FirstAdopter.com

Nintendo Revolution Specs

IGN got some developers to spill the beans on the Revolution's horsepower. It isn't so good and the numbers are barely better than Xbox. No, not the Xbox 360, we're talking the original Xbox. The main CPU will clock in at 729mhz and the graphics chip will run at 243mhz. For comparison, the original Xbox Celeron CPU ran at 733mhz and the graphics ran at 233mhz. It will come with about 88 megabytes of memory and a 512MB flash drive. At least will be dirt cheap, have $50 vs. $60 games, and have the innovative controller.

New Super Mario Brothers Preview

The Shack has a preview of the most heavily anticipated game in years. The New Super Mario Bros. will come out on May 15th and own your soul. I guarantee it.

Nokia Boosts 2006 Cellphone Unit Forecast

Nokia boosted their 2006 global cellphone unit forecast to 915 million. That is 15% growth vs. the 10% forecast they had before. The company said 80% of the growth will be from emerging markets such as China and India. Mobile phone subscribers will reach 3 billion by 2008. Only 3 in 10 people in China have a cellphone.

Facebook Buyout for $2 Billion?

Businessweek speculates that Facebook wants to get bought for $2 billion and has already rejected a $750 million offer. Can you believe the site was started only 2 years ago? I mean are we back in the dot.com bubble where you can make $2 billion in your early 20s in just 2 years?

Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Impression Update

Arogan's mid game update (20 hrs).

- My character is basically the Lifetaker (mage,combat,stealth) from the strategy guide with a bit more focus on strength and blade. I wanted to carry more stuff so I thought strength but maybe I should have focused more on alteration to use some of the anti encumbrance spells. Level 4.
- I've just closed the second oblivion gate. joined all the guilds (fighters,mage,thief,dark brotherhood).
- finished the arena battles (became grand champion). You get some pretty nice armor. You can also bet and watch arena matches instead of participate in them. One time I slept in the gladiator prep room and in the morning I came out and there in front of the arena bookie was a dead girl stripped of all her things that wasn't there the night before. About 20ft further out was another dead guy. Looks like some npc's went crazy during the night :-)
- In the beginning, if you just follow the main mission to the priory and make sure you talk to everybody. You get a free horse.
- The quests are of excellent quality so far. They are really well designed with a good variety. Even the few fedex quests are dressed up nicely. I'm trying to not take too many side quests right now (and there are a LOT of them). I'm focusing on the main story quests first, then I'll probably do the guild ones next if I have time.
- I'm enjoying the story and the characters more now.
- Most of the female character faces (at least the commoners. The royalty are a bit better) are all kinds of ugly. I'm not sure if they are trying to make it a more realistic medieval feel or what but I'd rather be looking at super models like in guild wars! Does anybody else think Martin looks a bit like Fabio? Makes it kind of hard for me to want to protect him.
- great journal system and markers so you always know where to go next. You can even place your own marker that shows up on the map and the compass. I kind of wish for a little pip map option.
- Combat has been pretty fun so far. I usually like to start with a sneak arrow attack (the stealth element in this game works pretty well. It's not quite thief but close), then maybe a bit of fire magic, and finally sword if they are still alive. I keep difficulty just a few notches toward easy from the default. Since npc's that are critical to a quest can't die (only go unconscious for a short time then get back up) you can pretty much use them like tanks. They do a pretty good job at combat and tend to get all Leeroy on you.
- creatures and loot level along with you and so far it's been working ok for me. I hear there is a bit of a penalty if you level too quickly though I haven't really noticed. Then again I'm only level 4.
- make sure you go back and repair all your equipment after each major battle/quest. Some of the higher end magical loot can't be repaired in the field with a repair hammer.
- Accidental Friendly Fire (doesn't apply to main quest npc's, just the occasional red shirts that tag along). I really hate this. On quests when you have npc's that help you, they tend to jump right into your line of fire. If that npc is low on health and you kill them, boom instant murder with 1000 bounty on your head. The next time you head in to town guards will chase you down on sight. The problem is during the heat of battle sometimes you don't even know you are the one who killed the npc and not the monster. I had to redo an entire oblivion gate quest because after I finished it I had 1000 bounty on my head. Now I just let the NPC's do most of the fighting at the start and hopefully the monsters will kill them off. Then I get to loot their bodies and everybody is happy.
- Really nice physics and ragdoll. You can "grab" almost anything and move/drag it around. You can grab individual body parts and watch the ragdoll physics work.
- load times. At first they don't seem that bad. But later in the game when you fast travel a lot and have to jump from town to town a lot those load times really start to add up and really start to annoy you. Also, there isn't a single button quick save/load (out of X360 buttons) like there is on the pc. So every time you want to save you have to hit start, save, pick a save slot. The PC has this beat hands down.
- a found a repeatable freeze/lock bug. If I go to this shrine (near azura's shrine), activate it to get a magical set of weapons for a period of time, mount my horse (it says something about not being able to unequip the weapon), ride off into the next load it will lock hard. I was able to duplicate this. It was easy to work around but still a pretty bad bug. That was about the only issue I had over 12 hrs of straight play.
- framerate issues. It does dip down into what looks like the 20's. It doesn't affect the gameplay much but it is noticeable.
- does AA and HDR (pc can't).
- I hear there is a memory leak or something in the pc version and after several hours you will see some performance degradation.

