Old and busted: Flight of the Conchords. New hotness: Fascinating Aida. I haven’t followed Flight of the Conchords lately, but something else caught my ear while lurking around mefi: Fascinating Aida! They’ve been around in some form or another since 1983 and I’d never heard of them before. But a few songs in and they’re my new favourite comedy music group. I leave you with a few juicy samples (some are NSFW). Dogging: (look it up!) It isn’t too late to be famous: And the sweetest but grouchiest ballad ever: There’s plenty more on Youtube. Go! And bring it up to a boil… This just in from Heinola, Finland (via The Sun): A RUSSIAN finalist in Finland’s annual World Sauna Championships died yesterday after he and his opponent were rushed to the hospital, organizers of heat-endurance contest said. It was reported that both men were subject to sitting in heat of 230F (110C), and the contest was called off after six minutes, when both contestants collapsed after the sauna door was opened. I’d like to sympathize with the families of both men, but if you’re telling me that they chose to sit and cook themselves above the temperature of boiling water, I’ll reserve my condolences for deaths (and empathy for injuries) for other people. Come on! What were they thinking as they took in the flavor of their own juices in the sweltering heat? And the organizer had the cheek to utter the following: “[The] event was interrupted immediately after the accident. [The] competition organization grieves these sad events,” [Head of the competition Ossi] Arvela said. Police launched an investigation, he said, insisting that “all the rules were followed” and that all the contestants had undergone medical checks before the competition began. The competition itself is an accident waiting to happen for crying out loud! And there are rules for cooking human sausages? Such a waste of human life. Idiots! The horror! The horror! Like the thousand upon thousands of Aya Hirano otaku who went through a seizure after the receding hairline bobblehead anime seiyuu revealed everything about her personal life to the public, thousand and thousands of Emma Watson fanboys are probably going through a cardiac arrest after this happened. Yes, the actress who plays Hermione Granger in the uber-popular Harry Potter series of movies has shed her long locks for a more “Winona-in-the-90s” do, saying on her Facebook page: “Dear all. Cut my hair off a few days ago… Feels incredible. I love it. I’ve wanted to do this for years and years; it’s the most liberating thing ever. Hope you like. Big love from Emma x” But do not fret, fanboys of the lovely Miss Watson, you can still catch her in her full silky glory in the upcoming Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, which opens in theaters in November. Who know, she might have grown a short bob by then! =D (For the record, I think her new hair-do is fabulous.) When in Rome… The end is probably nigh when the Americans military resorts to using moe manga to celebrate the 50th anniversary of The U.S.-Japan alliance, an agreement that has cost the Japanese plenty of taxpayers’ money, as well as the use of places such as Okinawa as US military bases. The comic depicts a small American boy by the name of “Usa-kun” (-_-”’) beginning his stay with a normal Japanese household, protecting the family from pests such as cockroaches, while later explaining the details and the need for the alliance. I have to agree with the writers over at Sankaku Complex that the comic does not include some of the problems of the agreement as mentioned near the end of their article: Unsurprisingly, the manga glosses over all the schoolgirl rape and vast sprawling Okinawan bases which are the most immediate cause of friction over the alliance, although this would likely require several volumes of ero-manga to do justice to. Those well-versed in the Japanese language and are interested in reading the “brochure”, the manga has been published online for free. UPDATE: On the bright side, I’m thankful that they produced a moé manga and not this guy’s life story. iPhone 4 grip of death in Singapore For the past couple of weeks people around me have been asking whether the iPhone 4 has reception issues. Like I said in an earlier post, the answer is “Yes, but it’s not an issue with a case or when you have full reception to begin with.” With the iPhone 4 launch in Singapore just around the corner (confirmed for Friday, 30 July 2010) and all 3 telcos releasing their pricing plans, I thought I’d address the antenna issue (very) briefly with a video of my own. The guys over at CNET Asia put up a short video a while back demonstrating the Grip of Death in Singapore, indoors, with a StarHub SIM card. I’m on SingTel so for those of you planning to go with SingTel, here’s how my left hand kills the iPhone 4′s reception: We’ve talked about this in the strip before. Bottom line: Apple dropped the ball with the design on this one, and it would be nice if they would admit it, but I’ll be happy with a free case when I (hopefully) pick up my SingTel set later this week. Let’s hope the rumour mill is true and Apple is going to coat the white iPhone 4 with some nice, thin and transparent non-conductive material. US allows Jailbreaking! The Copyright Office of the United States just allowed iPhone jailbreaking! Quoting from the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s press release (link): In its reasoning in favor of EFF’s jailbreaking exemption, the Copyright Office rejected Apple’s claim that copyright law prevents people from installing unapproved programs on iPhones: “When one jailbreaks a smartphone in order to make the operating system on that phone interoperable with an independently created application that has not been approved by the maker of the smartphone or the maker of its operating system, the modifications that are made purely for the purpose of such interoperability are fair uses.” Hell yeah! Common sense: 1. Apple: 0. To be clear, this doesn’t let you infringe copyright outright – as far as I can tell it is just a DMCA exception. Saurik just demonstrated cydia running on the iPhone 4 (link) – I can’t wait. Good job Tottenham! A great piece of news while I try to resume watching football without imagining a beehive in the vicinity: Tottenham Hotspur have become the first English Premier League team to ban the Vuvuzela on their home turf, White Hart Lane. “Following discussions with the Police and representatives from the local licensing authorities, the club will not be permitting vuvuzelas or similar instruments into White Hart Lane on match days,” a statement from www.tottenhamhotspur.com read. “We are concerned that the presence of the instruments