the rare hockey post

The Buffalo Sabres are 6-0-1. It is early in the season. They have played less than 1/10th of a (regular season) schedule. Still, I cannot help but remark on the following:

-they are enjoying this early success without Chris Drury, Daniel Briere, and Brian Campbell.
-Thomas Vanek, thought to be drastically overpaid by many, is leading the league with 9 goals in 7 games.
-Darcy Regier, vilified by just about every hockey fan in western new york, built teams that, even excluding the early success of this season, have enjoyed unprecedented success in Sabres' history.

I was in the minority last year in holding Sabres' management blameless for Drury's departure. Why is Regier so wrong for expecting a player to uphold his contract and then negotiate in good faith? Let it be known that the Sabres matched the Rangers' offer to Drury. Drury, and no one other than the man himself, chose to accept the contract offer of the Rangers. As far as I'm concerned, he abandoned the team that brought him into prominence in this league. Yes, he won a Stanley Cup with the Avalanche, I know -- but was Chris Drury a hockey-household name of his current stature before he came to the Sabres? Certainly not. He made many public proclamations of his love for Buffalo and for the Sabres organization before jumping ship to the Rangers. As far as I'm concerned, he can lie in the bed he made with them, and I hope it's decidedly uncomfortable.

The other players mentioned here were only doing what was best for themselves and their families. Was Briere likely to ever have as large an offer as he received after the 06-07 season? Not in my opinion. He had to take the big payday, and the Sabres couldn't oblige him. It would seem to me that he left on good terms, as did Campbell and Martin Biron, the popular goalie the sabres traded last year.

Anyway, here's to Regier: one of the finest hockey minds in the NHL.

this thing writes itself!

watch the whole thing for the best zinger of the campaign.

This is so good that I had to quote it here. I won't say who it is except to say it is from a friend of a friend who grew up in communist Russia:

Its a puritan, religious country... since the beginning. The only thing everyone agreed to is hating taxes.

A third of the country doesn't believe in evolution... and that's not even a very difficult theory to understand. How much easier is it to say that God is everything when you talk about partical physics? Or claim that the Large Hedron Collider will create a black hole that eats the earth (impossible say scientists! i'm going with my gut says the common man!).

we're run by a populist president who went to yale - but can still imply that educated people are somehow suspect. everyone is equal! everyone's achievements are the same! no-one is better than you simply because you are a lazy sack who never graduated high school, and they busted their ass to earn a degree and learn something!

for a country that hates communism, we certianly echo its worst traits: blind patriotism, distrust of education and knowledge, and a broad dismissal of critics as traitors and snobs.

So, tell me why we shouldn't fear Sarah Palin? To paraphrase Matt Damon: if one goes by the actuary tables, there is a 1 in 3 chance that John McCain dies in his first term in office, meaning she would become President Sarah Palin. And so we would go on, following our fearless hockey mom leader as she ruled in her best creationist-spewing, tolerance-smashing, ignorance-spreading way. People need to take notice of this and consider the future. I'm not saying Obama is immune to criticism or other issues, but at least he doesn't think its wrong to tell our kids that the universe wasn't created in 6 days.

Ignorance Is...How does that phrase go?

This is not the most original or truly astonishing prose, but I found, somewhat surprisingly, that it rather concisely sums up my concerns about a certain presidential candidate. I found the following to be especially poignant:

I am sick and tired of the president of the United States embarrassing me. The world we live in is too complex to entrust it to someone else whose idea of intellectual curiosity and grasp of foreign policy issues is to tell us he can look into Vladimir Putin's eyes and see into his soul.

George Bush's record as a student, military man, businessman and leader of the free world is one of constant failure. And the part that troubles me most is he seems content with himself.

He will leave office with the country $10 trillion in debt, fighting two wars, our international reputation in shambles, our government cloaked in secrecy and suspicion that his entire presidency has been a litany of broken laws and promises, our citizens' faith in our own country ripped to shreds. Yet Bush goes bumbling along, grinning and spewing moronic one-liners, as though nobody understands what a colossal failure he has been.

