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Sunday, November 28, 2010

Ideas that Shouldn't Be Dismissed

7th grade geography activityImage by Kentucky Country Day via Flickr
I have a ton of ideas always flying through my head. I have so many ideas that I can't always catch them before they disappear. Originally I kept most of these ideas  to myself. That was a good bit ago, but around the time I was in seventh grade I was getting tired of keeping things to myself. In seventh grade I met avery strange person that was very outgoing and a bit on the odd side. He didn't care what anyone thought of his weird imagination. He would spout stories at the lunch table that were very amusing. There were stories about hippos with rocket launchers and monkeys that sang. He was very outward with all his ideas.
He inspired me to keep a notebook of all my ideas. This would have been a good idea, it was for a while, until I had gotten so used to writing down all my ideas that I began to run through a 70 page notebook in under a week.  When I had noticed that i had about ten or twelve notebooks in my bookbag I realized two things. The first thing that i realized was that having that many books could not be good for my back. More importantly, as i looked through them I saw all the ideas I had sketched in the last month to that day, some of these inventions were rediculous. It wasn't all weird but thinking back I realize that something that I thought would be a cool idea was in retrospect a complete waste of paper.  But there are so many good ideas I had as well. Things that i should have acted on but didn't things that should have been obvious but simply were not noticed.
If I could have acted on every one of those ideas i would be completely overwhelmed by my work that it would be impossible for me to function.  If you have one idea that you want to dedicate your time to then by all means run with it, but there are ideas that are very good ideas but you dont have the time or desire to get on it. Those few amazing ideas should not be dismissed, but dont act on every idea or you are due to end up in a hole. Instead of keeping them to yourself, share your ideas with someone. Maybe your idea will be noticed and somebody will go through with it. When that happens you can quietly say "I came up with that" and be glad that it went through.
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Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Psychonauts 2?

Group photo of Whispering Rock camp alumni, an...Image via Wikipedia
I was reading the new Game Informer when I came across one of my all time favorite video game characters, Razputin "Raz" Aquato, of an amazing game from 2005. Psychonauts, despite being an awesome platformer and one of the funniest games I have ever played, did not do so well on the market. The problem was likely advertising as everyone who ever played it would tell you Psychonauts was the most unbelievable game they have ever played. While this game kicked so much patootie that it would make the Fable trilogy cry and run home to Lionhead, it also however ended up hurting Majesco and Double Fine, almost bankrupting Majesco.
But noticing the character in the magazine I thought it might be a hint as to something more. I thought perhaps they might actually make a new Psychonauts episode. So I Googled Psychonauts and decided to add a 2 on the end just for kicks. Astonished I found a blog posted something only four days ago regarding Psychonauts' Tim Schafer on the topic Psychonauts.(You can find the link here)  That can only mean that Psychonauts 2 may in fact be an upcoming title! Tim Schafer said he was ready to make Psychonauts 2. Straight from the big guy himself, it must be coming soon. I'll be first in line!

Saturday, October 30, 2010

Going Places

Zombie StrippersImage via Wikipedia
I have to post more, I have much less creativity now that i have been playing World of Warcraft for so long. Things are looking up though as I am trying to get back into college. I met a guy at a club we messed around a bit in his car and my iPod fell out of my pocket. We were in there for a while and my friend went looking for me. My friends needed to take someone to get their things from their landlord.
They were in a hurry and in the confusion I left my iPod in his car. I never lose an Apple product! Each Apple product has its own beauty in my eyes. They are sacred to me. Thankfully, I have good friends. My best girlfriend knows my passion for the fruit-tastic electronics and is bringing me back my iPod very soon. I have invited her over for Halloween on short notice but she is very whimsical so I may get it back tomorrow. If I can't get it tomorrow I can get it on Monday.
School starts next month and i have yet to receive a call back from the Art Institute. On Monday I'm going up there and finding the crazy bitch in charge of re-entry. Excuse the rage but she is never at her desk. I have tried repeatedly to get a hold of her and I have had no success whatsoever!
Tomorrow is Halloween and that means three things. First thing is of course weird looking kids that want candy. In a weird enough costume you may be able to scare them away and keep the candy for yourself. Which brings me to the second thing Adults watching movies and being disturbed every five minutes by "candy beggars". If i can't watch my Mega Monster Movie Marathon in peace I will not be happy. The third thing of course is movies, the kind that disturb you and make you cringe.
        There are also the funny B movies that I will be watching:


These are only the best of the best in B horror movies,  I will watch plenty of others tomorrow

•However you do Halloween be sure to watch a horror flick. Otherwise, you are doing it wrong!