within the stadium pose unnecessary risks to public safety and could impact on the ability of all supporters to hear any emergency safety announcements. “We are very proud of the fantastic atmosphere that our supporters produce organically at White Hart Lane and we are all very much looking forward to this continuing into the forthcoming season.” North London rivals Arsenal have, logically, followed suit, as have Liverpool, Birmingham, West Ham and Sunderland. I can say that I’m ecstatic with the ban, after suffering a whole month of that cacophony during “the world’s biggest stage”. See, I’m not such a big fan of international football (crappy football with players having not trained together for a long time, coupled with fatigue from the regular soccer season and other commitments), but the wretched plastic horn has made viewing intolerable altogether. So, I beseech all other football clubs to do the same, ban the vuvuzela! Ban the vuvuzelots while you’re at it! UPDATE: Blackpool have encouraged fans to bring their best blow to Bloomfield Road. Ugh. There will be blood Sports fanaticism knows no bounds. We’ve had the Church of Maradona, the God of Shaq in Beijing (next to his Great Wall of Bricks =D), and even a sandwich named after LeBron before he spurned the Big Apple for South Beach. Now a publisher is going to capitalize on that and make money from the blood of Sachin Tendulkar. Yeah you heard me right, the blood of Sachin Tendulkar. For those not well-versed in all thing cricket, Tendulkar is the god of cricket in India. No, I’m not exaggerating. Ask any Indian cricket fan and they’ll tell you that affectionately nicknamed “Little Master” is the freakin’ patron saint of the sport in the Sub-continent, even though his ability between the stumps is vastly deteriorating. So how are his autobiographers going to do this? Here’s how (from espnstar.com): “The signature page will be mixed with Sachin’s blood — mixed into the paper pulp so it’s a red resin. It is what it is — you will have Sachin’s blood on the page,” publisher Kraken Media’s chief executive Karl Fowler was quoted as saying in ‘The Guardian’. “It’s not everyone’s cup of tea, it’s not to everyone’s taste and some may think it’s a bit weird. But the key thing here is that Sachin Tendulkar to millions of people is a religious icon. And we thought how, in a publishing form, can you get as close to your God as possible?” said Fowler. “We’re publishing next February, in time for the cricket World Cup, which is being held in India. It’s perfect timing. He’s never done an autobiography before and has a great story to tell.” There will be only ten such books published, and each of the 825-page whoppers will be edged in gold leaf. Each blood-stained Sachin souvenir will weigh a massive 37kg and will cost in the region of US$75,000. That’s not all, Tendulkar has also been asked for a sample of his saliva which would be used to create his DNA profile and would be printed on a two-metre gatefold in the book. So, if you have a few bob to spare, and would like a bloody book as well as the genetic secrets of one the best batsmen alive, this is for you. =) Diversity One word: KAWAII! Game on ESPN STAR Sports> ’nuff said. Miyazaki: “iWhatever” users are “chronic masturbators” I had to do a double take when I saw this on Sankaku Complex (NSFW). Whoa ho ho. Hayao Miyazaki, Studio Ghibli founder and a filmmaker famous for his works such as Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away, let fly a steaming one when he caught an interviewer maximizing the use of the iPad with his digits (not Miyazaki’s, of course), saying: “That thing that looks like a gaming device in your hand, along with that strange stroking movement you make with your hands is by no means attractive to me, nor am I at all impressed by it. I feel a sense of revulsion for it, in fact. I’m sure in short time there will be an increase in people on trains making those strange masturbatory strokes. It was the same when everyone started reading manga on trains, and when it became cellphones – I’m fed up with it.” So it seems that the great director is not a big fan of portable gadgets, but I would like to ask Miyazaki: When was the last time you took the subway? The “iWhatevers” (and any similar product, including Ray’s new iPhone 4 =D) are most probably the only source of comfort in an individual’s commute to work/school on a packed, uncomfortable and sometimes smelly vehicle. Personal space is at a premium in this high-speed twilight zone and anything that can get me not thinking about the hairs of some lady’s armpits is greatly welcomed! To be fair to Miyazaki, he does end the interview on Neppu, an in-house Ghibli rag, on a positive note, saying: “You must not becomes a consumer. You must become someone that creates.” But I’m happy rotting my brains in front of my portable telly, dad! Meanwhile, it’s safe to say that iPads and their portable brethren will not be welcomed in the holy of holies of Ghibli lore. If you’re well-versed in the Japanese language, here is the original source. Kobe and Bell: A Love Story I wonder how this got on the front page of ESPN’s homepage. Must be a slow day in the world of sports (not really -_-”’). On a day that Minnesota Timberwolves franchise player Al Jefferson might be traded to the Utah Jazz, and with Charlotte Bobcats new owner Michael Jordan nixing a three-way trade with the Toronto Raptors and the Phoenix Suns, the “Worldwide Leader in Sports” makes it a point to highlight Marc Stein’s piece on Kobe Bryant trying to recruit declining defensive stalwart Raja Bell. I can understand that anything the Lakers’ superstar does on the court is prime-time news, but his offseason pitch to a guy that plays the same position as him and is way past his prime? This is absurd. From a basketball standpoint, Raja Bell, whose name won’t ring one unless we’re talking about NBA hardcore fans, has lost a step or two on the defensive end of the court. Dude can still shoot the three, but is a liability on the offensive end as well as he can’t create his own shot or get to the rim like he used to earlier this decade. So why does Kobe have such an obsession in bringing his former nemesis to LA, to the point that he’s made “several phone calls” to Bell? A gossipmonger “source” of the anonymous variety told Stein: One source close to the situation said memories of Bell’s takedown, which earned him a suspension for Game 6 of the [2006] series — the Suns, down 3-2, won the game at Staples Center without him — are actually one reason why Bryant sees Bell as such an ideal teammate. The premise? Anyone with the gumption to hit Bryant that hard is someone he wants on his team. That particular “takedown” is here in its full splendour: It’s awesome. So Kobe is going to arrange a face-to-face heart-to-heart with Bell in downtown LA real soon to try to entice Ra-Ra to don the Purple and Gold. I can’t wait for a reality show spin-off that rivals Keeping Up with the Kardashians on E! In other breaking sports news in the US, George Steinbrenner, who rebuilt the New York Yankees into a sports empire, died Tuesday at age 80. “The Boss” deserves an RIP for his work with the MLB giants. iPhone 4 Camera Impressions Took a couple of shots with the iPhone 4 camera. The shots are pretty decent for a camera phone, but you’re still going to want a decent point-and-shoot for travelling and such (your requirements may be different – the point-and-shoot I’m using is a Panasonic LX3). Pros: Pretty sensitive sensor for not-too-shabby low light photography An LED flash at last! 720p (1280×720 pixels) video recording at 30fps. Pretty sweet. There is some jiggling but that is to be expected. Cons: It’s very noisy. It may be because the camera app turns up the ISO to higher than what I would like – I prefer to adjust aperture / shutter timing before hitting the ISO if possible. It’s very noticeable in low light shots. Of course they look fantastic on your iPhone screen – they just look grainy and noisy on your computer. There is a weird white-out issue when bright lights face the camera. The glare will wash away all the colours and the picture you take will be varying degrees of unusable. Other comments: There is some heavy post processing going on, making colours “pop” more. Some of you will like it, some of you will hate it. I didn’t get a chance to test iMovie for the iPhone. Soon as I can get my hands on an iTunes card I will. Sample shots after the break. [Edit: added a night shot] Outside Burlington Square. Note the slight whiteout at the top. It does a decent macro up to about 4-5cm. Photos look OK zoomed out... ...but it's actually quite noisy close up (not the best example, I know) In a bit of an unfair comparison, here is the iPhone 4 up against a Panasonic Lumix LX3: Panasonic Lumix LX3: what noise? (click image to enlarge) iPhone 4: noisy noise noise (click image to enlarge) Edit: here’s a night shot I just took. The pool at night (click image to enlarge) My iPhone 4 is Here I ordered my iPhone from the Apple UK store, and had it shipped to me back in Singapore. It finally arrived (on a Sunday night, kudos DHL) and I have my grubby hands upon it! Oooo it is Le iPhone Fresh out of the box First thought as I held it in my hand: the flatness of the back makes it feel odd in the hand. I’m used to the curved back of the iPhone 3G. Second thought as I held it in my hand: it feels “expensive”. I’m not sure how else to convey it but there you go. It feels solid and expensive, and actually feels a fair bit heavier than the 3G even though it’s only a few grams heavier. Onto the hairiest part of getting my iPhone: cutting my SIM to micro SIM size so that it would fit in the iPhone 4 micro SIM tray. I followed some directions online and cut my SIM down to the requisite 15mm x 12mm. You can apparently buy cutters to do this for you, but I thought it was a bit silly to buy a one-time-use device. So I pulled out an old nail file, a pair of scissors, a ruler and my old SIM card, and got to work. This is what you will need After some cutting with scissors and some patient filing with an old nail file the newly minted SIM card fit perfectly into the tiny tray. A perfect fit I plugged it in, the phone synced up and I had access to my phone. The first thing you notice is the incredible screen. It’s like a glossy magazine – I can make out the pixels if I squint really really hard, but for all intents and purposes they’re not visible. 3G on the left, 4 on the right (click image for actual size) I made a couple of phone calls to test the iPhone 4′s antenna issue. General consensus online is that if reception is good, the attenuation caused by your hand will not disrupt your connection. But if you have borderline usable reception, touching the antenna will toast it. I can confirm this; my room gets some pretty bad reception and the antenna issue reared its ugly head. I can’t make calls on the iPhone 4 from a particular corner of my room. Worse than my 3G! Happily, 1m away there is no issue. This antenna issue may be a deal breaker to some of you; your mileage may vary. Fired up some games to play on it. It’s fast. I’m upgrading from a 3G so the speed difference is amazing. It’s the performance gap between a voodoo and a voodoo 2 or between a regular hard drive and an intel SSD. Once you upgrade you can never go back. It gets warm quite quickly, however. I haven’t had enough time fiddling with it to give impressions on the battery life, and I’ll update Squarebrain with new information when I can. It’s always nice to have a (girl)friend in the media… As most of you have found out in the hustle and bustle of a Monday morning, Spain have won the World Cup, beating the Netherlands 1-0 in the final. Andres Iniesta scored the winning goal, receiving a nice pass from Cesc Fiberglass Fabregas with just four minutes of extra time remaining and rammed in a screamer past opposing goalie Maarten Stekelenburg to give Spain their first taste of World Cup glory. Amid all the cries of biases to any particular team, whinging, diving and even kung fu kicks (take a bow De Jong, that was a beautiful “Cantona” on Alonso), it’s nice to see some touching moments in the Beautiful Game, especially if it involves a good-looking football WAG. This is where Sara Carbonero comes in. Carbonero currently dates Spain captain and goalkeeper Iker Casillas, and besides the usual “why did your team eff up win” interview she conducts professionally with her boyfriend, she sometimes indulges in a bit of showmanship on the screen. Enjoy. Do we really need a Rurouni Kenshin movie? Chanced upon this little tidbit while surfing: Samurai manga and anime Rurouni Kenshin is currently being made into a live action movie. Question is: Isn’t it eleven years too late? Unlike sci-fi manga/anime Gantz, the serialization of Kenshin ended yoinks ago. I‘ll be first to admit that I thoroughly enjoyed the manga and anime in its original run in the late 90s, though the anime turned a little crappy towards the end, in my humble opinion. However, to bring it back from the vault after a long hiatus is going to test even the most loyal of fans of the series. Here’s the reason why the show is only being done now, according to a source close to the movie’s production (from Sankaku Complex, NSFW): “Back when it had just ended serialization there was talk of a movie adaptation, but back then manga being adapted to film