The Turkey's Last Flight
Yes, it's time once again for the annual Thanksgiving strip over at the Hatbag site.As always, please vote Hatbag. Thanks.
And, since apparently a bunch of ATW readers don't follow the weekly Hatbag link, I thought a brief explanation might be in order -- Hatbag is a weekly webcomic Lain and I create; following two old college buddies as they adjust to sort-of grown-up life. If you read ATW, take a few extra seconds to go read Hatbag. Please? Please?
Wednesday, 22 November 2006
Editorial Note
Been really busy lately. Thus light blogging.Going to be off the grid for Thanksgiving, so I'll disappear completely for a few days.
In the meantime, have a good holiday.
ISS Tee
Per Space.com:Two astronauts will venture outside the International Space Station (ISS) today for a short round of orbital golf and laboratory maintenance.
ISS Expedition 14 commander Michael Lopez-Alegria and flight engineer Mikhail Tyurin are slated to spend six hours working outside the station in what will mark the first of four planned spacewalks during their six-month mission.
Among the highlights of today’s spacewalk—scheduled to begin at 6:00 p.m. EST (2300 GMT)—will be Tyurin’s golf shot, a stunt spurred by a commercial agreement between Russia’s Federal Space Agency and the Canadian golf equipment firm Element 21.
Tuesday, 21 November 2006
iPhone Rumors: The Sequel
To make the iPhone rumors more interesting, MacNN had a link today to an article with rumors about the next iPhone Apple is working on.
Monday, 20 November 2006
ATW Comic War: Round Two, Fight Four
The latest All These Worlds War continues: the ATW Comic War! Characters from twenty comic strips will be pitted against each other in one-on-one combat, and you pick the winner. All you have to do is vote for the character each battle that you think would be most likely to win.This is another fight from the losers' bracket, so the person who loses goes home -- if they live that long!
Dilbert was defeated by Bucky Katt in the first round of the ATW Comic War. Now he faces both Frank and Ernest, who together proved to be no match for Funky Winkerbean. Let the battle begin!
Cast your vote for the character you think would win:
Dilbert (3 votes)
Frank and Ernest (4 votes)
Backward Rebels!
You know, I'm beginning to think that at halftime at Ole Miss games, Ed Orgeron pulls his team into the locker room and makes it clear that they are not playing like Ole Miss, and that they need to get back out there and find a way to blow it. We're not supposed to be winning, you know?
Sunday, 19 November 2006
Movie Nights
After a fairly long movie dry spell, Nicole and I went to see three movies in three nights -- Stranger Than Fiction, Happy Feet and Casino Royale.The middle we went to see only because one of my coworkers had been passionate for months about getting a group to go see it, and it was, well, OK. I coulda skipped it and not felt that my life was incomplete.
The former, we really enjoyed. Good stuff.
The latter -- well, the last Bond movie I watched in the theater was Goldeneye. And, when there's another new Bond, I'll probably go see that, as well. Point being, I really don't have much of a standard to judge it by. I'd really love to hear what some other, more Bond-savvy people thought of it.
That said, two thoughts:
- I'm sorry, I know the kids love it these days, and I don't mind playing it myself, but seeing James Bond play Texas Hold-Em would have been like watching the Brosnan Bond drink Zima. Just a bit much of the zeitgeist for my tastes.
- It seems like every time there's a new Bond movie lately, there's an interview talking about how all the Bond girls before were just eyecandy, and that this one will bring a more modern strong female presence. It's interesting just how that's executed, though.
ReAnimator
So on the eve of the DVD release of Star Trek: The Animated Series (well, the eve of the eve), George Takei said that he hopes the success of these DVDs will spur interest in new animated Trek.And, really, it's an idea I could get behind, particularly if it were approached with the increase in maturity from TAS that say, The Clone Wars showed from Ewoks and Droids. I wouldn't mind seeing a good new movie-era TOS adventure.
However, I don't know that I completely agree with the last part of this statement: "And, our voices more-or-less still resemble what we sounded like 40 years ago, so I think the original actors could be brought back for that. And then there are some amazing people who can do remarkable take-offs on Scotty's voice and on McCoy's voice."
Well, that's probably true, but I don't know that I like the idea of just replacing Doohan and Kelley.
I started this entry with the idea of ending it with a poll -- Would you rather see the roles re-cast or just have Scotty and McCoy left out -- two rather unappealing options. I think, though, there might be some potential in working old lines into context; letting them play (albeit minor) roles in the story, but with the original actors.
What say you? Would you want to see new animated TOS (or another Trek, for that matter), and, if so, how would you handle the missing men?
Open Apple
TUAW is speculating that, rather than being offered through a particular carrier, the iPhone will be sold -- unlocked -- directly by Apple. You buy one at the Apple store and take it to your cellular service provider to get the hook up. It makes sense -- it would give Apple more potential customers and greater control over marketing, which sounds like a reasonable Steve approach. I wonder, though, if the carriers would sell the phone themselves, if I could walk into my local Cingular store and get one. My curiosity stems from the question of whether this approach would keep it from the bread-and-butter of cell phone sales -- the contract discount. If it means that iPhone customers would have to pay the full price, versus getting a RAZR or something cheaper with a contract, that could create a competitive discount. Of course, people are already willing to pay hundreds of dollars for an iPod; Apple would just have to make the phone as good an investment.
