Disney vs. Pixar

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The continuing animosity between Disney and Pixar amuses me to no end — it’s amazing how snarky the comments have been getting. For instance, this one, from a post about the possibility of Disney making sequels to the Pixar films that they have the rights to on MacMinute:

“The unproven writing and graphics quality of Disney’s work with computer-guided-image animation may have an unintentional ‘contagion’ impact since consumers may subconsciously associate these films as Pixar product,” Reif Cohen said in a report Thursday. “In addition, too many releases may fatigue CGI’s scarcity value, which has created consumer intrigue for this ‘event’ animation format.” Her comments mirror those made by Pixar (and Apple) CEO Steve Jobs. “We feel sick about Disney doing sequels because if you look at the quality of their sequels… it’s been pretty embarrassing,” Jobs said during Pixar’s fourth-quarter earnings call in February.

He’s certainly not wrong, though.

iTunes: “Bless You” by Orlando, Tony from the album Pop Music: The Golden Era 1951-1975 (1961, 2:09).

More online crack

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Another good online time-waster: a version of Breakout that actually manages to put a new twist on the game by giving it a circular playfield — Plastic Balls.

Rather than running your paddle back and forth across a plane…well, you know those bright yellow plastic funnel coin collectors where you drop a coin down a trough and watch it go spinning in circles down the funnel? Put bricks around the outside edge of the funnel, put your paddle rotating around the funnel, and let the ball bounce between your paddle in the center and the bricks on the outside.

Very cool, and the extra level of pseudo-dimensionality adds a nice new touch to the gameplay.

(via Collision Detection)

Anti-Goth measures fail due to lack of interest

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Two years ago, in a rather ridiculous display of small-minded stupidity, the town of Blue Springs, MO earmarked \$273,000 of their education budget to combat Goth culture.

“Goth culture” in Blue Springs, Mo., may be in for some tough times.

Thanks to Rep. Sam Graves, a Republican who represents the Kansas City suburb, \$273,000 out of the Department of Education’s fiscal 2002 budget will help the Blue Springs Outreach Unit take on a perceived problem for local youths.

“It is my hope that this funding will give the officers in the Youth Outreach Unit the tools they need to identify Goth culture leaders that are preying on our kids,” Rep. Graves said in a press release announcing the appropriation last month.

[…]

“It was really a community need, and they really weren’t able to satisfactorily get money at the local level,” Mr. Patek said of the Blue Springs project to combat Goth culture. Some parents and law- enforcement officials are concerned that, beyond the dark fashions and music characteristic of that subculture, some “Goth” teenagers are drawn into potentially dangerous behavior.

The program is meant to help train police officers, and help schools and families with children involved in Goth culture, according to the announcement from Rep. Graves. Drug abuse and self-mutilation are among the troubling behaviors Goth culture fosters, Mr. Patek said.

He stressed that the effort will not be limited to Blue Springs. “I know this was a good project,” Mr. Patek said. “And it’s a finite amount of resources. … We’re not talking about an ongoing federal commitment.”

This was so unnecessary. We must protect our children from those evil people who wear black, and listen to all that wierd music! Ugh.

Thankfully, word comes now that the project essentially went nowhere, and more than half of the money is being returned (and, hopefully, put to better use in the future). The best part? Rather than “combatting” Goth culture, the people involved ended up realizing that it’s not such a horrible thing, and just another aspect of how some people choose to present themselves.

The Goth grant is over.

Goth acceptance and tolerance is now in.

…plans for the grant never unfolded, and Blue Springs has returned \$132,000 of the money unused. Officials concede today they never found much of a “problem” at all associated with the Goth culture, and instead have developed a new understanding and acceptance.

A little good news to start the day, for once.

(via Jesus’ General, via Atrios)

Life in Fallujah today

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This is the democracy and freedom that our soldiers are dying for…

With U.S. marines gone and central government authority virtually nonexistent, Fallujah resembles an Islamic mini-state – anyone caught selling alcohol is flogged and paraded in the city. Men are encouraged to grow beards and barbers are warned against giving “western” hair cuts.

“After all the blood that was shed, and the lives that were lost, we shall only accept God’s law in Fallujah,” said cleric Abdul-Qader al-Aloussi, offering a glimpse of what a future Iraq may look like as the U.S.-led occupation draws to a close. “We must capitalize on our victory over the Americans and implement Islamic sharia laws.”

