Not only did I leave, but I decided it would be cool to break comments for the last two days. Word of advice for everyone out there…never use “http:” as one of your blacklist strings.

Sorry about that.

I will make this short and sweet. Jacob Gower (macgyver), owner of the CSS Vault and many other fine sites, has purchased FG and is now the head geek around here. Already the site is better off with more news and updates. Most of the crew will remain.

I had fun. I am sure you will see me again soon.

Merrill Lynch Japan predicts Sony will lose more than $1 billion on hardware during its next-gen console’s first year on the market–a sum it may not be able to recoup.

According to the latest issue of Japanese magazine Toyo Keizai, Merrill Lynch Japan Securities has recently calculated an analysis that the production of a single PlayStation 3 console will cost Sony approximately 54,000 yen to make ($494), as of its initial release in 2006.

Merrill Lynch Japan estimates that the machine’s main components–namely its Cell chip, RSX, and BD-ROM drive–will cost about 11,000 yen ($101) each. After adding the other electronics that will be used in the PS3, the machine’s production cost goes up to 54,000 yen.

Amazing what Microsoft can make you do. If it was just Nintendo in the arena I have no doubts that Sony wouldn’t have a problem selling their console for $499 or up.

After someone cracks the CSS encryption on DVDs don’t you think it would be a good idea to hire the guy? Maybe after he broke the encryption on the iTunes music store? Well if someone doesn’t scoop this guy up after he cracks Google’s video viewer then they have just lost it.

Instead of trying to fight these types of people they should be embracing them. Hell, if I had the money I would do it.

Jon Lech Johansen, also known as DVD Jon, posted software on his “So Sue Me” Web site that he says modifies the viewer so that it plays videos hosted on any server. The company’s Google Video Viewer, in turn, was modified from the free VLC media player to restrict it to playing video hosted on Google’s own servers.

I am sure everyone is well aware of this, but if not Apple has decided to add color screens to all of their iPod models (excluding the Shuffle for all you smartasses).

The simplified lineup features a new 20GB color screen model for $299 (the same price as the older monochrome version), a 60GB model for $399 ($50 cheaper), and an updated iPod U2 Special Edition with a color screen for $329 ($20 cheaper). The company has apparently dropped the 30GB iPod photo model, which sold for $349.

Saturday night I was out doing things that I probably shouldn’t be doing with people I shouldn’t be hanging out with, but it was fun. These people thought it would be a good idea to build a Star Destroyer replica from legos. It only took them 10 hours.

They also made a video of it using stop motion technology and I must admit it is pretty cool. Can’t see myself ever doing something like that, but to each his own.

The King Kong movie trailer has been released and I must admit that it is a doozy. Peter Jackson has easily established himself as one of the top 3 filmmakers for this decade in my opinion.

My first impressions of Kong based on this trailer are strong. Jack Black seems to be a perfect choice, even though I can’t get any of his Tenacious D songs out of my head. However, after watching the original 1933 version of King Kong, I see that the role he is playing is definitely a weird fellow. Jack fits perfectly, from what I see in the trailer.

Kong looks incredible. There are limited shots, and not much motion shown in this first trailer, but from what was shown Kong is definitely the best looking CG character to-date.

TUG

Many people have been wondering when the next round of submissions would be taking place for entry into the 9rules Network and I am happy to announce that we will open them up this Friday starting at 12:00 AM Eastern time. Once again we will only have the window for submissions open for 24 hours so if you are interested in joining make sure to get your entry in between 12:00AM and 11:59PM on July 1st.

We are looking for all types of content-based websites and if your site is different from what we currently offer our readers then even better.

There have been a couple of great discussions concerning the 9rules Network, but the best one to date was started by Matthew Pennell. The entry and the comments go into great detail as to what the network is about and how everyone is starting to view it. If you would like an inside perspective on how things are going for members then you might be interested in Darice’s perspective.

Unforuntately, after the last round was over I missed emailing some of the people who submitted their sites to explain why their site was not accepted into the Network. If you are one of those people do not hesitate to email me at scrivs{AT}9rules.com to let me know of my oversight. I have no excuses for this happening and would like to correct it as soon as possible.

UPDATE: The submission page.

Microsoft is planning to extend the RSS (Really Simple Syndication) standard to better support the publishing of ordered lists of information, a company spokesperson says.

Gary Schare, director of strategic product management in the Windows division of Microsoft, says that while RSS is a reliable standard for updating information in message form, it currently has no logical way to organize that information in a way that could help subscribers keep track of what is being fed to them.

Didn’t they “extend” HTML back in the day along with Netscape? It only took a couple of years and new sets of standards to fix that fiasco. Why not do it again I suppose is their thinking?

My friend received this email and I thought I would post it here since it seems like the kind of thing a lot of people would be interested in, but wouldn’t be aware of.

Harvard is offering free tuition for students that have a family
income below $40,000. If you are a mentor or have nieces and nephews
who might be interested, please give them this information. If you
know any one/family earning less than $40K with a brilliant child near
ready for college, please pass this along.