I fear to the depth of my being that John McCain is just like him.

the old gray mare, she ain't what she used to be

Between 1988 and 1997, the golden age of the MS-DOS operating system, I became an expert at writing boot menus. Various boot configurations were necessary in those days to run certain programs, because they all had different memory requirements, CD driver requirements (when CD-ROM's became available), and sound card interrupt and DMA settings. It was a complete pain in the ass. Usually after purchasing a new game, an entire day was needed just to figure out how the system needed to be tweaked in order to get it to run--and remember, this was before the Internet made it easy to just google an answer. Research by reading, trial and error, and plain old fashioned person-to-person communication was needed. I was such a PC gaming junkie in those days, and had become so good at doing this, that I actually parlayed the skill into a job, for a time anyway. Every PC at Cyberjocks, a local multiplayer gaming establishment, used a special version of my boot menu from 1996 to 1997.

During this same group of years, I became intensely interested in home theater, specifically multi-channel surround sound systems. There was something about high fidelity audio playback systems that fascinated me. Of course, back then home theater was sufficiently esoteric as to be out of the price range of most people, and the best a student with relatively small amounts of disposable income could do was voraciously devour every bit of information available on the subject. Of course, I fortified this with sporadic purchases of very well-researched, relatively inexpensive yet highly regarded pieces of home theater electronics. The true fuel to my passion, however, was the project of building the ultimate subwoofer with my good friend, Aaron Kondziela. Over a period of at least two or three months, we acquired the various components necessary for the project, took over his parents basement (which was delightfully full of useful tools and gadgetry), and constructed a beautifully proportioned (from the perspective of audio design, anyway), gargantuan 30 cubic-foot box. It was a ported design that required a design modification of intuitive ingenuity of which I am still proud. So exacting and fastidious were we in our construction efforts that the final product was able to move enough air to blow shut a door 50 feet away, and shake the foundation of my parents very old, very large and very brick house. I still remember the first sound produced by that behemoth: track 6 of Harry Connick Jr.'s "She:" "Follow the Music," which has an initial bass note so deep and strong that you need a good sub just to hear it properly.

So, what's the point? Well, I still enjoy video games. I still enjoy home theater. But now, I have a PS3, and Xbox360, a Wii, and a relatively capable gaming PC. Over the years I've acquired so many games that I probably wouldn't recognize them all if you laid them out in front of me. I have a dedicated home theater room with a 100" screen, a 1080p projector, and a high end multichannel surround-sound system capable of playing high-resolution audio. I have reclining leather theater seats, and about 5 gagillion movies. In short, if between 1989 and 1997 I had made a list of all the things I could possibly want, the list would be an inventory of my current home (ok, and few other things that I haven't quite been able to take care of...yet). The funny thing is that while I still enjoy all of these things, something is lost now that I own all this stuff. There is no challenge, no work in it. I didn't have to design anything, write any code, or even break a sweat for any of it. Of course, I worked to earn the money needed to buy all this stuff, but that's not really the same thing, is it? I guess that what I'm trying to say is that after acquiring all this stuff, I've never been less interested in it. The irony is not lost on me.

I feel like a prophet...

Here's a column talking about the same things I've been spouting off for years.

"We'd sell if we could, but we'd lose our shirt," Johnson said. On a recent walk, she counted 15 "For Sale" signs. A similar home nearby is listed below $400,000.

"I was so glad to get out of the city, the pollution the traffic, the crime," she said. Now, the suburbs seem mean. "I wouldn't do this again."

The plural of "Lego" is "Lego"

If this requires exposition to explain its coolness, then you and I are different on some very fundamental level:

Down with LHC?

...apparently it won't destroy the world? Well, you be the judge:

There Will Be Blood...

...watched it last night. I think it's probably one of the most relevant films ever made, and in my opinion every American should see it. Without getting into a long discussion, basically it forces the viewer to empathize with some very unsavory aspects of the "american spirit." I know that I learned something about myself while watching it, and it's not every day that one can say that about a film.

GHET-TO!

I've have a really nice road bike that I've ridden sporadically over the past 5 years. I've used it to exercise and to recreate, but I've never done anything practical (read "commute") with it, although I've always intended it for this purpose. After all, one doesn't buy an expensive road bike if one intends it only to collect dust. So, why am I not using it for my morning commute? Well, not to put too fine a point on it, but I'd likely have to duck as I ride by the 2 or 3 drug dens that I pass on my way to work. Anyway, I've started riding it to the gym during the week, and yesterday I decided to bite the bullet (hopefully not literally) and ride to work. Using googlemaps like the geek that I am, I found a route that bypasses most of the mess without taking me too far out of my way. I go thusly:


View Larger Map

3.3 miles...and that's with a relatively long detour (if you look at the map, the detour is where I ride southwest on main st. to kensington avenue.) The shortest route is straight across main, down filmore to kensington. If you need illicit substances that's the road to take, otherwise I'd go the long way...

