wooooo

Back Burner

So in our fight to get off comcast services, we’ve made another step to getting completely to free IPTV.

Downgraded to the basic $12 package and threw my new $265 refurb dell tower behind the flat screen and am using the following:

Netflix Watch Now (yea totally worth it.)
VLC + 1 TB NAS w/ movies and media on it
Itunes (vid podcasts / rentals)
Hulu / My Media Player
Joost (getting better!)
Veoh (still awesome)
Babelgum (mehhh)
Miro (still playing with it)
Moviesister.com + Movietvonline.com (dont download, watch)
TidalTV (meh)
Orb for remote viewing (absolute must)
Tight VNC for remote control via ipod touch
Slingbox

+ wireless keyboard / mouse = media happiness

It’s awesome. Yea, theres not a program that i have found yet that can aggregate all these programs, but its a really great alternative, i don’t miss cable at all.

I wish there were more plugins for XBMC so i could use that more. This is taking the place of the xbox right now.

There is a lot of programming out there, you don’t need your cable company, they need you.

I don’t like sports.

Yea, when i was younger, i played JV Soccer, Baseball, JV Basketball, but when i got into music i left that all behind. I think it taught me some important stuff, but whatever.

WHY AM I ADDICTED TO WATCHING THE OLYMPICS?

It’s not just because there’s nothing else on all night, cause i still haven’t watched Dr. horrible. It’s not because I’m bored cause there’s adult swim and 100+ other channels. Yea i also do a LOT of work at night too. It’s not that it makes me feel good about myself, because my torso sure as shit doesn’t look like Michael Phelps.

Yet somehow i found myself getting pumped over the women’s soccer match earlier this week and staying at work for an additional 50 mins to see the women’s volleyball team kick ass.

I guess i like seeing exceptional people do normal things exceptionally well.

The only thing i can think of is that there must be an underground olympics a la “Beerfest” that is cooler than what i am watching.

so i decided that i needed to hack my new phone the other day, its a RAZR v9 (04.C1 R263311_U_9C.13.37R3) for multiple reasons:

a) fuck you att, i am not a walking billboard
b) the default themes are crap
c) anything in the media-net-mall-whatever is even worse
d) i can’t be seen with a piece of equipment that is not modified in one way or another. that would be unacceptable. just unacceptable.

so luckily theres a huge community already developed around hacking moto devices and i gravitated towards modmymoto.com. They pretty much had everything i wanted. Here’s what i did.

I downloaded the following tools / file and basically followed this.

Seven 2.2a MP - Megapack for my version phone (Complete Firmware Replacement)
Moto Drivers - drivers needed
Flash & Backup 3 - to…flash…and…backup firmware
P2K_Commander - file manager and then some
RAZRv9 FB3 Profile - stuff you need for FB3 to see the v9

You put the phone in boot loader mode by starting with the phone off, then holding *, #, and the power button. It shows you the BL version and Firmware that is currently on the phone. If you want to transfer files or flash it, you change the usb connection mode to default to the data connection and plugin the usb cable to your phone and computer prior to turning it off. Fairly simple.

For some reason i was looking at stuff for the V3xx when i first started modding it. I was wondering why my flashes just rebooted the phone. heh. glad nothing bad happened.

So yea, just put the phone in BL mode, fire up B&F3 and load the v9 profile. Backup everything. Flash the file to the phone. Done. Use P2K Commander to look inside and add stuff (ringtones / pics)

Thats pretty much it, it was an interesting few hrs of learning. If i find anything really cool, i’ll put it up here.

Now i’m going to think about why i had to even go through this in the first place, and why cell phone companies make shitty themes.

This is a video my friend matt parra made for my band grindbox back when we were in high school.

one day i will be skinny again.

This is a listing of Webisodes i created with my last band, Lokata.

#1

#2

more vids and live vid after the break..

Read the rest of this entry »

Nothingface -Mega Twisted EVIL Raw Nu-metal for the masses.

If they can somehow capture the rawness and evil in “An audio guide to everyday atrocity” they may gain +5 listening status in my ipod. Word on the street is that they’re back with the lineup from violence (2000) and working on a new album. Some vids on their myspace.

Nothingface - Blue Skin (Live)

SICK OF ALL THE SHIT

You know what i’m talking about, thats right. NO MORE HELLYEAH.

Crossbreed - Electrocore with so much potential.

The coolest live show ever. Allow me to paint. Black lights, dudes wrapped in flashing fiber optic cords, glow in the dark contacts, keyboardists with grinders shooting sparks off the sides of their keyboards losing their minds in a sandstorm of confetti.

I accidentally stumbled on some old stuff of their on last.fm and ended up finding out that they not only released a full 7 song EP just a few yrs ago, but they also have 2 songs on their myspace that appear to be a sneak peak for a disc that was due in 07. Listen to End of Days, its a great song.

Crossbreed - Underlined

Flaw - “Watch me fall while i go down, i’m taking all you bastards to the ground with me dead or alive, all your fuckin whole life is systematic hype still means a bit much to me.”

I always dug this band. Despite the singer having a perpetual sadness in his voice. I guess they were five bolt main for a while, but now theyre on a digital label and ready to roll.

Flaw - Payback

TRUSTCompany - The band to bridge the emo-nu metal gap.