The departure of the marines under an agreement that ended the three-week siege last month has enabled hardline Islamic leaders to assert their power in this once-restive city 50 kilometres west of Baghdad.

(via Atrios)

How to make friends by telephone

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Many people are linking to this 1940’s era booklet on the then-newish telephone system and commenting on how amusing it is.

As for me, after flipping through the pages, I’m struck by how much more bearable many phone conversations these days would be if people would keep these pointers in mind.

(via Boing Boing)

iTunes: “Storm 3000” by Leftfield from the album Leftism (1995, 5:43).

Gore’s speech at NYU

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Excellent speech given by Al Gore at New York University yesterday (it’s a shame that this Al Gore wasn’t the Al Gore campaigning against Bush in 2000). This is a long one, but it is really worth watching, or reading, in its entirety.

C-Span Video (RealOne, 1 hour 9 minutes): Al Gore at NYU.

MoveOn.org Transcript: Remarks by Al Gore, May 26, 2004.

George W. Bush promised us a foreign policy with humility. Instead, he has brought us humiliation in the eyes of the world.

He promised to “restore honor and integrity to the White House.” Instead, he has brought deep dishonor to our country and built a durable reputation as the most dishonest President since Richard Nixon.

[…]

As a nation, our greatest export has always been hope: hope that through the rule of law people can be free to pursue their dreams, that democracy can supplant repression and that justice, not power, will be the guiding force in society. Our moral authority in the world derived from the hope anchored in the rule of law. With this blatant failure of the rule of law from the very agents of our government, we face a great challenge in restoring our moral authority in the world and demonstrating our commitment to bringing a better life to our global neighbors.

During Ronald Reagan’s Presidency, Secretary of Labor Ray Donovan was accused of corruption, but eventually, after a lot of publicity, the indictment was thrown out by the Judge. Donovan asked the question, “Where do I go to get my reputation back?” President Bush has now placed the United States of America in the same situation. Where do we go to get our good name back?

The answer is, we go where we always go when a dramatic change is needed. We go to the ballot box, and we make it clear to the rest of the world that what’s been happening in America for the last four years, and what America has been doing in Iraq for the last two years, really is not who we are. We, as a people, at least the overwhelming majority of us, do not endorse the decision to dishonor the Geneva Convention and the Bill of Rights.

[…]

In December of 2000, even though I strongly disagreed with the decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to order a halt to the counting of legally cast ballots, I saw it as my duty to reaffirm my own strong belief that we are a nation of laws and not only accept the decision, but do what I could to prevent efforts to delegitimize George Bush as he took the oath of office as president.

I did not at that moment imagine that Bush would, in the presidency that ensued, demonstrate utter contempt for the rule of law and work at every turn to frustrate accountability…

So today, I want to speak on behalf of those Americans who feel that President Bush has betrayed our nation’s trust, those who are horrified at what has been done in our name, and all those who want the rest of the world to know that we Americans see the abuses that occurred in the prisons of Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantanamo and secret locations as yet undisclosed as completely out of keeping with the character and basic nature of the American people and at odds with the principles on which America stands.

I believe we have a duty to hold President Bush accountable – and I believe we will. As Lincoln said at our time of greatest trial, “We – even we here – hold the power, and bear the responsibility.”

(via MeFi)

Descent 2 for Mac OS X: FREE!

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This rocks.

I’m not much of a gamer. Never have been, likely never will be. Most computer games bore me, requiring far too much time and mental effort to bother with (any strategy based game — StarCraft, WarCraft, WoodCraft), or just being so pointless I can’t envision devoting time to them (EverCrack). Generally, if I get into a game, it’s for a few minutes at a time, and either brainless but fun point-and-shoot (Doom) or brainless drive-around-in-circles racing games (Star Wars Pod Racer, Wipeout for Playstation).

One of the few games that ever really got my attention was Descent. At the time it came out, it was a groundbreaking game — taking the then-typical pesudo-3D first-person-shooter approach of Castle Wolfenstein, Doom, and so on, and putting it into a true three dimensional world.

Where previous “3D” games were actually two-dimensional (your only real choices of movement were on a plane — forward, backwards, left, and right turns, etc.), Descent put you in control of a small spacecraft flying through tunnels within planets and asteroids, adding the final third dimension, allowing you to pilot your craft through all three axis of movement. You could dive, barrel roll, loop-de-loop, swoop down on targets, anything.