wasn’t something you really saw much, unlike now. Add to this the fact that CG technology wasn’t very good… CG tech has come a long way since then. As a result, the movie was suddenly decided upon recently.” I won’t hold my breath for a brilliant adaptation. Just look how they bastardized Dragon Ball, Initial D and the Fist of North Star! UPDATE: Here is the original link, if you can read Japanese. Miami, I choose you! If you’re a casual basketball fan, you would have probably caught wind of LeBron James announcing on his TV special that he’s committed to signing for the Miami Heat of the NBA. I think it’s well and good that he’s finally teaming up with fellow Olympians Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh to form a new “Big Three” in South Beach. However, I feel the way it was hyped up may have been rather distasteful. Consider the context of the matter: A basketball superstar taking a whole hour of air time on ESPN to announce where he is going to play next season. Does it get more narcissistic than that? After months and months of flirting with other teams (including the one that he was playing for before Miami, the Cleveland Cavaliers), with six of them shedding salary at an alarming rate, spending millions upon millions to host King James, build 30-foot billboards of him in their cities, make recruitment videos featuring the Sopranos and the characters from The Family Guy, and even forming a celebrity alliance, James called on sports media giant ESPN to make an hour-long special to commemorate the occasion of his decision. What a load of BS, and this coming from a self-professed basketball lover. Here is an excerpt of the video, with James informing the world of his decision from a Boys and Girls club in Connecticut: [via AssociatedPress on Youtube] C’mon people, as much as I know that this vid will drive ratings up the wall, it’s just basketball. Not as if the guy discovered the cure for cancer or something. That said, to all Miami fans: Enjoy it while you can, you lucky @#$%^&*@. In other news, Cleveland Cavaliers team owner Dan Gilbert has been less than cordial in his reaction to James’ departure. Arise, Vincent the new guy Hi there, just thought I’d get in a quick post after Ray and Zeng were gracious enough to grant me posting privileges in SquareBrain. The dynamic duo decided that it would be a good idea to include a third guy on the site after some deliberation, which I agree wholeheartedly. =D I’ll be bringing in some sports stories from time to time, and include some stuff the guys may have left out in other areas. So do log on for some interesting dinner conversation material (I know some of our articles and comics have become that), and I’ll try my best to post as regularly as I can. Cheers, Vince P.S. Again, it feels great to finally be able to post! Sorta like the level-up Hot Rod got with the Matrix. I Lurf Rock n Roll I love this Singaporean uncle demonstrating how to rock ‘n’ roll on a creative labs midi keyboard! Rock on uncle! [Via Boingboing] Hold Different .XXX TLD approved… /Facepalm From PCWorld comes news that ICANN has approved the .xxx top level domain for pornographic content. From now on, pornographers can register www.sex.xxx and put all their naughty stuff there. What a wonderful idea. Now all the pornography on the Internet will surely be moved to these new domains. It will be so easy to enforce this on a global scale. All we need now is an independent, international organisation with teeth (like the UN!) to determine what is pornographic and banish purveyors of filth to this top level domain. And then ISPs around the world can just filter “.xxx” out, so no one can see “.xxx”, and the world’s problems will be solved! Keira Knightley will never have troubles with typosquatters on www.keiraknightley.xxx because the domain dispute resolution process will be quick, efficient and painless! Oh, international justice. So easy and efficient and just. …oh wait. See, we’ve encountered this .xxx issue before. It is an old idea from at least as far back as 1998. It was a stupid idea then, and it is a stupid idea now. Some smart people sat down, did some research, asked for comments, and put them all in a 22+ page document that basically said: nobody knows how to define pornography, it will be completely ineffective without unified global political pressure (which is impossible) and anyway, you can re-direct everything from a regular domain to a .xxx domain easily thus rendering .xxx useless. That same document concluded thus: The concept that a single top level domain name, such as .sex, or a single IP address bit, could be allocated and become the mandatory home of “adult” or “offensive” material world wide is legal and technical nonsense. So all .xxx does is open up new liabilities for people and companies who would be very interested in not having their name linked with a .xxx top level domain. Well done, ICANN. Well done. [Link to PCWorld post] [Link to RFC3675] How to win in love Ubisoft to Customers: Suck on it, Criminals Many of you know Ubisoft’s new draconian Digital Rights Management (DRM) scheme that ships with PC copies of Assassin’s Creed II and Settlers 7. If you don’t, check this link out. And this link. The executive summary is this: if you play Assassin’s Creed II on a PC, you must be permanently connected to the internet or the game will stop working and you will lose your progress. For Settlers 7, you’ll “only” have to suffer the game stopping. Latest news indicates that this DRM will ship with the new Splinter Cell: Conviction, too. Words cannot express how pigheaded this move is. It’s a giant fuck you to customers. It’s an expression of utter contempt for the people who line your pockets with their hard earned cash. It’s Ubisoft saying “Yeah, suck it, suck it and swallow because you have no other choice, bitch!” The Problem is that DRM Does Not Work My position on DRM is well documented, but indulge me in a rant. (1) If your game is a single player game, it will not stop pirates. Company executives need to get their heads around this fact. Piracy involves two parties, and for lack of a better term I’ll call them a cracker and a downloader. Crackers will crack your game. They are smarter than your programmers, and there is nothing you can do about it. It’s an intellectual challenge to them, bragging rights to get the first cracked copy out onto the world wide web. They’ll get an advanced copy from a leak you never knew existed and BAM, days before your game is launched it will be available for download for free. Remember Spore? As for downloaders, they will not stop downloading. If Joe has $70 and has a choice between videogames and food, guess what? He’ll buy the food