IPPA stripped of bad mojo

According to this article, the Senate seems to have heard the people.

Unless I'm reading things incorrectly its now :
- *more* illegal to film movies in theatres
- *more* ok to skip through parts of films
- *more* difficult for promoters to take advantage of professional boxers

National Treasure

I had the opportunity to go see "National Treasure" this afternoon. It was pretty good and better than I expected. It was not quite "Pirates of the Carribean" good, though but entertaining nonetheless. It was good to see Nicholas Cage do a good job as the intrepid treasure hunter. Justin Bartha makes for a really good sidekick. And Diane Kruger makes a really good "the girl to be gotten".

The Good : A lot of fun overall. Justin Bartha's comic relief.

The Bad : A couple of potential plot holes but these can be easily overcome if you decide going into the movie to suspend disbelief.

This movie gets a thumbs up.

Once you've seen the movie its kinda neat to actually see these search results.

IPPA still trekking ...

Nothing much really new to say on the subject of HR2391. Here's another article on the matter.

A good quote from John McCain in the article: "Do we really expect to throw people in jail in 2004 for behavior they've been engaged in for more than a quarter century?" Did I mention I really like John McCain ... but only in a political way.

I've been schooled...

Yes folks, I have apparently been unaware of all the nuances of calling shotgun. You may remember doing this as kids ... or if you are like some of us, still do this to this day. So here are the official rules for calling "Shotgun".

Dude, you're getting a Best Buy Customer

A few weeks ago Best Buy made an announcement where they told Wall Street that they were putting their bad customers, those who mail in rebates, buy items on sale, and return items often, into a "bad customer" database. Apparently those customers "wreak enormous economic havoc" and they need to be rid of them.

Dell has apparently welcomed those evil, villainous, low-price wanting customers with an ad in the LA Times.

It slices, it dices, it puts you in jail for skipping a commercial

The lame ducks appear to be quacking up a storm :
Wired has an article on the Intellectual Property Protection Act (HR2391), a bill collection, which the lame duck session in the Senate is trying to pass. The bill does such things as get rid of "fair use", define a fine and/or 3 years imprisonment for bring a video camera into a theater, and to top it off the language of the bill is apparently vague enough that it would call into question the legality of Apple's Itunes service.

You can reach your senator here.

And here is a picture of my senators with the RIAA representative.

Now I know where my missing socks went

Apparently Atlantis has been found ... again .

There is still much skepticism about the find ... worst case it will
give those wearing aluminum foil hats fear of an impending sea attack.

I've been Saved!

Well it was a cold, drizzly, and dreary day in Dallas. It was a good day to sit around do not much of anything. So not much of anything managed eat up a good chunk of the day.

Of course you probably want to hear about something a little more exciting than my extensive use of Tivo and the Comedy Central "Top 100 Stand-Up Comics" countdown. So ... I did happen to have a chance last night to finally watch "Saved!" which was pretty funny. Jena Malone did a really good job and Macaulay Culkin proved yet again that he's more than just the kid from the "Home Alone" movies. The movie was not nearly as blasphemous as the theatrical trailer would lead you to believe. The storyline was sound and although, at times, it was definitely in "caricature mode", the movie does make some very good points. It gets a thumbs up from me with a "your conservative Great Aunt Judith wouldn't approve" rider.

Also, while it still fresh in my mind, I must say that "Bad Santa" is a downer. At times it can be funny ... but it coupled with Friday's "Joan of Arcadia" episode (great show, btw) did not make for a very feel good night.

Why not?

Well instead of just spamming some of my friends with countless links and sarcastic commentary I figure I would expand my audience or at least switch to an "opt-in" model for my ramblings. So this is the result of that line of thinking.

I must warn everyone that I am a geek and honestly had to resist the urge to open with a very slashdotty "First Post" post. Luckily I resisted that urge, right up through the second sentence.

So we'll see where this experiment goes and hope for the best, but first, here are some links that I thought were interesting from this past week :

The ad that let this company be the #1 item on "The dumbest things on Wallstreet this week" and the pesky other matter which also made them #5. Thank god I don't own alot of their stock ... oh wait ... I do. Crap.

And of course the disturbing, "point on the doll where the robot touched you" article.