Odex wins appeal against PacNet Odex has won its appeal against PacNet, who now has to cough up the details of the downloaders who obtained anime titles off Bit Torrent. Previously, the District Judge had held that because PacNet owes a duty of confidentiality to its customers, Odex had to show an “extremely strong prima facie case” of wrongdoing before it could obtain the names of the downloaders. Justice Woo Bih Li overturned that. He was of the view that, on principle, making a disclosure pursuant to a court order could not amount to a breach of confidentiality. He also noted that the actual copyright holders of the anime titles had joined Odex as plaintiffs in this suit, and therefore the plaintiffs had a right to the names of the downloaders. [Full judgment available here, though I’m not sure for how long.] So we’re at this sad, sad state of affairs. On the one hand, the law is clearly correct. On the other, Odex has pretty much slapped a large number of anime fans in Singapore in the face. The backlash from the community when Odex started this whole affair was tremendous by Singapore standards. The Odex street protest. The blog coverage. The many SingTel and StarHub customers piling invective upon hokkien invective on their internet service providers (not linked, Google it). Now I don’t condone some of the backlash from the local anime community. Death threats to Stephen Sing? Not the right way to go. But to Odex, I would say this. Your customers want a product. If you don’t sell it, they will get it elsewhere. If you lose out, too bad. Suing people will only drive them away from you. Do you honestly think any of the people you sent letters of demand to will ever buy an Odex product again? What about the people who burned their VCDs, smashed their DVDs, in protest? Or the people who set up the Odex protest with anime-based toys? Those are the guys who didn’t care about the sub-standard quality of your dubs and bought them anyway. Those are the guys who went out and bought toys, action figures, models, and painstakingly painted them and added them to their collection. Those are the guys who saved their pocket money to buy the things they were passionate about. And those are the guys who are never spending that money on you again. Almost lost our domain My apologies, we almost lost our domain ‘cos (1) the credit card I use to update it was cancelled, and (2) the e-mail address registered with GoDaddy was made defunct. I’ve paid the necessary fees and everything is fine again =). Cloud strife sketch Just a sketch of cloud strife , more towards advert children costume. Happy holidays! I have stopped playing WOW Yeap, haven’t touched it for a month now, and even though I’ve still got a month remaining on the subscription I doubt I’ll be going back to Azeroth until Wrath of the Lich King comes out, if ever. I realized what an incredible grind it is to experience the end-game content. It’s mind-numbingly boring. It’s so boring, in fact, that while I am mining that next piece of ore (to get that next piece of gold to get the requisite 5 thousand pieces to get my epic flying mount to do the next repetitive netherwing quests…) I am (A) watching a show on my other monitor, (B) listening to a free university lecture in podcast form, or (C) sampling a new wine I bought. Then as I marvelled at the irony of having to amuse myself while playing a game, I met someone, so seriously, fuck that WOW shit, I have better things to do. (Besides, PORTAL is awesome. Muhahaha) Check this out!! RESPECT. WGA STRIKE! It really looks like its going to happen. The Writers Guild of America has been threatening to strike for a while now. The dispute is over online distribution of TV shows, amongst other things. See, the current contract between writers and networks is that writers get a cut of DVD sales and TV ad revenue (amongst other things). But now some networks are pushing media to the web. Shows like Battlestar Galactica and Lost have webisodes, web-only episodes, exclusively available from the parent network’s websites. These networks derive ad revenue from these webisodes, and the WGA wants a cut. Since the current contract is up, the WGA wants to renegotiate… unfortunately, networks don’t want to pay them for online content. It may not sound like much, but it is a big deal. WGA members write all your favourite TV shows: Heroes, Lost, House, etc. These shows are written through to the end of the year, but after that, no new episodes will be written. Heroes is even considering writing an alternate episode 11, finishing the current season early. It’s an incredibly stupid move on the networks’ part, and I hope it gets sorted out soon. It isn’t enough that we get crappy shows on all the time, now they’re going to ruin the ones we do watch as well! …And they wonder why we hate them. Voideck (2007) starring Bi-Beeeeee Vincent stars in this student project from NUS. Can you guess who he plays? Muhahahahah! Robert Jordan Dead! The author of the Wheel of Time series has finally bit the bullet. I’ve mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, the first 6 (yes, shuddup, SIX) Wheel of Time books were the best things I’d ever read. They were engaging, lucid and paced with exquisitely torturous precision - anyone who has hit the final hundred pages of any of those books at 4AM at night will know what I am talking about. On