and download the videogame. If the crack isn’t out yet, he’ll wait until the game makes its way to bargain bins or second hand stores or he’ll borrow a copy from a friend… but no way is he spending that precious $70 on a videogame that he can get for a whole lot cheaper. Now, if you’re selling a multiplayer game and run the servers on which the game is played on, you can indeed dramatically cut down on piracy. That’s what Blizzard does with World of Warcraft, and that’s what Infinity Ward does with Modern Warfare 2. But for a single player game? Hah. Ubisoft has done something interesting in that they’ve made the online component integral to the single player experience. We’ll talk about that in a moment – more after the jump. (2) You’re making a clear statement that you don’t trust your paying customers. You’re saying that since you don’t trust them, you’re going to monitor their every move and make sure your customers do as you tell them. And that will work out great, because everyone likes being treated like an untrustworthy criminal, right? Hey, we’ll even pay for the privilege! This leads me to my next point, which is… (3) You only hurt your paying customers. Of all the stupid, pigheaded, idiotic things that draconian DRM results in, this takes the cake. Remember how I said above that crackers will crack your game? And downloaders will download your game? Right. Now imagine Joe the Pirate and John the Good Customer both get Assassin’s Creed II, except Joe the Pirate got a cracked copy and John the Good Customer gets an original. Both are playing up to the climactic ending of Assassin’s Creed II, and all of a sudden… oh, let’s say a typhoon cuts a major undersea fibre-optic cable, or your home router chokes and stops being able to route packets, or your internet connection is interrupted by any number of legitimate, plausible, and frequently occurring reasons. John the Good Customer’s copy of Assassin’s Creed II stops working as it tries to reconnect. He loses his progress and has to replay a significant portion of the ending sequence… 3 days later, when the submarine welds the busted undersea cable back together. Meanwhile his friends spoil the ending for him. “CURSES!” he screams. “I hate you, Ubisoft!” Joe the Pirate’s copy of Assassin’s Creed II doesn’t do anything. Joe continues playing, finishes the game, enjoys the ending, and goes off to spoil the ending for John. ‘That was pretty neat,’ he thinks to himself. ‘And it was all free! Haha!’ See what happened there? You, Ubisoft, shafted your paying customer and earned his well-deserved ill will. The evil pirater, on the other hand, got off scott free – something he did not deserve. Worse, John may just walk out on your games. I know I did. My PC got infected with the terrible, terrible StarForce DRM that came with one of the later Splinter Cell games, and I have not bought another PC game from Ubisoft since. Now, Ubisoft. Explain to me how this is good business. Wait! I know the answer, and I’ll tell you. But before that, my last point, which is… (4) DRM is antithetical to the progress of technology in the digital age. Computers are very, very good at copying digital information. That is, in essence, all computer hardware does: manipulate digital information. That’s what’s gotten copyright law all up in a tangle. Copyright law is crafted to give content creators, and only content creators, the right to copy, or reproduce, their own content (I am simplifying tremendously). If anyone else reproduces the content without the creator’s permission, BAM, that’s copyright infringement. That was all fine and dandy when the only content being created was books, and printing presses were large complicated machines that were not cheap to buy or operate. But now, when information is all digital and copying is not only laughably trivial but at the core of the technology that drives the modern age, well, now Copyright law’s got a problem. Enter DRM. DRM’s purpose is to make copying harder, not easier. Slower, not faster. It locks information up. It doesn’t fit. In the immortal words of Sesame Street, one of these things is not like the other. DRM is like a fish out of water – it’s just not built to survive in this environment. Ubisoft Responds in the Dumbest Way Imaginable So hearing the outcry, Ubisoft defended its decision to shaft its customers. The entire transcript is available here, and I have reproduced it below to rebut it. What’s the problem this DRM is trying to address? Ubi are increasingly concerned about piracy on the PC. “It’s a huge problem – you know it, I know it, other people know it. It really is a very important issue that all serious companies need to address,” says their spokesperson. But they also believe that their online services will make PC gaming better. “The real idea is that if you offer a game that is better when you buy it, then people will actually buy it. We wouldn’t have built it if we thought that it was really going to piss off our customers.” Repeat after me: 1 less pirate does not mean 1 more sale. Assuming your DRM works, if Joe the Pirate cannot afford the game, he will do something else with his time. Or he will make a decision about how many games he can afford to play and make cuts. Also, remember how I said only paying customers get hurt, while pirates get off scott free? Yeah. That. So what’s in it for gamers? Ubi say there are three advantages to their online services. The first: you don’t need a disc. The second: that you can install the game on as many PCs as you like, as many times as you like. And the third: the automatic uploading of savegames to Ubisoft’s servers. Bullshit. First, I only needed a disc because your previous DRM required me to put it in. There is another point here that I will get to in a bit. Second, I can already install a game I bought on as many PCs as I would like, and when I can’t, it’s because your shitty previous DRM didn’t let me do it in the first place. Third, I don’t have 7 different computers that I play 1 game on such that I will need access to a centralised saved game repository. You’ve “given” me 2 things that you took away from me in the first place, and added a third thing that doesn’t really matter. It’s like taking candy from a kid and making him pay before you’ll give it back, while saying “See? You can enjoy this awesome candy that I took from you in the first place if you pay me for it. Also you can have this empty tin can, you can keep marbles in it, it’s really cool.” Do Ubisoft understand that we don’t want to be permanently online? They’ve spotted the outcry, yes. “We know that requiring a permanent online connection is not a happy point for a lot of PC gamers, but it is necessary for the system to work. Translation: Suck it. I know you don’t like to choke, but you have to learn to suppress that gag reflex if you want to play tonight. Which PC games will require an always on internet connection? All announced Ubisoft PC games will include the online services, whether sold online, or from brick and mortar stores. That includes Splinter Cell, Silent Hunter 5, Assassin’s Creed 2, Prince of Persia and the newly announced Ghost Recon. “It’s hard for us to say, yes, from now until the day that we all die all of our games are going to include this,” says their spokesperson, “but most will.” Translation: We will shaft you with this broom, with this cactus, with this rolling pin, and anything else we find just lying around. You will like it, and you will say “please sir, can I have some more?”