Finally getting off my ass and deciding to do this made me realize how close I am to work, and it made me feel guilty for waiting so long to start. I highly recommend this for anyone who lives and works in the same municipality--I'd hazard a guess that even if my ride was twice as long it wouldn't make much of a difference. I timed the ride, and biking the detour route takes literally a couple of minutes longer than driving the short route. (I've biked the "danger" route and I made it in the same time it takes me to drive, which makes me feel even more guilty.) All of this aside, it's just plain nice to be out on a bike. Unless it's snowing. Or raining. Or there are 30mph winds.

To sum up, the benefits of biking to ECMC (saving $, lower CO2 footprint, exercise, "experiencing" the city) to me outweigh the potential negative aspect ("experiencing" the city.)

Your McCain Me Crazy

In the interest of fairness...

Since I posted a while back criticizing McCain for retaining crazy evangelist advisers, I feel compelled to post about his recent repudiation of John Hagee. While I am still puzzled over why he would have sought the endorsement of guys like this in the first place, this is at least a good first step towards sanity.

puck

The summer hockey season started this week, and we kicked it off in style with a convincing 5-1 win. The summer performax league is much more engaging than the crappy winter league we were in over the past several months: the league maintains a website that uploads scores and stats after every game. I'm not going to deny the geeky pleasure I get out of playing a game, and then coming home and checking out my stats for the night. If you're interested, they can be found here. (note you have to select the "sportsman north" league from the drop-down box in order to see yours truly.) For the record, this was my best statistical game ever, with a 1.00 GAA and .963 save percentage. However, if there's any significance to those stats (and there isn't), they serve to illustrate the difference in skill level between winter league and summer league. Our 5-1 win came on monday night. The following night, we played one of our 4 remaining winter league games, and were soundly beaten 8-2. Granted, our team had a grand total of 7 skaters for Tuesday's game, and none of our better players showed up, but still...

High Gas Prices Are Good

This article was written about 2 and 1/2 years ago. Not that 2005 is so long ago, but at the time gas was about $2.20 a gallon. In gas-price-years that probably feels like an age to any regular driver. Anyway, the author makes a good point, and I've been saying the same thing for some time now: high gas prices are a good thing. If you don't want to read the entire article, there are two main points. First, expensive oil makes expensive alternative energy sources look more favorable to those who must fund their creation. Second, enormous profits from high-priced gas put these same companies in a great position to make some headway in alternative energies. It comes down to motivation: if we continued on with $20/barrel oil for the next 100 years, I can safely promise you that you'd be putting regular unleaded in your car come 2100. However, if that same barrel of oil costs $250 by 2050, you can bet your sweet sweet crude that energy moguls will have a trump card up their sleeves. There is no motivating force in the history of the human race to compare with greed, and I'm counting on it to save our collective bacon.

Oil companies are the only entities on the planet with the wherewithal and the motivation to research, design, and implement alternative energy sources and infrastructure. If it means that we have hydrogen powered cars sometime in the next 20 years, I'll pay $10 a gallon for gas...and I'm not kidding.

Radio Free Market Economy

This has been muddying my thoughts recently so I thought I'd write about in the hope that it would find its way out of my brain: I have more important things to do, after all. heh heh heh

A lot of talk has been thrown around lately about how awful the u.s. economy is, how awful it is that gas prices are rising, how awful it is that the dollar is tanking, etc. etc. etc. Awful, awful, awful. Woe woe woe is me. There, there: shut up, little girl! What's happening seems (to me at least) very simple--the world economies are equalizing. As free trade increases, the market naturally migrates (in certain industries anyway) to cheaper environments, boosting the economy and quality of life in those areas and reducing it in others. Naturally, there is a (fluctuating) finite amount of wealth in the world (finite in that wealth can be defined by how much everybody thinks everything in the world is worth at that one particular moment), and as industries and markets move around, they will shift that wealth accordingly. It shouldn't come as any great surprise that the U.S. economy, which was until recently artificially protected on the world stage by trade barriers, is finding itself falling a bit--especially industries such as manufacturing. Molecules in areas of high pressure will gravitate toward areas of low pressure.