the other hand, his later books… well, sucked. Gone was the pacing, replaced by a meandering dialogue of 50 different things, 30 of them describing angsty dominatrix women in various states of angsty domineering. So my anticipation for the final book of the series is not as high as it would have been, my disappointment not as deep. At this point all I want is some closure. And the man has to go and bite the bullet! The good news is, the last book is likely to be cobbled together from the author’s detailed notes. Hopefully the person who brings the story together can restore some of the insane page-turnability that was the hallmark of the earlier books. Hopefully. RIP, Robert Jordan. Tokyo Game Show I’ll be heading to Tokyo for the TGS convention, *beams* My company was good enough to give me and my brother the businesse day tickets for the convention. so…..I guess that means MGS 4 demo all for myself!! FTW! Don’t worry guys I’ll take lots of pictures of the game girls and post it up here when I come back :3 Miss Teen Stupidverse Qn: Why can’t Americans find America on a map? Ans: We don’t have enough maps. Also, we must help Iraq and South Africa! I’d still hit her it, though. Ratatouille FTW Go and watch it! What’s incredulous is the 6 “rotten” reviews on rottentomatoes. For shame. It may not be as good as some of pixar’s earlier works, but it is so far above everything else on cinemas that it doesn’t matter. Shame on crappy old Singaporean cinemas for taking so long to bring it here and instead show shit like Rush Hour 3. Anti-piracy in games: Why? I wonder what anti-piracy companies tell their investors and customers in order to convince them to fund/continue to use their product. We all know that SecuROM, Safedisc and StarFuck StarForce don’t actually reduce the incidence of piracy at all (go to torrentspy and see for yourself!). Even if it does, any savvy game developer would weigh the pros (number of pirates stopped) and cons (price of implementing an anti-piracy measure) and surely they would reach the conclusion that the cost isn’t worth it? It’s not like games make incredible sales. A game that sells 50,000 copies can be considered a hit; most games sell far less. If you, as a developer, are already hard pressed to break even on the game… why pay an anti-piracy company more for an anti-piracy measure that will be cracked within hours of the game’s release to retail? Because believe you me, it will be cracked. Most within hours, some within days, a few really tenacious ones within weeks. And the anti-piracy companies have got to know that. 2K Games and BioShock The reason I’m pondering the existence of anti-piracy measures is, of course, the saga that is currently screwing over PC BioShock customers. In a nutshell, the BioShock installer only lets you install the game twice. If you want to install it more times, you actually have to uninstall the game first. That is, you go to your control panel and click “uninstall”. Otherwise it doesn’t count. “Big deal,” you say. “Normal users should be doing that anyway; why are so many people whinging over this measure? It’s nothing more than a minor inconvenience!” But see, it most definitely is a big deal. It is a big deal just from principle. If I buy a game, I should be allowed to install it multiple times on multiple PCs that I own. After all, I bought it. If I cannot do so, then you must tell me that I cannot do so, so I can consider whether or not I want to continue with the purchase of the game. It is a big deal because of the viscissitudes of PC use. How many times does your windows installation crash? How often does your hard disk fail, your RAM go bad, or any number of system-disabling disasters occur? A lot! It is a fact of a PC gamer’s life. Some of us play games over extended periods of time; weeks or months, because we simply do not have the time to invest. In that period, what are the chances that something prevents you from properly uninstalling the game, thus forcing you to take some potentially expensive measures just to play again? Even if the above only happens to say, 1% of your consumers, is that not 1% too many? It is a big deal because of practicality. The practical reality is, everybody who wants to pirate this game will pirate it - guaranteed. Anti-piracy measures depend on one simple fact: that those measures be actually present on the game disc. The only people who will have anti-piracy measures on their game disc, are the people who bought legitimate copies of the game. Pirates would be using a cracked version. Therefore the only people who will be affected by these measures… are the people who bought the game! Pirates will never be affected by these measures, and therefore it doesn’t work at all to stop piracy. It is a big deal because it defies common sense. Imagine you are in a family of 5; Mom, Dad and 3 kids. Dad buys BioShock for his teenage kids, and wants to play himself. Dad is pretty well off and has a computer for everybody in the house (believe me this is not uncommon, my house has 4 computers for a family of 4). Can Dad buy just one copy of BioShock? Common sense says yes! It is only for his family’s use, after all. But 2K games, BioShock’s developers, say NO. It is a big deal because it pushes users towards piracy. Do you think Dad will buy a new copy of BioShock, or do you think Dad will download a cracked