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Thursday, October 14, 2010

Is World of Warcraft Getting Attacked?

World of WarcraftImage via Wikipedia
Oh Blizzard, you may have 12 million players but they are not happy. As I played WOW today my computer repeatedly disconnected. I have checked my pings and apparently I am getting denial of service attacks by playing World of  Warcraft. I believe blizzard is being attacked.
If my theory is accurate then some irate gamer has decided to confront Blizzard in a nasty way.  It hasn't even been a full day since the patch that has put off so many WOW veterans. Nerfing so many spells and talents (Nerfing: dampening for user or gamer experience) can put off the most loyal gamers. Blizzard just reached a milestone in players if they lose that they are more likely to alter the game so that it is similar to how it used to be. Blizzard may in fact be the victim of a full frontal assault from a hacker or group of hackers.
The attack if I am correct would be sending a pings to blizzard and their players rapidly to make playing the game near impossible. This would put off more and more players. Eventually their player count would decrease and people would unsubscribe. Blizzard cant have that happen. They need that milestone for the release of Cataclysm. If Blizzard does have an attack being put through then they need to take care of it and announce that they were attacked. They need to get the feedback and change the game to suit the veterans more and still be noob-friendly. They cannot prioritize one over the other. The changes in the patch were far too drastic and Blizzard will lose players that have played  since the beta of the original game. If they do not change things in a way that pleases all players then World of Warcraft will be doomed to the demise that Sony caused Star Wars: Galaxies.
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Friday, September 10, 2010

The New and Improved Facebook

Facebook logoImage via Wikipedia
Facebook has changed overnight yet again but before you punch your screen, cursing out the world for hating you, know that this time nobody should be upset about this. Nobody should hate this one except of course billion dollar online casual gaming company, Zynga.
 Zynga has many ways of advertising, but the most abundant and annoying way on Facebook is of course app spam. Zynga is one of, if not, the worst offender of app spam on facebook.They have altogether lost my respect as a casual gaming company. However thanks to last night's update that is a thing of the past.
You now have the option to delete posts from your news feed and profile wall. Wait it gets better, you can do even more than just manually delete posts. If you delete a post on your news feed you have the option to hide all posts from that source. If you delete an application's post from your wall you have the option not to allow the application to post without your consent. Once you have done that next time you delete that app's post you will have the option to delete it from your applications. Finally, the next time you delete their annoying spam you are able to blacklist that application from your profile. You are even able to report any post as spam.
I am so happy that facebook finally did something about spam. Rejoice in the new and improved facebook. These capabilities are long overdue I wish they had added them sooner.
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Thursday, September 9, 2010

World of Warcraft Saved Bob from Itself!

World of WarcraftImage via Wikipedia
World of Warcraft took away my chat privelages. I finally have no reason to play it. Thank god now ill be able to pay my bills as there nothing distracting me.  Guess what?  The world of warcraft blogging crisis is over. It is time to get a job and move on with blogging.
In World of Warcraft there are chat channels one of which is for trade. It was originally for trade anyways. Trade chat is now full of ppl called Trolls. A Troll is an annoying person who spams trade chat. I trolled and a game master took away my chat privelages. Now I can keep my phone. He did me a favor.
He did a favor to you, my readers as well. Distraction-free i can give you more news faster.  Thank you stupid game master you helped me out quite a bit! I was a fully functional human being before World of Warcraft. I like the game but its addicting. People make fun of you if you are a casual gamer as well. I am a casual gamer and this site has reviews for casual games. I'm done with World of Warcraft.
On to something more productive.
I'm just going to sum it all up in a nut shell :

Now I'm going outside to see what daylight looks like again!

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

Bob Has Finally Caught Up With Apple!

A packet of ketchup, opened with the contents ...Image via Wikipedia

Recently  I ceased posting and took a long time to gather information. What I ended up with is ketchup. Apple flavored ketchup and it is actually really good. Quite a bit has happened but I'm gonna give you a good bit of the important stuff.

  1. iPods with New Features and iPods that Look Rediculous Apple has some new toys and they are weird. Some good features, some old features on new items and some obvious features that they forgot to include in the last version.