We had some great multi-player Descent games at The Pit (my old apartment in Anchorage), and for once, I had the advantage. While I would occasionally play games, I wasn’t enough of a gamer to have very many old habits built in, so when I started playing with the controls of Descent, it didn’t take me long to get the hang of moving through a fully three-dimensional world. My roommate Jason wasn’t able to adjust as quickly, due to the ingrained habit of only thinking along two axis of movement. Many was the time when he’d end up behind me, blasting away, when suddenly I’d go round a bend in the tunnel just out of his sight, fly into a large open room, and immediately shoot straight up to hover just above the entrance. Jason would come screaming into the cavern and start trying to find me — panning left and right. Meanwhile, I’d be targeting him from above, suddenly unleashing a blistering stream of laser fire onto the top of his ship, and sending him off into blissful digital oblivion.

Of course, Jason being the jobless obsessive-compulsive that he was, he soon spent far too many hours doing nothing but play Descent, so it was only a matter of a week or two before he was flying circles around everyone else in the apartment. Still, my little reign of terror was fun while it lasted.

What got all this started running through my brain, though, was Phil tipping me off to some wonderful news — Descent 2 has been ported to run on Mac OS X, and is freely downloadable!

Schweeeeet.

It’s downloaded, just waiting for me to install it. I think I better wait ’till the weekend to do that, though, otherwise I’m likely to get nothing done from here on out.

What a deal!

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While on my lunch break today, I heard the sounds of Queen’s “We are the Champions” emanating from the television mounted in the corner of the burger joint I frequent daily. I looked up to see shots of middle-aged men running down the street, jumping into the air, and pumping their arms in jubilation. Then the subject of the commercial came on.

Some sort of Viagra “club” deal — buy six doses, get the seventh free.

This struck me as completely bizarre.

I’m also left wondering just what the punchcard for this deal must look like…

iTunes: “Music (Groove Armada Club)” by Madonna from the album Music (2000, 9:31).

So much for that idea

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My plan for the morning was to wander down the hill and see Kerry speak on today’s swing through Seattle. It even looked like I was going to be able to pull it off — I set my alarm an hour early, actually managed to haul myself out of bed, and was out the door by 8:45am.

Springtime in Seattle, though, doesn’t always have the best weather, and today is definitely one of the drearier days. Grey, windy, and rainy. I wasn’t terribly concerned about this on the walk down the hill, as one of the first things I learned about being a Seattleite is that an umbrella is a necessary part of one’s supplies. I walked down Pike to the Pike Place Market, took the stairs down through the market, and crossed Alaskan Way to head to the pier. One of the police officers on duty directed me to the line, and I started working my way down…

…and down…

…and down…

Waiting to see Kerry speak

…and about five blocks later or so, finally found the end. Still, I’ve got no big problem with queueing up for something that interests me, and I’ve been curious for a while as to how Kerry would strike me in person. What little I’ve seen of him (generally during snippets on CNN while I’m eating lunch, as I’m without TV at home) hasn’t really impressed me to date, but I also know that many people can come across far better in a personal appearance than in a compressed 15-second news soundbite. So, I staked out my spot in line and waited.

And kept waiting.

An hour later, after having moved only about the length of two blocks, it became very clear that chances of actually making it into the designated area when Kerry was still around were getting slimmer and slimmer. The final straw, though, was when word came down the line that due to security measures, umbrellas were not being allowed into the secure area. Bags not being allowed I was expecting — that had been mentioned on Kerry’s website — but umbrellas? Sure, I’m not going to melt, but that doesn’t mean that I particularly relish the idea of standing out in the wind and rain, either.

The pile of umbrellas

So, I gave it a few more minutes to think it over, decided that it wasn’t worth it, and wandered my way back home. On the way out, I passed the solution to the umbrella situation: a huge pile of umbrellas at the bottom of a lamppost close to the screening area at the entrance. Ugh. Talk about a quickly improvised and badly thought out solution. I was not impressed.

So, that was my morning adventure — an aborted and unsuccessful attempt to form better impressions of the Democratic nominee for the 2004 election cycle. Hopefully I’ll have another chance before November rolls around (and if I do, I hope it goes better than this one did).

iTunes: “Heartbeat (Armand van Helden)” by Somerville, Jimmy from the album Platinum on Black, Vol. 2 (1995, 4:53).