version and never buy from 2K games again? Maybe he is so rich he doesn’t give a damn. But most of our dads aren’t. It is a big deal because of the poor way developer/publishers continue to treat their customers, who are their lifeblood. The official response on the 2K games forum, from someone named “Elizabeth”, is this: hey guys, first, let me say this. you DO NOT NEED TO USE THE INTERNET EVERY TIME YOU PLAY THIS GAME. it is only the first time. second, you can uninstall and reinstall this game, and if, by chance, you have 2 computers you want to simultaneously play this game on, you also can do that. if by some chance you are reinstalling this game without uninstalling it first, a lot, there is a chance you may have to call securom and get a key, or deactivate some older installations. but if you upgrade your hardware next week, you’ll still be able to play the game. if you revamp your system and need to reinstall bioshock, just uninstall it before you go through the overhaul, and then do your reinstall. calling it “hardware fingerprinting” is a bit alarmist. we do not transmit any of your data to any companies. really, the only people who will be concerned about any of these security measures are those who are rapidly putting bioshock on many pcs… if you use the game as you normally do, you won’t notice this at all (emphasis added). Note how the company just defined what amounts to “normal use”! According to 2K games, if I install my game on more than two computers, or if I reinstall without properly uninstalling the game, I am not using the game normally. Who are they to tell me how to play my game? If I want to play it on three different computers with the save files synced on a central server somewhere why can’t I? If I want to buy it so that my family members can all play from the same purchase why can’t I? And most importantly, if I can’t… why didn’t you tell me so? Why anti-piracy? Forgive me if I am still a little bit confused as to why these anti-piracy companies are still around. It’s like DRM, except it makes even less sense - and that’s saying a lot. Even DRM vendors clued in a long time ago that limited-play and limited-copy restrictions were simply not going to fly. How are they getting the money to continue to think up asinine schemes that get broken within days? Do their shareholders not know that the latest SecuROM protocols have already been cracked? Why do they keep funding it? Do their customers not know that the protocols are ineffective against piracy? Why do they keep buying it? Even if you are a big publisher with lots of money, surely you realize that the price of putting these shoddy pieces of shitware in your products is not worth the amount of flak you get from your own customers, the gamers! Why not save that tiny bit of money, give it back to your shareholders and save us all the heartache? The piracy problem is going to be there forever, believe you me. You will not suffer any losses, gamers will be happy, and your shareholders will be happy; it’s win-win-win! Mayhaps I am too naive; no matter. I will end by saying this: stop being so damn terrified of piracy, and worry about getting a good product out first. If you have nothing worth buying, then you have nothing worth protecting. And if you do get a good product out, believe you me: it will be bought, and you will make money. Superbad. Ratatouille is FINALLY coming out on big screen in Singapore,to think that we get Pirates of the carribean 3,Shrek 3 and many more visually astounding hollywood banging movies out even earlier than the official openings in US. You’ll probably think they do the same for a masterpiece from Pixar, but for all the local animators and CG artist here waiting for it a few months back… yeap we only get to see it shown this week. Wait, are we still promoting animation in this island? This is …Superbad. *search the local papers for more garbage* SuperBad trailer… Now this is something I’m looking forward to. :) Let’s see how long we’re gonna wait for this superbad ass movie to come to our shores. Rambo 4 trailer is out too. And I think we can all shut our mouths about Stallone getting too old to party. yeahhh more blood! I (heart) Charley This is one of the most… um… beautiful youtube clips I have ever seen. Meet Charley. He’s spastic. He’s a cat. If you don’t love him and want to laugh and cry at the same time when you watch this video, you are inhuman. Please kill yourself and clean the gene pool. BitTorrent goes closed-source, nobody surprised Back in December last year there were rumblings that BitTorrent was acquiring the uTorrent project. And why not? After all, uTorrent was more succesful than the mainline client ever was. It eventually turned out that the purchase was true, and copyfighters everywhere despaired, for of course Bram Cohen, like his predecessor Shawn Fanning, had by that time sold out to the MPAA. Now they’re turning the project closed-source. That’s right, the version 6 protocol will be closed source, thereby destroying one of the very reasons why the protocol was succesful in the first place - the ability for any developer, anywhere, to make a better product. So the several million users of uTorrent are going to use an “improved” feature set (I use that word with some doubt), and the several other million users of Azureus, BitComet et al are going to use another. Who wants