Overall I'm still loving this game.

As far as pc vs x360 I would say they are very similar:
360:
+ achievements
+ nothing to install
+ get to play on an big hdtv and sit on a couch
+ future content over live
+ hdr with 2xaa
+ inventory system built with control pad in mind
- longer and eventually annoying load times
- some framerate issues
- no mods
- harder to aim ranged attacks with control pad (it hasn't been too bad though)

pc:
+ fast save/load (this is a big advantage IMO)
+ superior (IMO) keyboard mouse controls for combat
+ can run at crazy resolutions if you have the machine
+ lots of tweaking through the ini
+ easy to cheat/experiment with console commands
+ future mods
- no hdr with AA (and no hdr support at all with ati unless you have an 1X00 card. Sheesh and I got my x800xl just last year and it's "out of date")
- inventory system a bit clunky with mouse
- no achievments!
? stability issues
? will future live content be available for the pc for free

Angryintern can probably tell you more about the pc version.

If you have a really powerful pc then go with pc otherwise go with x360. for me it was the combination of achievements and getting to play on a hdtv sitting on the couch that sold me on the x360 version. [Discuss]

Dell 2707WFP Specs

BeHardware confirmed that Dell is going to launch the 2707WFP LCD monitor later this year in October. It will feature 1920x1200 resolution and a 27 inch Samsung panel. Response time will be 8ms with a contrast ratio of 1000:1.

FirstAdopter.com Show Episode 10

This show covers the following topics:

Elder Scrolls Oblivion, Nintendo DS Tetris Metroid, Genesis and T16 games, Microsoft delays Vista and Office, Google Finance, AjaxWrite.com, Microsoft Promises more 360s, Dick Cheney Hotel Demands, Great sites and blogs.

Download the MP3 Podcast

Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

TheAngryIntern - Well, i have a couple of hours into the game now, and I must say so far it is everything I hoped it would be!!

The game world appears to be freaking HUGE, but they put a nice feature in where you can click on you destination on the map and automatically travel there if you don't want to walk. There are horses in the game which allow you to get around a bit faster. The character creation is pretty thorough. You can change a lot of the features of your character to make him as unique as possible. The races are the same as Morrowind, and so are most of the classes. you do have the ability to make your own class, which I did. I wanted to call it a Shadow Mage, but there is a limit to how many letters, so I called it a Dark Mage. He specializes in stealth and destruction magic.
If you have played Morrowind you will definitely feel right at home. The menu system is a bit different and takes a little bit to get used to, but the overall feel of the controls is the same as Morrowind. The Graphics are mind blowing. Huge draw distances let you see the trees blowing in teh wind atop distant hills, vegetation is everywhere swaying in the breeze. I think they borrowed a bit of the facial animation from Half Life 2, as the characters actually look likey they are speaking what they are saying (if that makes any sense). And so far, all conversations with NPC's i've had have all had voice overs, a nice touch. Patrick Stewart does the narration during the introduction sequence, another neat touch.