    1. iPod touch The new iPod touch looks awesome I'm not gonna lie. It has a front and back camera and a gyro. In iOS 4.1 there will be multitasking! You even get the update free with the iPod! Get the freaking thing!
    2. iPod nano The new iPod nano is pretty odd. Why? One word, Touchscreen and its tiny.  It is extremely tiny and it has multitouch but you will never ever use it because it is so small that fit more than one finger on it. They also got rid of the camera (I was never really a fan of it because my finger always got in the way). It basically just migrated to the iPod touch.
    3. iPod shuffle There is a new feature, buttons, Apple's page for it even says "Features: Buttons, VoiceOver". I saw that and laughed my face off. I wonder what they were thinking when they did that?

  2. Ping Apple made a social network and immediately succeded. Ping has been around for a week and has over 1 million users. It was brought to us during the latest update along with a new icon. I will delve into this more later but from what i can tell you can share musical interests and connect with bands in a facebook-esque fashion. Apparently there is a bad bit of spam as well, this will go away soon,  Jobs likes to keep things tidy.
  3. iOS 4.1 and 4.2  iOS updates have been annoyingly lacking recently these new updates will bring multitasking to the iPod touch and iPad platforms. Multitasking, need i say more. You can finally have your digital cake and play Plants vs Zombies too. 
Apple did a good lot of things recently but there will always be something amiss with Apple (buttons, multitasking, folders etc.) Follow me on twitter for updates on Apple.
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Sunday, August 29, 2010

iPads Now Shipping Within 24 Hours (Short Post)

Behold the iPad in All Its GloryImage via Wikipedia
Apple has finally caught up with the high demand of the iPad and are now producing enough to promise
iPads to ship within 24 hours after ordering. This is wonderful but how long will this promise keep. With a product as sexy as the iPad you can expect the demand to rise with the new greater availability. Now that people don't need to worry about waiting an extra week to get the darn thing. That being the case I hope that Apple realizes this and exponentially ups productivity to match the demand.
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Thursday, August 19, 2010

World of Warcraft, Jobs and Akinator

World of WarcraftImage via Wikipedia
I am so close to getting this job at Five Below. I may get it this week. It's my birthday very soon and I got World of Warcraft. It is very addicting, I havent blogged since I got the trial account some weeks ago. Now I cant stop playing it. My farm probably looks like junk! Cafe World is probably knee deep in moldy grills and ranges by now.
Yesterday I found out about Akinator.com, an amazing Twenty Questions style game that can guess any character from anything ever with the utmost accuracy. It got The Milkman a delusion of a character in a game called Psychonauts. It easily got IG-88, the bounty hunter droid from Star Wars. The most awesome thing about the site is that It is hosted by a freaking genie. So check it out and be amazed.
                  Akinator
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Monday, August 9, 2010

Blazing Wyvern

My family recently started playing Dungeons & Dragons again, which got me in the mood to draw some cool things. Today I drew a deadly blazing wyvern. A wyvern is sort of like a flying bug-dragon-lion thing. I gave it spines that come out of its wings so that it can impale any enemy it encounters. The head is a dragon of the traditional chinese shape.  A chinese dragon has a head similar to that of a wolf and commonly has whiskers and a beard. Occasionally it has a trailing mane as I drew as flames in this sketch.

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Saturday, August 7, 2010

Yesterday's Events


A picture is worth a thousand words. This is my first photo-blog post. Yesterday I went malling with my girlfriends. We had a great time. They got some clothes for school. I found that I look good in a dress. Perhaps I have a future in drag. We are a crazy few, me and my friends. I look fabulous! 

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Google Wave Cancelled: Is This the End Of The First Ever Tidal Wave?

Lars Rasmussen introduces Google WaveImage by dailylifeofmojo via Flickr
Some of you may know that Google has discontinued the Wave project. There may be some confusion on my plans to keep this site afloat. There is good news however.  As Google is a pro-open-source company the truth is that although Google Wave is lost the Tidal Wave experiment is not.
Google has in fact posted the source files as a free download and open source product for developers. I will in fact be able to do much more with the site. I have downloaded the source and will be implementing widgets and other items as I experiment with the source. There will be a tab for members that allows you to view applications under development. As work progresses the website will become much more interactive.
If you are not a member you can join on the sidebar of the blog. At this point I have only just downloaded the source and it will be months before major features take effect. I highly suggest that you subscribe if you are interested in the project. If you have any ideas send me an email entitled [yourName]"Tidal Wave Idea" i.e. Bob Tidal Wave Idea.  I will send emails to members about the progress on the site.
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Monday, August 2, 2010