. You will get some more only if you pay us for the privilege. If my internet connection goes down during play, will I lose my progress? That depends on the way the systems have been implemented. The two examples we have now, Assassin’s Creed 2 and Settlers VII, show differing implementations. In Assassin’s Creed, if your connection cuts out, you’ll be taken back to the last checkpoint. “With Settlers, your game will resume exactly where you left off,” says Ubisoft’s spokesperson. Oh thank you Gods of Ubisoft, for letting me resume my single player game exactly where I left off when Typhoon FibreCutter destroyed the Asia Pacific Cable Network leaving me disconnected from your servers and unable to play your single player game. Your magnanimity knows no bounds! Note to American readers: we call ‘em typhoons over here. You know them as hurricanes. How will I know what I’ll lose? “You’ll have to wait for the reviews, and to hear what your peers are saying.” …what?!?! What happens if Ubisoft take the DRM servers offline for maintenance, or suffer a technical breakdown? In the case of a server failure their games will be taken offline, and you’ll be unable to play them. “The idea is to avoid that point as much as possible, but we have been clear from the beginning that the game does need an internet connection for you to play. So if it goes down for real for a little while, then yeah, you can’t play.

” ……What?!?!?! Are Ubisoft trying to kill PC gaming? One theory states that piracy is such a problem on PC that they’d prefer to move their customers to the Xbox or PS3. Their spokesperson disagrees. “No, we’re not trying to kill the PC market. Are we frustrated by the PC market? I think everyone is. In the end it all comes back to one single truth: piracy is a big, huge, hairy problem. It’s a market that suffered a lot because of piracy, and we’re all just trying to figure out what we think is the best way to deal with it.” Do Ubi believe this DRM is unhackable? They accept that it’s all DRM’s fate to be eventually hacked, explaining that internally, they’ve already talked of a timescale for how long their games will be protected by it. But, they believe that it’s secure enough for them. “We wouldn’t do it if we didn’t believe in it. The guys who designed it believe in it. Do we think that it’s the one system that God has sent onto earth that will never be cracked by anybody ever? We can’t guarantee that, but we believe in it.

” I acknowledge that piracy is a big problem. Thing is, you’re not addressing it. You know it, and I know it. You even admit that this DRM will eventually be cracked. How does this help stop piracy? It doesn’t. It’s not helping. This market that has suffered a lot from piracy will suffer even more because pirates will get off scott free. How many times must this happen before you see it? And speaking of DRMs you believe in… well, look at Ubisoft’s track record. Remember that Rainbow Six game that came with a shitty disc based DRM? Remember how it was available for purchase online, but customers who bought it online didn’t get a disc and thus could not play the game? Remember Ubisoft’s solution? Yup, Ubisoft told customers to download the crack. The contempt you must have for your customers. Does this mean that Ubi are dissatisfied with other online rights management platforms like Steam? There’s a hint of that, although Ubi are keen to praise Valve’s online platform. “We think what Steam has done is amazingly valid, but aren’t Steam games cracked amazingly fast? It’s not a question of dissatisfaction, it’s a question of ‘we’ve got another idea, another way of implementing it, and we’re going for it’.” Steam does not treat its customers like criminals. It tries to make the buying and playing experience pleasant, or at the least, doesn’t try so hard to make it unpleasant. You, on the other hand, are treating us like criminals. Oh and Steam has an offline mode. What happens when it becomes economically inefficient to run the servers for these games? Will Ubisoft take the servers down? And will that mean we can’t play the games we bought? The first point Ubi makes is that they intend for the servers to stay up. “Say in 5 years someone who bought Assassin’s Creed 2 wants to go back and play it, the hope is, the plan is that we’ll be on Assassin’s Creed, I dunno, 3, 4, 5, and the servers will still be there to serve those new games,” explains their spokesperson. “They’ll also be able to serve the old games.” But Ubisoft have the ability to patch the DRM out of their games. “If for some reason, and this is not in the plan, but if for some reason all of the servers someday go away, then we can release a patch so that the game can be played in single-player without an online connection. But that’s if all of the servers are gone.” At last! The first thing Ubisoft spokesman said that makes sense. They can patch the DRM out of their games, so that when their servers go offline, people can still play their purchased games. It’s a neat solution to a problem that should never have existed in the first place. Bravo! …wait, if Ubi can patch it out, can’t crackers patch it out too? Nevermind. It’s a good starting point! Maybe it won’t be so bad after all, I’m sure the next question will not completely squash the embryo of hope… Will Ubi make a firm commitment to removing the DRM if the servers are to be taken offline? We’ll paste the straight transcript here: 

PCG: What I think a lot of us would really like is a firm commitment that you understand our worries that the servers are going to go down and suddenly we’ve just got some trash data on our hard drives that we’ve paid for.

 Ubisoft: The system is made by guys who love PC games. They play PC games, they are your friends.

 PCG: So you can commit to saying that those systems will be patched out? 

Ubisoft: That’s the plan. 

PCG: It’s the plan, or it’s definitely going to happen? 