The world market is changing things, to be sure--wealth is spreading. The average american joe who had a skilled labor position and enjoyed a ridiculously high salary (when compared to like employees in a global context) is going the way of the dodo. In his stead there will be more jobs in other industries, such as software engineering, healthcare, communications, etc.; positions that take advantage of the (still) relatively high level of education and entrepreneurial spirit in this country...and the sooner people figure out that this isn't a bad thing, the better it will be for everyone. There seems to be a certain pervasive attitude in certain parts of our society that fears this change greatly and will fight, tooth and nail, to preserve the "old ways." The old ways aren't slowly dying away: they're dead already. People in this country will have to figure out a way (find a way!) to excel in the new world economy or they'll be pushed aside. Obviously many companies are already doing this, notably U.S. based companies that are heavily invested in foreign markets.

I'm not judging this situation in a context of right or wrong--I'm just pointing out that it is true. Right or wrong, good or bad, people need to embrace reality, or risk being pushed aside as irrelevant.

Oh, and if you think that most people do understand this and are ready to move on? You're wrong--I can't tell you how often I overhear some ECMC employee talking in the hall about how awful it is that "we have to give up retiree healthcare!" or "we have to give up summer-hours!" (that one always gets me...summer hours are a relic of the days when county buildings had no air conditioning, and in the summer employees were allowed to go home 1/2 hour early because of the heat.) Since ECMC has to stay open 24 hours a day, this means that its employees of course must continue to work a full day...but the hospital has to either a.) pay them more, or b.) give them extra days off at other times--all because they are working through their precious summer hours...At this point I have to point out that, even though my position is non-union, and I don't get the more ridiculous benefits like summer hours and silly holidays like election day, I still have very good benefits and in no way feel cheated, slighted, or otherwise wronged by my woeful situation.

I guess my point is that in order to adapt in the new free market economy, all people in this country, not just the few multinational corporations, have to adapt. This means you, mr. union laborer. These people aren't losing anything aside from over-inflated salaries and benefits propped up by years of artificial protection and misguided union muscle.

Now, anyone who is an economist (out of my way, I'm an economist!), or is in any way qualified to talk about the stuff that I just bandied about as if I knew what the hell I was talking about, can feel free to tell me how crazy I am.

Ah yes, regarding high gas prices. Supply and demand, my friend, supply and demand. Don't like high gas prices? Move closer to your job, get a bike, or ride public transportation. I have a feeling that we are going to move into a period in our culture where privately owned automobiles will become (slowly, perhaps very slowly) less prevalent as petroleum prices continue to rise--or at least we'll end up using the automobiles that we currently own less.(note that I'm only talking about the U.S. here. I'm well aware that automobile sales are increasing like crazy in China, which only serves to bolster my point about quality of life equalizing on a world scale.) When an alternative fuel infrastructure based on an abundant fuel source (like hydrogen, for example) is created, things will swing the other way again, but not until then. Rising gas prices, more than any other single factor, are going to affect both the impetus to create an alternative fuel infrastructure as well as the need to reduce CO2 emissions. With that in mind, are higher gas prices really a bad thing? Seriously: move into the city.

Lair on G string

This relates to my "why does everyone hate the PS3" post...

Today's discussion focuses on the PS3 game, "Lair," which is at its core a very simple action title in which the player controls giant, flying, fire-breathing dragons in several combat scenarios. Lair was released last October, but it gets the blog treatment because its developer (Factor 5) is about to release a patch which adds analogue stick control support to the title. For anyone who isn't a videogame-fiend and is unaware of such trivialities as opinions published in the videogame press, Lair has been almost universally lambasted for its implementation of Sony's motion-sensitive sixaxis controls*. It was also considered to have a poor targeting system, lousy voice acting, and an unfortunate choice of color palette (that one always makes me laugh).

Now, before I go on, let me get something out of the way. Its criticisms in the press aside, "Lair" is a flawed title in several ways: it is too short, it doesn't do enough character development, and the voice acting is generally lousy. Other than these few gripes, Lair is frigging awesome. Maybe I'm weird, but I think controlling fire-breathing dragons in inherently fun.