Jailbreak Me

JailbreakImage by ீ ๑ Adam via Flickr
Finally there is a jailbreak for iOS4. It is an untethered jailbreak that works through Mobile Safari.
 It is a free site that quickly jailbreaks your device. It is well designed as well. the site looks like the lock screen and it say slide to jailbreak on the slider. Once you do so and it does its thing you're done. Thats it, I didn't even have to sync first ( I recommend you back up your files though).
I have been playing with my ipod since this morning and right now there are not many iOS4 supported jailbroken apps so download at your own peril as with all jailbreaks. Visit JailbreakMe.com on your iphone or ipod touch to jailbreak your device.
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Thursday, July 29, 2010

Penny Auctions are Awesome

Image representing QuiBids as depicted in Crun...Image via CrunchBase
I just learned about this amazing website, QuiBids, that does what are called penny auctions. Penny auctions have been around for a long time and are an interesting concept. You can win auctions at an outrageous Discounts.
It sounds too unreal but how it is paid for is actually quite simple. You first need to purchase  a bid  pack. Bids cost 60¢ ($.60) each and are bought in packs of 45 75 and 300 bids.
While you can get things like an iPad for $20, Quibids wants users to come in to an auction with realistic expectations, it is likely that it will cost more. I highly suggest reading the articles in the QuiBids 101 section on the site and take advantage of the beginners only auctions. You can join QuiBids here

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Wednesday, July 28, 2010

The Mash-tastic features of iOS4!

iphoneImage via Wikipedia

I just did something incredibly cool that i didn’t know was possible at all.
Have you ever been using an app on your iPhone, maybe you were reading the news and you wanted to tweet an article,  and it brings up the dreaded and unbearable web view. I loathe the web view, it is such an ineffective way to communicate design. Many people, I believe, would much rather use their apps to tweet an article.
Thanks to Mashable you can have your cake and eat it too by setting a default twitter client. It is crazy cool,it opens up your app, TweetDeck perhaps, and you are able to tweet the article using the default message or customize it to say what you like. Thanks to multitasking you can get right back to reading as well. It is a fantastic experience!
Mashable is one of the most amazing news sites I have ever used and the app is beautifully designed with a minimalist scheme. It is a highly praised source of info, and I applaud both the blogging teams and app developers. Keep bringing the news!
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Tuesday, July 27, 2010

Apple Brings Us New Toys

CUPERTINO, CA - OCTOBER 14:  Apple CEO Steve J...Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Holy freaking awesome! Today the Apple store went down for a good bit. Don’t fret though everthing is fine, in fact it is better than fantastic.

              Apple brought in some new playthings. A new trackpad that is about the same height as the keyboard allows you to better manipulate the items on your new iMac. Yes, I said a new iMac. Remember those reports about the outrageously powerful i7 processor that can set fire to a macbook unless you use it on its side? Good News! They are now in the new iMac. The best part is iMacs are vertically designed to enable it to not explode.

              For an extra $69, the cost of the magic trackpad, you are able to customize the iMac to come with the new touch-tastic toy as well as the magic mouse that it automatically includes. Honestly I half expected it to cost more than that, you can’t expect apple to sell you the thing for an OEM price on the first day it is available.

              To top it all off they have announced a new more powerful Mac Pro. The new Mac will include a 12 core structure and I’m willing to bet that there might be a few different ports on it as well (specifically Firewire 1600 and 3200). Don’t be expecting them too keep the recent 800 ports.

              Start saving up because these things are not cheap. Stock up on new cameras and camcorders if you plan on getting the new Mac Pro because those old firewire ports are as good as gone now. If you are a casual user I highly reccomend the Magic Trackpad and it might be a good idea to save up for that iMac as your next Mac purchase. I can’t wait until August. My birthday is coming up and there is a new Mac Pro coming in.

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Sunday, July 25, 2010

Facebook Games are Annoyingly Addicting and Cute

Facebook dragged me into the games again. Every time I get out it is only to be sucked back in. Fronteirville is a very annoying game to say the least. The problem is that i cant stop playing it and its driving me away from my work.

I promised myself I would get more me time. Now all my time is spent on that crazy game Frontierville. I have been neglecting my blog and haven't written anything for two days. There is app spam all over my Facebook page and I don't know how to get rid of it.