Saturday, 18 November 2006
Hollywood Strong Arm Tactics
There's a discussion over at collectSPACE about who should play Neil Armstrong in the movie adaptation of First Man that Clint Eastwood has talked about making, so I thought I'd turn the question over to the ATW crowd to see what thoughts y'all had.
Used tags: apollo, collectspace, history, movies, space
Taking Stock
OK, if anyone is ever curious how seriously to take my Apple commentary and predictions, you should keep in mind that I sold my Apple stock not too long before it hit an all-time high.That's pretty darned stupid.
Krypton Go Boom!
Per Newsarama:Best-selling author Kevin J. Anderson just closed a major deal with DC Comics and HarperCollins Books to write “Last Days of Krypton,” an epic novel about the demise of Superman’s home planet. The novel, reminiscent of “The Last Days of Pompeii,” shows the pomp and grandeur of a doomed world, the politics and struggles, brave heroes and traitors, and finally the escape of one baby. The story features Jor-El and Lara (Superman's parents), as well as famous villains General Zod and Brainiac, and how a whole planet came to be destroyed. In almost 70 years of “Superman,” this complete story has never been told.
Anderson, who also won science-fiction’s highest paid advance for co-authoring a series of DUNE novels with Brian J. Herbert in 2004, is one of science fiction’s most successful authors, not to mention most prolific. Since 1993, 40 of his novels have appeared on national and international best seller lists, and he has over 20 million books in print worldwide, translated into 29 languages.
Fans of Superman legend and of Kevin J. Anderson can expect the new book to release in Fall 2007.
Thursday, 16 November 2006
Yay, Spam
I read the other day about a new kind of spam, where they send random passages from works of literature through e-mail, and was totally jealous I wasn't getting any of it.
Well, today was my lucky day!
Actually, it wasn't quite what I was hoping for. What I read about sounded like messages consisting only of the passages, but my opened with a message telling me I needed to be on, uh, my peak performance Christmas night, and gave me a link where I shouldn't "loose this chance and try it".
Following that was a passage that a little Googling reveals is from "The Master and Margarita" by Mikhail Bulgakov, considered, per Wikipedia, "to be one of the greatest Russian novels of the 20th century, as well as one of the foremost Soviet satires, directed against a suffocatingly bureaucratic social order."
The portion I received was as follows:
came in and obviously mistaking him for someone else in the hellish lightThis section is from Chapter 4, The Pursuit.
she whispered gaily :
'Kiryushka! Do stop fooling! You must be crazy . . . Fyodor Ivanovich
will be back any minute now. Go on--out you go! ' And she waved her loofah
at Ivan.
The mistake was plain and it was, of course, Ivan Nikolayich's fault,
but rather than admit it he gave a shocked cry of ' Brazen hussy! ' and
suddenly found himself in the kitchen. It was empty. In the gloom a silent
row of ten or so Primuses stood on a marble slab. A single ray of moonlight,
struggling through a dirty window that had not been cleaned for years, cast
You can tell that this is a great work of literature, because Chapter 3 ends with the sort of conclusion that it would take some authors an entire book to build to:
Berlioz vanished from sight under the tramcar and a round, dark object
rolled across the cobbles, over the kerbstone and bounced along the
pavement.
It was a severed head.
Regular Richie Feature
Recent search strings on Alltheseworlds.net:- Touchdown in the land of the delta blues in the middle of the pouring rain lyrics
- "Songs of Science" torrent
- "Guy Bluford" editorial STS-115
- space
- In the Zone IPOD giveaway on October 13, 2006 Huntsville, texas
- "sts-124" crew rumors
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- all these
- "Laika" "Sputnik 2" "film footage"
- fake ipod ads
- thanksgiving playlist
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- lyrics "everything changes" kitt
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- prize competition" "birdman"
- sts-124 ufo
- Guin Bluford - First Black Astronaut
- "Baptist hymnal" astronaut
ATW Comic War: Round Two, Fight Three
The latest All These Worlds War continues: the ATW Comic War! Characters from twenty comic strips will be pitted against each other in one-on-one combat, and you pick the winner. All you have to do is vote for the character each battle that you think would be most likely to win.This is another fight from the losers' bracket, so the person who loses goes home -- if they live that long!
Jason Fox comes to the losers' bracket after getting spanked by Calvin's dad in an early round. Now he faces Lucky Cow's Claire, who was slugged by Sluggo. Let the battle begin!
Cast your vote for the character you think would win:
Jason Fox (2 votes)
Claire (1 votes)
Iffy Proposition
It's like old home week at Hatbag this week with the resurfacing of an old "friend."As always, please vote Hatbag. Thanks.
And, since apparently a bunch of ATW readers don't follow the weekly Hatbag link, I thought a brief explanation might be in order -- Hatbag is a weekly webcomic Lain and I create; following two old college buddies as they adjust to sort-of grown-up life. If you read ATW, take a few extra seconds to go read Hatbag. Please? Please?