to bet that part of the v. 6 protocol will include some lame-ass oppressive DRM scheme? Didn’t think so. Read the official response and weep. Sure, you can buy a licence to the protocol. But d’you really think the next big thing is going to come from someone who is pedantic enough to purchase a licence? Bleah. I has a camera phone So I can share these pictures of silly things with all of yous. The first dumb photo we have is the new BK fish burger! Yeap, its on promotion because it’s new. Now is the time to try this awesome burger at the cheap cheap price of $3.35 per! … or is it? What an amazing discount! I volunteered to give the counter staff the 5 cents but they declined. Man, you’d think after their earlier shenanigans they’d have learnt something. * * * Next we have a delicious menu item from the basement of Liang court. I don’t remember the name of the place in question but it’s the udon store just outside meidi ya supermarket. I know it’s kind of blurry, so I tried to put a bigger photo below. However the Nokia 6300’s camera does not have auto-zoom, so I’m pretty much stuck with what I can get. Here’s a close up of the udon: That’s right, cold bukkake udon. Yum. Wonder if they have warm bukkake udon. Incidentally, I had a cute reaction from a female friend who got shown this. Once shown she gasped and made a big-mouth :O face. The conversation then proceeded… S (friend of mine): Do you know what bukkake means? E (she, trying desperately to appear sweet and innocent): Ummm.. no! S: Then why did you react like that? E: *speechless* Adorable =P. * * * And now for the piece de resistance: If you don’t get it immediately, read the names out loud one by one. Samsung Employee Dance Ah, the crazy Koreans are at it again! Check it out: [link] It just gets more and more amazing as you watch. Things learnt while watching Transformers 1) Say hello to subliminal advertising and product placement. HP, eBay, Nokia, Mountain Dew and General Motors have paid a lot of money to Paramount. As if it’s not going to make enough money as it is. 2) Male government code-breaker/analysts are dorks. Female government code-breaker/analysts are hot Australian blondes. 3) If there is a sensible way of doing things, and a ZOMG I WILL DO IT CUZ I CAN AND IT LOOKS SO COOLZ SERIOUSLY DOODZ way of doing things, expect the latter to win out. See: Bumblebee, mouths on Transformers. 4) If there is a sensible way of doing things, and a ZOMG I WILL DO IT CUZ I CAN AND IT LOOKS SO STOOPID way of doing things, expect the latter to win out. See: pissing Bumblebee, Megatron. 5) A Michael Bay movie is pretty much a Michael Bay movie - over-dramatized slow-motion, moving camera shots and sunset walks galore. Yeesh. 6) A Michael Bay movie is pretty much a Michael Bay movie - crazy over-the-top action, over-dramatized slow-motion robot combat and big explosions galore. Woot! 7) Megan Fox. Megan Fox. Megan Fox. Did I mention Megan Fox? 8) Despite being able to transform into anything, Autobots can’t fly. 9) If a giant transforming robot cop car demands to know if your eBay user name is LadiesMan217, take note. The correct answer is no. 10) Giant robots turn me on. Go watch this movie. Work is a biatch I seriously have not even had time to check Squarebrain for comments, let alone write any content for it. Now that I’ve got a free second to spare, I just popped by to say: we’re not dead! I’m just trying to survive the harsh reality of waking up at 7.40am every single day. Ugh. We’re trying to rope in some peeps to contribute so Squarebrain doesn’t stutter and die. Zeng has flown off to Japan for some conference thingamajig - way to go! In the meantime we’re just trying to seek some sort of equilibrium here. I bet we lost most of our readership during the lull. Grrrrr. WOW is just like real life The reason you haven’t seen me post anything is because I’ve been spending many hours on World of Warcraft. I’ve gotten myself a level 43 Paladin, pretty decently decked out, and something struck me while I was playing: WOW is just like real life. See, back when I was a lowly 37, I’d toiled and grinded my way to about 56 gold. It wasn’t easy, seeing as money making items are hard to come by, but ceaseless mining and skinning expeditions had gotten me enough bronze, silver and leather that I’d finally reached 56 gold. And with that money, I happily purchased a pretty buff weapon, Sword of the Magistrate, which also happened to have a +7 attack enchant on it, for a whopping 38G. A friend of mine who is also playing, started out just about the same time that I did. He is now a puny level 27, but he’s decked out in all blues. He casually mentioned that his dagger cost him 200 gold, and he got that money from friends in high places (level 70 dudes with too much money from the Outlands). Life lesson learnt: it’s better to have friends in high places, than it is to work hard and become good at what you do. Heartwarming Digg Users Are Revolting Person A: “Digg users are revolting!” Person B: “I know!” So goes the joke (paraphrased from the movie Chicken Run). But if you visit digg, you’ll see the entire front page covered with nothing but stories leaking the HD-DVD encryption key. “It’s nothing short of a revolt!” they proclaim. A riot on the internet, a powerful negative reaction to DRM. Well done, give yourselves a pat on the back, you’ve shown The