Yep, theyre back. From the looks of their myspace theyre doing a few shows here and there and they have 2 new songs on their myspace. Theyre pretty classic TC, lots of singing in that oh so familiar voice.

Check the new songs.

TRUSTCompany - Downfall

more to come…

I wanted to write a quick review of Wall-e that we saw tonight. Suffice to say it was awesome. But as i was going through my daily feeds the giz had a near perfect review. So i’m going to post it here.

Wall-E might be the most sympathetic, lovable robot ever created on film. While R2-D2 was hilarious and endearing, he had the benefit of C3PO to translate for him and a cast of human characters to carry the weight of the story. At the end of the day, R2-D2 was simply comic relief, but his descendant, whose voice was also created by Ben Burtt, is so full of humanity that you feel like your heart might just burst. Simply put, Wall-E is a masterpiece.

The first 40 minutes or so of Wall-E are almost completely without dialogue. Instead, the story is told visually, as we see Wall-E, the abandoned garbage bot, puttering around a staggeringly rendered post-apocalyptic Earth. He goes around doing his job, as he has for the past 700 years, compacting trash into cubes and stacking them into immense towers. On the side, he collects remnants of humanity to keep for his own amusement. Zippo lighters, Rubik’s Cubes, Christmas lights: these are what Wall-E surrounds himself with. Because he’s so alone (except for a little cockroach), these dirty, abandoned objects are his companions, his contact with humanity.

He watches Hello, Dolly! on an iPod that he somehow hooked up to a VCR, emulating the dancing and learning about love. (That’s not the only Apple reference in the movie: he makes the classic Mac bootup sound when he turns on, and his love interest EVE was designed by Jonathan Ive). When you see Wall-E try to imitate the dancing using a hub cap he collected just for that purpose, you know that this is more than a piece of machinery. Proving Pixar’s raison d’etre, this little silent robot has more humanity in him than most movie characters played by actual humans.

Immediately, we realize this isn’t your typical kiddie cartoon. No pop culture jokes? No instantly-recognizable celebrity voices? A decimated, humanless landscape full of towers of garbage and decrepit buildings? A lonely robot trying to learn about love and humanity through centuries of its trash? This looks more like a beautiful, haunting sci-fi movie than a children’s movie, because that’s exactly what it is.

Wall-E features loving nods to everything from Brave New World to 2001 to Star Wars without ever feeling derivative. Instead, it builds on them, making what has the potential to be an almost relentlessly bleak world into one full of complete joy and levity. It always has that undercurrent of melancholy just under the surface, as we never really forget that humanity has utterly destroyed the planet and turned itself into a race of pudgy, helpless babies, but heart of the story is Wall-E and his longing for love.

And isn’t that the sign of great science fiction? While on the surface it’s a movie about robots and spaceships set centuries in the future, deep down it’s about humanity and its place on Earth and in the universe. It uses its out-of-this-world settings and characters as a lens to reflect our own world back at us, showing us both the beauty and the ugliness of our existence through the eyes of a guileless, trash-compacting robot.

In a movie season that’s overpopulated with tired superhero movies, remakes and sequels, it’s incredibly refreshing to see a movie that stands on its own as a completely new and unique creation. It’s safe to say you’ve never seen anything like Wall-E, and you might not see anything like it again. Go. Go see it as soon as you can.

- By Adam Frucci

Thanks PIXAR. At least my four year old doesn’t have much dialogue to learn in this one.

Time to kick the skank ass ho to the curb.

After calling multiple times on my connection issues, no one returned my call. They told me i was going to get a dispatch, never called. fuck you too then.

My new internet is getting installed today. ADSL2+yo.

We’re going to make do with no TV and see if we can function without reality TV and G4 for a month.

However i’ve been researching legit tv progs. Here’s what i like in order from least to best.

5. TidalTV

The closest thing to actual TV online. Has a few channels, i hope they get more.

4. Hulu

http://www.paulyanez.com/labs/mymediaplayer/ — this makes hulu better.

3.  VeohTV

Incorporates lots of hulu videos with tons of online vids and a good search. The best thing about this prog is the interface.

2. Netflix Watch Now

If you have a subscription, theres tons of tv in their watch now sections. Quality is awesome.

1. Slingbox

Well it’s just tv. So its a complete replacement. Granted i’m just stealing my dad’s TV, its the best. Quality is decent, damn stable. Why isn’t there a port of this to XBMC / PS3 yet?

The whole point of this is to not watch tv and do stuff like work out, so we’ll see. There’s really nothing thats totally blew my mind yet.

*and there is always nbc.com / abc.com for that sitcom kinda stuff.

cause it reminded me of..

Veronica Corningstone: Mr. Burgundy, I am a professional and I would like to do my job.
Ron Burgundy: Big deal. I am very professional.
Veronica Corningstone: Mr. Burgundy, you are acting like a baby.
Ron Burgundy: I’m not a baby, I’m a MAN, I am an ANCHORMAN.
Veronica Corningstone: You are not a man. You are a big fat joke.
Ron Burgundy: I’m a man who discovered the wheel and built the Eiffel Tower out of metal and brawn. That’s what kind of man I am. You’re just a woman with a small brain. With a brain a third the size of us. It’s science.