I often wonder why seemingly no reviewer enjoyed the sixaxis control scheme of the game. After all, it is a bold, innovative step in an area that rarely sees changes. Conversely, Nintendo's Wii is universally lauded for its revolutionary motion-based controls. Yet here we have poor little Lair getting dumped on for being different. Shame on you, video game press. I suppose it is important at this stage to point out that I found the controls quite easy to use, once I had taken the time to learn how to use them. Similarly, anyone who has tried the game in my presence has had a little trouble at first, but within 5 minutes had intuited most of the games functions. Obviously one can now infer that the controls are not "broken" as they are suggested to be by most reviewers. Essentially the game is challenging insomuch as it forces the user to learn a relatively unusual control scheme, and then master it to the point that said user can complete the game. To me, this is not a reason for complaint, it is simply a game-challenge paradigm that hasn't been used much since the last major shift in console game controllers (obviously excluding the current generation of games consoles, I'll give the nod to the Nintendo 64 for making the last major controller change, being the first to implement an analogue stick). Complaining that Lair sucks because it is hard to control is kind of like complaining that the game of football sucks because it's hard to throw a football. No, football doesn't suck: you just suck at football. (disclaimer: football probably does suck for several other reasons, but not because throwing a football is hard. Also, at this point I will stop using the word "suck.")

Now, are Sony's sixaxis motion controls as easy to use as the Wii motion controls? Certainly not. They are not nearly as intuitive, and yet are clearly not meant to be. Sixaxis is a design compromise, intended to bridge a gap between a new type of intuitive, motion based control and more traditional, manipulative controls that require manual dexterity. As a design compromise, it is inherently imperfect. That said, I think developers who take risks in order to be innovative should be applauded and rewarded for their efforts--even moreso when the product is actually fun.

And now, the punchline: Lair is good. Oh, and about that patch that made me want to write this in the first place: if you still really hate the sixaxis controls, the patch allows you to play it with your ol' analogue sticks. Personally I think this would detract from one of the most entertaining and challenging aspects of the game, but to each his own. Oh, and you should really learn how to throw a football.

*sixaxis controls allow the user to use intuitive movements rather than manipulate buttons and control surfaces in order to interface with a game.

Maaaagic

So, Orlando is a whole lotta no fun. Aside from the 8 hours every day listening to bullshit and droning on and on and foaming at the mouth and falling over backwards from the happy folks at Amicas, I went to Epcot Center one day for about 1.5 hours. It was enough. The rest of Orlando? Well, I was there for only a few days which means I'm no expert, and of course I'm sure there are nice parts, but the entire area reminded me of Niagara Falls Blvd between Sheridan and the 290.

hockey update

Another game, another loss. 5-1. It was a bad game all around, but to be fair we only had 8 guys on our bench compared to roughly 50 for the other team. Or 16: I'm no scientician. As for me, I played well in the 3rd period, but there were two early goals I would like back. Who knows: if we were 2-1 instead of 4-1 heading into the 3rd, it might have ended differently...

the politics of failure have failed!

Anyone who thinks that U.S. foreign policy will change with McCain as president isn't paying attention...

I would rate stories drumming up fear about the U.S.'s plans to invade Iran nothing but far left-wing media creativity, if McCain wasn't seeking the support of people like Rod Parsley and John Hagee. Parsley has been called by McCain himself as a "spiritual adviser." Parsley has made very startling statements, such as suggesting that it is America's "divine purpose" to destroy Islam, and that "America was founded, in part, with the intention of seeing this false religion destroyed, and I believe September 11, 2001, was a generational call to arms that we can no longer ignore." Apparently we are supposed to start a nuclear war in Iran, end the world, and let God sort it out. How much of this is political pandering to the christian evangelical vote, and how much of it represents McCain's own beliefs? The fact of the matter is that whether or not McCain believes we need to bring on the apocalypse, he should certainly not be associating himself with lunatics like this.

As an aside: when did it become necessary for republicans to pander to the christian right? I would suggest that it is because most members of the christian right also happen to be conservatives, but maybe we should ask what, inherently, makes the christian right "conservative?" There is nothing conservative about the christian right's policies these days. Fiscally, they are supporting a military conflict of questionable merit that spends billions every week. Also, what about the christian right's old adage of keeping government out of religion? I guess that goes right out the window when one realizes government power can be used to promote one's religion. Frankly I find the whole situation confusing and frightening.