I can already tell this game is going to consume at least as much time as Morrowind, and most likely much much more. Just like Morrowind, there is a main quest line and about a bajillion side quests to do, so you can go exploring to your heart's content.

That's about it for a quick little review. Perhaps I'll add more later as I get further into the game. As for a first impression, it gets a big thumbs up from me and I highly recommend it to all the First Adopters!!! [Discuss]

Blazing Angels Xbox 360 Demo

Arogan - I just completed the demo.

- You get quite a bit of gameplay in the demo: 3-4 single player missions, about 45min worth of play time.
- graphics are good but didn't really blow me away. I guess I expected more detailed ground elements (villages, city buildings, ships, etc). For some reason the game didn't look quite as good in motion as it did in screenshots.
- target boxes are pretty tiny. So is your crosshair. I found my self squinting a lot trying to line up targets.
- Water didn't seem all that impressive
- Explosions were a bit underwhelming
- damage/fire/smoke effects are excellent. As you get shot up you start catching on fire which makes it a bit hard to see things.
- goofy german radio chatter that can get quite annoying
- very arcadey/simplified control system. You can't roll independent of turning. You can do loops and even stall. Those of you that like the advance control settings of ace combat might be a bit disappointed.
- The lock on camera view takes a bit getting use to but after you get use to it, it works pretty well. Still I wish there were more hud elements even though it's 3rd person. Maybe a few carrots around the edge of the screen would have helped tracking enemy planes to supplement the lock on camera.
- missions are pretty long with multiple objectives and an in mission check point save system. Any damage sustained is persisted between checkpoint restarts.
- framerate gets a bit choppy once in a while
- Annoying invisible walls. You'll be lining up a shot then all of a sudden it goes letterbox and turns your plane around for you.
- gameplay is still pretty fun and exciting for the most part.

Hmmm I was pretty excited about this title and was planing to pick it up. Now I'm not so sure unless there is a really good sale. Maybe multiplayer will be better. I have to say I was expecting more and came up a bit disappointed. [Discuss]

Link Roundup

AjaxWrite - more like an online Microsoft Word than Writely

Microsoft announces better 360 availability - finally

GDC Ron Moore Keynote - Battlestar Galactica and why he was able to succeed

Dick Cheney Hotel Demands

Cel-da for DS

V for Vindetta Movie Review by Arogan

Arogan Website - Just saw this in an all digital DLP theater. The tech looked great! The movie wasn't bad either. I came into this film knowing nothing about it or the comic it is based on.

- amc uses multiple projectors. While you are sitting around waiting, they play the ads on this horrible low rez projector. You could really see the pixels (major screen door effect). I was getting worried that this was what pro DLP was like. It looked like 480p blown way up. Then right before the real trailers start it switched over to the "real" DLP projector. They even do this funny film melting DLP promo. WOW! Now that is pro DLP! Btw the silent hill trailer looked VERY GOOD. It might be the best video game movie yet (ok I guess thats not actually saying a whole lot).
-It needs more knife fights. More Knife Time!!!
- good performaces all around, good Wachowski writing. Production values look good for the 50 million they spent on it.
- Natalie needs her hair.
- Some of the political points get hammered into you over and over and over. Ok we get it! I think about 20 min of editing would have helped the film a lot. - Overall it wasn't quite what I was expecting but I still enjoyed it and made for some good discussion aftewards. Just remember this really isn't an action film.

film 7/10
DLP 10/10 [Discuss]

EA's New Game Plan

Businessweek talks about Electronic Art's new gameplan of more internally developed IP, flexible development cycles, and focusing more on small creative teams. That is the right formula for success, but as they say, "execution is everything."