Harvard’s Tuition Announcement Highlights Failure of Prestigious
Universities to Enroll Low-Income Students March 1, 2004, Harvard
University announced over the weekend that from now on undergraduate
students from low-income families will pay no tuition. In making the
announcement, Harvard’s president Lawrence H. Summers said, “When only
10 percent of the students in Elite higher education come from
families in lower half the income distribution, we are not doing
enough. We are not doing enough in bringing elite higher education to
the lower half of the income distribution.”

If you know of a family earning less than $40,000 a year with an honor
student graduating from high school soon, Harvard University wants to
pay the tuition. The prestigious university recently announced that
from now on undergraduate students from low-income families can go to
Harvard for free…no tuition and no student loans! To find out more
about Harvard offering free tuition for families making less than
$40,000 a year visit Harvard’s financial aid web site at:
http://adm-is.fas.harvard.edu/FAO/index.htm or call the school’s financial aid office at (617) 495- 1581. EEO Office, Richmond, VA

It could be a scene from the “Da Vinci Code:” A high-tech art sleuth finds a hollow space behind an Italian palazzo’s murals, and believes he may have discovered a Da Vinci masterpiece not seen since 1563.

In a case of life imitating art, Maurizio Seracini, an internationally recognized expert in high-technology art analysis, has done just that – and, in an odd twist, he does indeed appear, as himself, in Dan Brown’s popular bestseller about secrets hidden in Leonardo’s work – the book’s only non-fictional character.

I might be the only person on the planet who has yet to read the Da Vinci Code, but the significance of this finding is not lost on me. This kind of stuff is just too cool. I once found an arrowhead in the forest.

Not necessarily all interesting things because they can be done with any computer so I am not sure why they picked just to do them with the Mac Mini, but nonetheless it gives you something to do if you are bored.

List includes:

• WebDAV Server HOW-TO
• WebDAV Clients HOW-TO
• Managing Web Sites with WebDAV
• Remote Mac Access with AFP and SSH
• RSS Made Really, Really Simple
• Backing Up Your Mac … for Free
• Mac OS X Tiger Backups: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly
• Building a Data-Driven Web Site
• Building a Streaming Audio Server
• Web Hosting (Is Not) For Dummies
• Hosting Multiple Web Sites and Domains
• Creating a Secure (HTTPS) Mac OS X Web Server
• Building A PureFTP Server … If You Must
• Building a Home Automation Server
• Building a Computer Telephony Server
• Turning Your Mac mini Into a DVD Player Kiosk
• HOW-TO: Turn your Mac mini into a media center
• CenterStage – The Mac Media Center Open Source Project
• UStec Mac mini Home Media Server
• Wiki Knowledge Base: Using a Mac mini as a Home Media Center
• MacVroom – The Definitive Mac mini Car Integration Site
• iDash: Mac mini for Your Car or Land Rover or Lexus or VW GTi or BMW or 3000GT
• HOW-TO: Turn your Mac mini into a low-cost recording studio
• Installing and Tuning Open Office on Mac OS X
• Exploring the Mac OS X Firewall

A while ago we reported on a company making porn for the PSP and more details have surfaced about the venture.

A Tokyo-based sex-video maker declared on its website that on July 8 it will release the world’s first adult UMDs, optical discs that play on a PSP. The five titles carry price tags from 2,800 yen or 3,800 yen (25 or 35 dollars).

Another Tokyo company will launch three titles on July 16.

For its part, Sony said it had no power to stop the release of the PSP porn videos.

Haha, like Sony would be stupid enough to even stop them from making porn anyways.

Chris Davis has put together a nice tutorial on podcasting with WordPress and to show you how he eats his own dog food he has prepared the tutorial as a podcast.

Maybe FG will do a podcast one day, but that sounds like it requires some type of thought. Not so sure about it now.

I said it before, but I will say it again. In my opinion what made the original Playstation and the current Xbox so popular was that they could be modded. Being able to tinker with a device and hack it adds much more appeal compared to closed systems. This is also what will make the PSP outshine the DS over time.

If you are looking to run homebrew applications on your PSP (who isn’t) then Make has a wonderful tutorial showing you how its done.

Now just give me an attachable keyboard and easy to run Linux OS on the system and I will be set.

I like to think that I am good at Halo 2, but I just don’t play enough to even be considered decent. Wonder how I would do against the newest Halo 2 world champ?

All in all, across the regional qualifiers and world competition, King Tuur walked (staggered, etc.) off with a half-size Master Chief statue, a personalised Xbox Live Halo 2 Championship sweatshirt and Regional Champion Plaque, a Samsung camcorder, a 50″ Samsung flat-screen DLP HDTV, a Samsung DVD player/recorder, a personalised Xbox Live Halo 2 Global Champion Trophy and “the US equivalent of $1,500 in cash”. Which is presumably around $1,500 in cash.

via Joystiq