Ubisoft: That’s written into the goal of the overall plan of the thing. But we don’t plan on shutting down the servers, we really don’t.” Translation: Uh, we can make the DRM not as shitty, but we’re not saying we will do it, but uh, really, we won’t need to, trust us it’ll be awesome DRM, WeLoveYouGuysHugsAndKisses! Yup, hope squashed. So Why The Hell Are They Doing It? It doesn’t help piracy. It forces people to connect to play, and some people will legitimately not want to connect to play. Like when I’m out with my laptop and want to play but there’s open WIFI nearby. So why in blue blazes is this a smart decision for Ubisoft? Why are they doing things this way? My unoriginal theory is this: Ubisoft is trying to kill the second hand games market for its games. It’s been discussed before in the context of digital downloads and Steam. Hell, it’s been discussed before in the context of game creators “expressing their concern” over how more people play their games than buy it. See, for e.g.: this article, and this article. The second hand market is lucrative stuff, and Ubisoft wants a piece of that pie. I can just imagine some exec’s thought process beginning with “Damn this second hand market, I should be making money every time the games my slaves made exchanges hands! Never mind the doctrine of first sale, what does the Supreme Court know.” How does Ubisoft plan to do it? Make the games CD-less. Make the games require an online connection, nay, make the online component integral to the gameplay experience, based on whatever thin excuse you can concoct. Require an online account. Essentially, make it such that if anyone wants to play your game, they have to get it from you and you alone, and they have to pay for the privilege. That means I can’t loan my friend my copy; presumably that means I can’t even gift my friend my copy. A one-to-one relationship with Ubisoft is the only way you’re getting to play their games. This is a one-two for Ubisoft, because they’ll probably save on real life shelf space as well, though I’m not really sure how the numbers would work out. Of course I can’t verify that this is the reason why Ubisoft decided to implement their arse-backwards DRM scheme. I’m willing to put good money on it being a significant factor, though. And, to be honest, there’s nothing wrong with trying to make some extra money – games cost a bomb to make, and developers go bust all the time even after releasing awesome games (Looking Glass, Double Fine Productions). But come on, Ubisoft. Have the decency to not insult our intelligence, and wipe those crocodile tears about the terrible damage piracy is doing to your bottom line away. Piracy is not your problem, and fighting it like this will just hurt you. I suspect, as Tycho does, that this DRM will ultimately go away. Maybe it will, like DRM and the music industry. Let’s all hope so, because Ubisoft makes some damn good games, and I really, really want to play them. That is all. The Four Stages of TOTO Thermaltake Level 10 Tips Behold! This is one of only two Thermaltake Level 10 cases imported into Singapore through Corbell… …and it’s mine, all mine! The Thermaltake Level 10 is a premium computer case designed in collaboration between Thermaltake and BMW Group DesignworksUSA. Yes, BMW, as in the German car manufacturer. Now, I’ve not seen many reviews of this case out there, but seeing as how you’d want to know everything you can about this case before you plonk down a whopping SGD$945/- for one (ordered direct through Corbell, you’ll have to go there in person), I figured I’d put up a few tips about buying and building a system around the Level 10. 1. This case is big The Level 10 comes in a huge box that weighs 25kg. I first mistook it for an office fax/photocopying machine. A smart person will pay Corbell to deliver it to you. I, however, am not a very smart person, and so I struggled to get it in the cab. Take note that if you take a cab, it will not fit into the newer, smaller ones. Get an old-style Comfort cab (the boxy ones) and it’ll take up the entire back seat. Of course you’ll be fine in a Maxicab too. The case itself weighs in at 21.5kg empty and is a bit bigger than some full tower solutions out there, at about 66cm tall, 60cm long and 32cm wide. Make sure you have space, not just to put the case, but to show it off too. Weirdly enough, though… 2. Not everything can fit inside it You have some hard limits to the sizes of your CPU cooler, video card, and power supply: CPU Cooler: cannot exceed 150mm height. This will be a fatal flaw for some enthusiasts out there. Top tier CPU cooling solutions for the LGA1366 socket, including the Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme, the Prolimatech Megahalems and Scythe Mugen2 will not fit in this case if we obey this limit. I’m not about to find out if you can force one of these babies in. The Scythe Zipang2 will fit, but you may want to consider getting an alternate cooling solution like the liquid cooled Corsair H50, which is what I will have running inside my Level 10. Video card: cannot exceed 310mm length. This may be a fatal flaw if you absolutely must run the new ATI 5970 cards. I don’t know if its true for all of the cards out there, but the ASUS 5970 is 317mm long. You can get around this if you’re willing to substitute the intake fan (about 25mm thick) on the Level 10 with something thinner. Or you could wait for nVidia’s Fermi to come out. Power supply: cannot exceed 210mm length. I didn’t know that power supplies got this big, but it wasn’t an issue for me. The size of the case also leads me to my next tip, which is… 3. Buy extension wires The Level 10 has a modular design; the motherboard, CPU, video cards and RAM sit in one big module, and the power supply, 5.25″ bays and 3.5″ bays are all in separate modules. Any wiring has to “weave” through the main vertical stand to get from point A to point B. While this makes for a very neat wire management solution in the modules, it does mean your standard-issue cables are not likely to fit. Depending on your motherboard configuration, you may need extension wires for practically everything. I myself needed to get longer SATA cables to connect my BD-ROM drive to the motherboard, and my front panel audio connectors still can’t reach the proper pins on the motherboard. I can confirm, though, that the Seasonic MI2D does have power cables long enough for all your needs, including PCIe cables that can reach the 2nd ATI 5850 further from the power supply. My advice is to buy the case and the components first, and set aside a nice afternoon to back-and-forth between your home and Sim Lim Square to get everything sorted out nicely. 