Off the topic of Iran, but still on the topic of McCain's questionable taste in advisers, we have John Hagee, who has made similarly idiotic public statements. Apparently New Orleans was destroyed not because of some engineering gaffe or outrageously violent weather brought on by climate change, but because New Orleans housed a level of sin which is "offensive to God." He, like many anti-catholic protestants over the years, has also referred to the Catholic Church as "The Great Whore." There's a good collection of his thoughts here. Think what you will about any religion, but should someone who is vying for the presidency actively court the opinion of a guy like this?

I will say that in an election campaign, the person vying for the presidency can't possibly know everything about everyone with whom he associates, and I can certainly envision scenarios where someone would have to bump elbows with some relative unsavories in order to secure a section of the vote (anything to win, right?) But for crying out loud, there is no way that a person vying for the highest political office in the most powerful country on the planet should make the mistake of associating himself, even for the briefest of moments, with people like this. It doesn't make sense unless, at least on some level, there is agreement among them.

Just wanted to point out a great post on Cirque du Poulet regarding a great article in The Star pointing out some of the absurdities of the Iraq war. Get on over there and have a look.

Quantum? I don't even know him!

These days it is of course very common to purchase all forms AV entertainment using the Internet, but it is increasingly common to use it as the actual infrastructure for the delivery of said content. The use of Internet as infrastructure for delivery of AV content is allowing it to compete directly with the traditional physical delivery infrastructure, and I think it's a really interesting situation. For the purposes of this discussion, I'm focusing on non-interactive content, specifically: high definition movies.

There has been a lot of discussion lately about high definition content, its delivery, format and media standard. On the physical side, we have blu-ray emerging as the de facto standard for what currently passes as "high definition" content. (I don't like using that term because it is so very arbitrary--what will we call "high definition" content in five years? Standard definition? Old crusty definition? It's silly.) As far as current state-of-the-home-theater tech goes, Blu-ray is a pretty good standard: it has the capacity to house quite a bit of minimally compressed high-resolution video and audio, and the bandwidth to adequately deliver said content to a playback system. There is valid criticism about the completeness of the Blu-ray (roving) standard vs. its rival, HD-DVD, but the fact is HD-DVD couldn't compete with Blu-ray's superior technology, and this is likely the key advantage that won the format war. (The format war discussion, however, is for another day.) So, the question in the context of this discussion is: can a data delivery infrastructure compete with a physical media format? In my opinion, the short answer is yes, but not yet (at least for the foreseeable future.)

There are three major hurdles to get over before widespread adoption of content-as-data will be accepted. Firstly, Internet infrastructure (for the purposes of this discussion I'm only talking about North America) is grossly underpowered for this task. The Internet backbone is capable of handling quite a bit of bandwidth, but the home distribution layer is not even close to where it needs to be in order to make convenient delivery of massive amounts of data a reality. Let's work with some numbers. Comparing apples to apples, let's see the differences in obtaining content via Internet or via Blu-ray by way of brick and mortar establishments:

Our fictional friend Larry has a Blu-ray player and a broadband internet connection which averages about 3Megabits/second download speed (a solid and very typical broadband speed). A Blu-ray disk can contain up to 50Gigabytes (thats 400Gigabits) of data. How long would it take to download that much data over a 3Mb/sec internet connection? 37 hours, and that's assuming that Larry's internet connection speed never drops below 3Mb/sec, which is very unlikely. Now, let's assume Larry is lucky enough to have a connection like Verizon's FIOS, which has a 10Mb/sec download speed. Things speed up to 14 hours, again assuming no drops in speed. How many of you plan what movie to watch 37 or even 14 hours in advance? Now, combine this knowledge with the fact that a majority of Americans are still without even basic broadband internet access, and you can see that the combination of inconvenience with lack of delivery infrastructure makes it unlikely in the near future that downloaded content will be able to compete with physical media. How do delivery mechanisms like Apple's iTV and Microsoft's XboxLive service get around this problem now? By compressing the hell out of content and offering it at a lower native resolution, both of which diminish the quality of the delivered product. In short, these services do not offer a product that can compete directly with the current state-of-the-industry. Now, what about Larry's Blu-ray player? Well, he can likely be at any number of establishments that offer Blu-ray discs in a matter of minutes. A more accurate comparison might be made with purchasing movies via an online retailer like Amazon.com, which would require similar wait periods for a movie. However, online retailers like Amazon represent but a fraction of total sales of media--most likely because of this very challenge.