It will take me a few days to catch up on the Apple Rumors I had been Following. There is so much I have to fix now.

Thursday, July 22, 2010

iPhone Coming to T-Mobile?

Image representing iPhone 3G as depicted in Cr...Image via CrunchBase


    I just read an intriguing post about the iPhone coming to T-mobile. It sound's farfetched but I absolutely believe this will happen.
    According to the highly praised Apple news blog, Cult of Mac, T-Mobile leaked that there is an 80 percent chance that they will start selling the iPhone in the third quarter. This information is very specific so there must be a bit of truth behind it. 
    Before I left Radio Shack my T-Mobile representative said that they were getting rid of all their HTC phones to make room for something awesome. She said that they were bringing in a better phone than the EVO 4G. This was before the EVO 4G was released. What is an EVO 4G other than a bigger version of the iPhone 4 with the Android operating system.
   I look forward to using  the iPhone on 3G network that is ten times as fast as Sprints tiny 4G "area-lets" that they advertise as a network

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Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Rolling Watermelon Cooler for Picnic-Crazy Geeks



 Image via Engadget.com
This is no joke, you can now keep your melons fresh using science. Yet another unusual oriental invention, or is it. No this is actually an object dreamt up by a man in North Carolina. Which is really only place that you could find something like this. Apparently North Carolina is obsessed with the big green fruit. They even have an official license plate of the juicy goodness.
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Monday, July 19, 2010

Ladders are Scary

My middle brother has been making video games for six years. Today I played a game that he designed for a contest to win $50.  Sure it isn't big money but it is a little hard to make a ladder-based mental illness treatment side-scroller. That is the genre that he chose for the contest.

Barnstar for WikiProject Video Games.Image via Wikipedia


The goal of the contest was to create a game that was of a combination of genres. My brother chose the genres:
  1. Ladder based like Donkey Kong
  2. Mental-illness treatment not dissimilar to the objective of psychonauts
  3. side-scroller I shouldn't need to tell you what that is. If I do think "Mario".

He did very well making the game scare the bejeezus out of me. The game, named Ascendaphobia, is about a mental patient who faces his irrational fear of ladders in an area designed to pit patient against fear.  If he doesn't win the contest then it is rigged because I am still shaking.

He got me to finally commit to making games for iPhone and iPad and I actually made my first application today. It wasn't hard and Apple makes it so that I don't have to do any coding. My next step is to design my own basic game for the Mac.

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Sunday, July 18, 2010

I Need More Leisure Time, Androids are Taking Over the World & Magical Trackpads

Android robot logo.Image via Wikipedia
I have been spending so much time on this blog that I decided to take a me day today.I went to get my hair done, then I sat down and  watched Shrek 3, which is actually pretty funny.
   I managed to find out some interesting things.

I have the trial of  Ten One's program and it hardly works. While it is able to tell whether my finger or my stylus is on the trackpad. It sometimes thinks that my stylus is my finger and vice versa. I would rather use a Wacom tablet for photoshop than my tiny trackpad. It does open up great possibilities for the iPad. I expect  to see applications with this technology very soon.
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Saturday, July 17, 2010

Today I wanted to do a really nice post on Apple's latest press conference. I unfortunately was unable to do so because of Google's ridiculous text editing tools. It really bothers me that the text tools think that I am an uneducated doofus. I can't use that thing and its not out of stupidity. Apparently there is a point where you can become so good at something that the tools you use need help from you in order to function.
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Friday, July 16, 2010

Bob's App Reviews: Graffiti for Android.

Graffiti, that old input system
Image by tnarik via Flickr


Today I opened up one of my favorite RSS readers, Feedly, and the first thing that caught my eye was a post from Engadget When I saw that it is the original graffiti, from palm, I immediately installed it, made a stylus, and started writing this review using my HTC Hero.

The extension is far better than had expected. It is an exact duplicate of the original graffiti that even includes cursor movement. the best part about the graffiti extension, the jawn is free.

   The the text and some HTML, Preceding this article was all written in Graffiti for Android. Note that I used to own a palm that used Graffiti and I still haven't Gotten used to it on my Hero. It took me a long time to write this article in Graffiti but I am greatly satisfied with the product.
   I look forward to updates, especially one that will include a spell-checker. As this is the first release I don't expect it to work like a magician. What I did expect from the application was exceeded.
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