4. This build is not a solo affair You’re going to need someone’s help to build this PC. You need someone to help thread wires through the main vertical stand, carry the 21.5kg case around, hold the power supply cage up while you screw it back to the main vertical stand, and so on. It’s not a solo build. …and that’s it for my tips! I’ll leave you with a shot of the innards while it runs: New Strip for a New Year First strip of the new year is up, and all of it is true. At least the person who spewed such hateful nonsense was a taxi driver, and not, say one of the leaders of a country or an ordained minister… … actually, I’m not sure how that makes things any better. I’d call them bigots but for the irony. Onwards 2010! A True Story, Word for Word Crunchpad Killed in disagreement with Singapore Start-up The Crunchpad, a touch screen tablet device developed jointly by Michael Arrington (at Techcrunch, a pretty well known tech blog) and Singapore start-up company Fusion Garage, is dead. This is pretty bumming news, because the Crunchpad looked to be one sexy piece of computer hardware. I mean, look at it. It looks like something Apple would design, and a Mac tablet is something Mac fans have been having wet dreams about for forever: A blog post on Techcrunch details Michael Arrington’s side of the story (I recommend reading it, if only for the drama-entertainment value). According to the post, the beginning of the end was when Fusion Garage’s founder, Chandraseka Rathakrishnan, sent Arrington an e-mail just 2 days before the product was supposed to launch. This e-mail apparently said that, upon pressure from its shareholders, Fusion Garage decided to move forward to produce the Crunchpad… without Techcrunch’s involvement. I’ve always thought of the Crunchpad as a joint job from the start – the Straits Times even had a hands-on preview on it, saying that it was a result of a team-up between Fusion Garage and “famed American technology blog Techcrunch” – and Arrington is pissed. “We jointly own the CrunchPad product intellectual property, and we solely own the CrunchPad trademark. So it’s legally impossible for them to simply build and sell the device without our agreement,” he writes. Everything has now apparently gone straight to hell, with nobody answering Arrington’s phone calls and e-mails, and it looks like the Crunchpad is well and truly dead. Meanwhile, Arrington writes that he’s probably going to sue Fusion Garage, and possibly Chandraseka and his shareholders as individuals. I’m kind of sad that a local start-up is getting such bad press, and I’d love to hear their side of the story (Fusion Garage’s website is currently down). Arrington is… well, not someone I’d usually agree and/or side with, but it does look like he and Techcrunch got shafted up the rear. I guess I’ll have to keep on waiting for Apple to release that mythological tablet. Hammer. Of. JUSTICE! (designmartus, via BoingBoing) (I’m aware that comments are totally wonky right now, looking into it!) Tuberculosis Tuberculosis strikes! We’ve been unable to update because the irritating disease hit me just as the new layout got done, and simultaneously, Zeng’s computer went kaput (but who cares about his crummy computer!). The kind of TB I have is apparently not in my lungs, it’s in the lining between my lungs and my chest, or what is known as the pleural cavity. According to the doctor this means it’s not contagious. The TB had been sitting in my pleural cavity for a while, discharging fluid (or letting it build up, I’m not entirely clear about this point), and eventually enough formed in my pleural cavity that I got a stabbing pain whenever I did anything physical involving the chest (like, say, breathing). Yes, it was time to go see a doctor. This may seem obvious, but it is crucial that you have a good, regular GP. The first GP I went to was a doddering fool who didn’t even bother to listen for diminished breathing sounds, forgot my answers to his questions and told me “Oh, sometimes when you cough you can pull a muscle in your chest”. The second GP bothered to listen, thought something was amiss and sent me up for a chest x-ray. The x-ray bugged the hell out of the radiologist: And I was forced to go to A&E. So I cannot stress enough how important it is to have a good, decent, competent GP. At this point nobody knew what was actually wrong. Worse, every test thrown at me by the hospital was negative. Blood test, blood cultures, all nothing. They poked into the fluid-filled area and drained some of the juice (it looked like thick urine, a very disturbing liquid to have drain out of your chest) and tried to grow the crap in it – nothing. In the end, I had to go for surgery to do a biopsy of the infected tissue and clean and drain my right pleural cavity. Going under general anesthesia is an interesting experience – I fought it just long enough to inform the doctors how weird it felt (it most probably came out as an unintelligible mumble), and then my vision closed in on me and I knew no more. During the surgery they cut a bit of the infected tissue out, flash froze it, threw it under a microscope and peered at it, after which the pathologist declared it was most likely TB. Then they stuck a 20cm-long flexible tube inside my chest to make sure the area stayed drained for a bit, stitched me mostly back up and let me wake up. That chest tube stayed connected to a gentle suction device for a couple days, and after I stopped leaking, all 20cm of that tube was pulled out of my chest. To help the doctor close the wound left behind the surgeon had left stitches ready to be tightened, drawstring-style, as soon as the tube was out. Both of these procedures were carried out while I looked on. It was not fun. To give you an idea how not fun it was, I asked the doctor if it would feel like when the nurse pulled the Foley catheter out of me (follow the link, don’t be lazy). His answer was a hesitant “Um, something like that”. Yeah. The TB diagnosis will not be confirmed for another 2 months – TB is a very slow growing bacteria. Meanwhile I am on TB medications, which currently consists of 8 pills and 2 capsules: That’s one dose up there! Luckily it’s only once a day. Apparently the course lasts for 6 months, and gets reduced a bit of the way through – TB is a very hard to kill bacteria. So hopefully crisis averted – Wikipedia says TB has a 2/3 mortality rate if untreated (I am really NEVER going to that useless GP again, ever). On the downside, I’m not allowed to have any alcohol for 6 months because the drugs are apparently so hard on the liver that straining it more might give me hepatitis. Now I’m just recovering at home, and as soon as doing stuff doesn’t hurt anymore, we’ll try to get some content up.