Secondly, there is a cultural hurdle in the way of the digital distribution services: people still like to see and feel the thing they are buying. There are many of us who are comfortable with the idea of housing an entire collection of movies, music, videogames, etc. as arrangements of 1's and 0's on some type of data storage technology, but there are many more of us who have yet to adopt such familiarity with technology. This particular issue will only be resolved over time as digital storage becomes more commonplace. It's not a problem per se, but rather a cultural shift.

Lastly there are security and licensing questions that continue to cause problems for the AV industry. Copy protection on a disc can be cracked, the content copied and distributed universally; indeed this is happening now. What remains to be seen is the fallout from offering very high quality content (i.e. content virtually indistinguishable from the original master) exclusively over the internet. It could be argued that illegal tampering of IP is a fringe activity these days (I'm sure many in the industry would argue that point), but what will happen once we have an internet infrastructure capable of delivering this data in a matter of minutes rather than days? Whether it be more or less secure, one thing is certain: until it can be proven unequivocally that a studio's content is secure, there will be resistance to a new form of infrastructure from those who will make these decisions. Quantum computing might solve this problem once and for all, making it against the laws of physics to copy data protected by a quantum state, but we aren't quite there yet. Also, what about licensing? If I buy a movie online today, will I be able to queue it up at a moment's notice 10 years from now and be able to watch it at my leisure without renewing a license?

So, in an ideal world we would flip on our TV's, order whatever content we wanted, have it delivered to us in a matter of minutes, then stored permanently on some redundant storage medium in either the great server rack in the sky or in a smaller-scale version of the same in our own homes. The savings in fuel consumption alone justifies this (think of how much fuel is used to bring a disc of whatever type into your home!). Then there is all the detritus of packaging..."stuff" that is inherently wasteful and useless. Personally I'm looking forward to the day when this is a reality. Unfortunately, I don't see the brick and mortar establishment going away for quite some time.

we need a win

Played the 2nd-place team in our division tonight, and lost 5-4. Very frustrating, considering we were leading 4-3 halfway through the 3rd and tied with 13 seconds to go. Letting in a goal with that much time on the clock is no fun for a goalie, even if we did have to kill two consecutive (very dumb) penalties. Still, there were silver linings. We are not playing well this season, and it shows with our (I think) 6-12 record. Thus far we've been manhandled by the upper half of the division, so to play one of the top teams that close is encouraging.

I rate my performance tonight a solid 'B.' I've played better, but not much. I made some nice saves: a breakaway, a two-on-one, and a one-timer from right in front of the crease come to mind. I also had fairly solid positioning as I made a couple of saves with screens set; during each I never saw the puck until it hit my pad. My butterfly was solid, and after sharpening my skates my butterfly slide was working well again. The glove was working pretty well too. The only goal I really want back is the last one, but that's to be expected as it was the game-winner.

Another interesting note: I can usually tell how well I played by how the other team greets me in the post-game handshake line. If they give me a crooked nod, say "good game" through a crooked smile, and a hard slap on my blocker, I know I was doing my job well. Tonight was one of those nights, and these inexplicably welcome moments of camaraderie are always encouraging and fortifying in a way.

Get a Load of the Nerd?

I'm geeking out...

What is it exactly about the PS3 that brings out the ire in people? Maybe this isn't the world's most pressing problem at the moment, but indulge me for a bit...

when the PS3 was first released, there was almost universal criticism over its price. $600 is a lot of money for a console, but why didn't anyone consider the Xbox360 too expensive? When I bought the 360 in early '06, the base console was $350. Then I had to add a hard drive for, I believe, over $100, and a wireless network peripheral for $100. The total price of that 360 system was just about the same as a PS3, and the PS3 included all of those features as well as a high-definition movie player and HDMI interface. If I wanted to add a high-definition movie player to the 360, I would have to spend another $180, bringing the total price of a competitive 360* $130 higher than a PS3. Of course, since its inception the price for a top-of-the-line PS3 has dropped to $500. So, what gives with the hard line about the PS3's price?