Man… …absolutely nothing. It’s a start, to be sure, but what effect will it really have on DRM? Jobs has already announced that the iTunes store will sell DRM-free music from EMI, presumably with others soon to follow. Sure, it’s a completely self-serving gesture, but it’s also the right thing to do, and it’s actually making a difference. A difference to people who are disconnected from their customers (read: the music industry), a difference to the customers themselves, a counterpoint to Captain Copyright and his band of seriously lame propaganda spouters. But the “revolution” on digg? There’s a phrase that describes the mass riot on digg perfectly. It’s called “preaching to the choir”. A bunch of guys who agree with each other decide to give each other mutual hand jobs. Yes, it’s one step up from masturbation, but it ain’t sex, if you know what I mean. That being said, it’s really cool to see the entire front page covered in nothing but links to an obscure hexadecimal number. thegreatsze on Female Mediocrity Link (via tomorrow). Excerpt: They do not think: If I drive a car, I should learn about its maintenance and upkeep. If I utilize technology on a daily basis, I should familiarize myself with it above and beyond just consuming. They wail instead: “But why? I have my brother / father / uncle / husband / boyfriend to do it for me.” And this wail is final, a comprehensive answer to life’s vicissitudes. This is not an exercise in misogyny. Rather, it is a general diatribe against modern society. We - and by this, I mean both men and women - have unconsciously conspired to allow mediocre women to stagnate happily in their mediocrity. I do believe that we are all born mediocre, save for the talented, God-gifted few. All is hard work. … This is not just the fault of the female, though it is arguable that she has let herself down by falling so comfortably into the unchallenging role that society has carved out for her. It is the fault of us all; we prize female beauty to such an extent that all else that she does has no real effect on our judgment of her. It is of course our loss; when an entire gender expects little from its collective self, it is the entire species that suffers. Yes. The comments are exactly what you would expect, and a good read in themselves. I suspect a lot of people are misreading the essay; it’s not a diatribe against women so much as a diatribe against passionless, soul-less mediocrity. Women just happen to be a convenient smoking gun… believe you me, there are plenty of mediocre guys around, too. “A Man should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently and die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.” - Robert A. Heinlein I’d add to that: drive a stick shift, play an instrument, read widely, stay healthy, write the rules, break the rules when the rules are stupid, respect someone who deserves it, disrespect someone who doesn’t, please a woman, please himself. Specialization is indeed for insects. Don’t be a liability to humanity. Two Cool DIY Projects These two made my day. First up, we have the mouse mouse. Literally: I’d love to have one of these on my desktop! Disturbing and cool at the same time. Plus the cat would go crazy. The mouse mouse is furry, pocket-sized, and perfect for your laptop too, so you can bring it to the hip cafe down town and use it to pick up chicks… or at least, use it as an interesting conversation starter. Too bad I splurged on a Razer gaming mouse. The other project is the spider mobile. Some guy built a full-sized, steampunk, 8-legged walker for about $15,000. It’s somewhat scary if you’re an arachnophobe, but no one can deny it’s uber coolness: And that made my day. Gamer Gals Gamerhelp has a picture-heavy article up on Girls who Play, featuring - you guessed it - hot gamer girls. Great. This is just another way of putting some random cute attention-whore posing seductively next to an XBOX, implying that yes indeed, hot nekkid chixxors do play games. This shameless exploitation of women, this crass cheap attempt at selling sex, this … .. I’m sorry, what was I saying again? Kingdom Hearts II Fanart My fanart of Sora. Final Mix is out in japanese….tempting…. really love the animation quality put into this game. :) My Doom Approaches The “Cancel” button is right there. Click it… CLICK IT!! Alanis Morissette Covers My Humps Had me in fits of laughter. You should hear her wail “My hump, my hump”. Blame VA Shootings on Videogames, Part 1 Well, I can’t say I didn’t see this one coming. Riding high on the coat-tails of the terrible tragedy of the VA Tech shootings, our dear Jack Thompson is once again pointing the finger at videogames. I love how the Fox News guys introduce him. Jack Thompson is an expert on school shootings! They must have a course for that in Florida, somewhere. For a complete breakdown on all his lies, check out Kotaku’s post on the matter. He does say some things that make sense, though. Like how he feels his kids aren’t safe. Like how he prays for their well-being. But all that is overwhelmed by the un-eraseable impression that this guy just wants some air time, and Fox News is willing to give it to him and call him a friggin’ expert on school shootings. The Japanese Art of Relationships A hilarious “video workshop” on dating in Japan. A short film showing how u can apply all those theories youve seen from above!