There seemed to be a viral mudslinging campaign almost from day one with the PS3; indeed to this day when I speak with my contemporaries on the subject of console gaming, the PS3 is held in about as much esteem as the proverbial red-headed step child. The original collective negativity has been very effective, it seems, at steering potential consumers away from the console. Although the PS3 has eaten into the 360's market share over the past 6 months or so, it has done that mostly by dominating markets outside of North America (namely Europe and Japan**).

There are, of course, valid criticisms of anything, and certainly the PS3 is not immune: early in its life there wasn't much to recommend it in terms of software. There were a few shiny titles, but for the most part, gaming was second fiddle on the PS3 for almost a full year after its release.

However, that time is now past. There are several high quality games available for the PS3. I would argue as many as there are for the 360 (high quality titles mind you), but that is of course subjective. With the playing field leveling out in terms of games, what's wrong with the PS3? What indeed! Considering:

1. the PS3 has a blu-ray player, and will shortly be the first blu-ray player on the market to support BD-live profile 2.0 features.

2. the PS3 is a PC. It runs Yellow Dog Linux. $500 gets you a games console, a high-end blu-ray player and a very capable computer. That's not just cheap, it's the first time anything like this has ever been produced at anything close to the price.

3. any SATA harddrive can be used in the PS3. Don't like the included 80GB drive? Buy your own 250GB version for $50 and install it yourself.

4. the PS3 is much quieter than the 360.

5. The PS3 doesn't die.

Why do I choose to evangelise the PS3? It's not corporate ideology, if that's what you're thinking: Microsoft and Sony are both about even when it comes to the whole "big faceless corporation" thing. I just appreciate well-designed technology, and frankly the PS3 is a marvel.

*to be fair, the PS3 still had the advantage of an HDMI interface, something not available until later in '07 for the 360, as well as a larger hard-drive: 60GB to 20GB.
**I'm not including the Wii in this discussion. Yes, I know it far outsells both the 360 and the PS3.

The Great Polarizer

What is it about facial hair that has people all up in a twist? It seems everyone needs to have a comment about it. Maybe it's because I've never had facial hair and so upon gazing at my newly bearded visage, people are particularly surprised? Perhaps most people have nothing to say to me, and so latch on to the one easy target of conversation? Perhaps, but I'm of the opinion that it is a bit more than that.

Ponderings about the need to comment aside, I also find it interesting that, unless most people are just being kind, the near universal opinion of my new scruffiness is positive...outside of work. At work, although some do proclaim an affinity to the beard, it is usually a cautious statement, as if the commenter is being watched. Others in the office seem to be downright dumbfounded as to why I would ever consider doing this in the first place. "Don't you know that we don't that here in 'merica?"

My own opinion is typically subdued: I neither have great affection for it nor do I dislike it. It is simply another variation of my outward appearance. There are elements of it that I like, just as there are elements of it that I dislike (e.g. patchiness in certain areas).

Anyway, I find the office/non-office dynamic to be interesting.

censored by the BOT

turns out if one uses too many links in a post, blogger's spam-bot brigade comes down on you like kleenex at a snot party...one human test and two days later, everything is right as rain.

pure hilarity!

cumbo etymology

This for anyone wondering about the title or the picture behind it:

This tower as it stands today was built around the 19th century and derives its name from the ‘Cumbo’ family which used to reside in it.

It turns out the Cumbo name comes from Malta, or at least that's where we originally made our bones. All the most famous Cumbos are from there...excepting the most recent iterations, of course. You can read more about it here if you are so inclined, although this is certainly the most interesting part:

One version says that in 1526, Marianna was engulfed in last-minute preparations to betroth Toni, a young member of the powerful Manduca family. While she was at the Tower, the corsairs of the Barbary Coast, helped by a former slave in the service of the Cumbo family, broke into Marianna’s residence and carried her off into captivity. Toni, her husband-to-be found out that his beloved was taken to Tripoli. Thus, posing as a wool merchant, he went to that city to rescue her. This he managed to do, but due to her vicissitudes in slavery, his dear Marianna died soon after she reached Malta, mourned by the whole population.

...and of course, the "Irish" part of the name is because I'm half Irish, from the Gannon family.