Ugly Websites Make Big Money

Interesting article that notices that some of the most successful websites out there are pretty ugly. They mention one site that offering a free online dating service that makes $10,000 a day.

FirstAdopter.com Show Episode 9

This show covers the following topics:

Ubisoft Ghost Recon, Nintendo DS Rules, Palm 700p details, Blu-Ray BDP-s1 $1000, Lawyers get rich off Blackberry, Apple iPhone coming out definitely, PS3 news, Vista November 2006, J-mac, Canon ZR500 Mini-Review

Download the MP3 Podcast

Ubisoft Flying High with Tom Clancy Ghost Recon

Tom Clancy Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter is flying off the shelves. In North America it as sold 240,000 copies since its March 8th launch, which is the fastest selling game in Ubisoft history. It has also sold 120,000 copies in the first 3 days in Europe. Thanks to the success, Ubisoft stock price is rising.

Palm Treo 700p Release Details

I've had my Treo 600 since its launch over 2 years ago. I've had to replace it once because it just stopped booting up one day. Thankfully this happened one week before the 1 year warranty was up. However 14.4k modem or less data speeds and the crashing frequently OS is a bit getting long in the tooth. I'm looking forward to EV-DO on the 700p, but not all that excited about using the same crashy OS.

A new sheet has been leaked out that shows a 5/28/06 targeted release date for the 700p. It will come with Power Vision EV-DO, 1.3 megapixel camera, Sprint TV on Demand, Phone as a modem capability, Bluetooth, 128MB of memory (yay!), SD card slot, and a "refined industrial design". Let's just hope they made the OS and build quality a bit more bullet proof.

Sony Blu-Ray DVD Player $1000

Sony announced it will sell their first stand-alone Blu-ray high definition player in July in the United States for $1000. The model name is BDP-S1 and it will use a HDMI display connector. It will also upscale normal DVDs to 1080p resolution. Sony also plays to include Blu-ray players on some models in their PC line. It's no wonder that the Playstation 3 is being delayed because it would totally cannibalize the stand-alone Blu-ray sales of $1000 a pop. PS3 as a videogame machine, can't really sell for more than $500.

Lawfirm to get Paid $200 million off RIM's Settlement

Rein & Fielding LLP will get 1/3 of the $612 million patent settlement NTP received from RIM over the Blackberry patent infringement case. Not too shabby for a law-firm working for 5 years on the case. Supposedly the lawyers use RIM Blackberrys. Hypocrites!

New Apple iPhone Soon?

Piper Jaffray has written a report to its clients that they estimate a 75% chance of Apple releasing a iPhone within the next 12 months. I actually think it is close to 100% chance as the Motorola CEO has gone on record he knows Apple is working on their own iTunes/Cellphone combination. With Apple's computer and software expertise, we can easily look forward to Palm-like PDA functionality also. Imagine having your address book and iCal on an iTunes music and video enable iPhone? Wouldn't that be sweet?

Playstation 3 Information

So Sony finally issued more information on the PS3. It will launch globally in November with about 2 million units (Yikes! Talk about lines around the world for that one). The company vows to sell 6 million by March of 2007. The PS3 will have a basic LIVE-like online service for free and be fully backwards compatible with PS1 and PS2 games (upscaled to HD). The final dev kits will come out in June, which means we won't see many real games until late next year. It will require an upgradeable 60GB hard-drive and run a Linux OS. Sony is also going to launch a $199 Sony PSP SKU just for the basic unit. They will come out with a web browser and offer PS1 game emulation off a Memory stick. The reason for the delay is finalizing the copy protection scheme for the Blu-ray drive, which will be able to read 50GB on a dual-layer disk.

With such a low volume launch and the obvious lack of games, PS3 is obviously not ready for prime-time till late in 2007. Shipping out final dev kits in June is ridiculous. Microsoft, this is your opportunity to gain huge ground this Christmas and well into next year. Take advantage of it.

Microsoft Vista Release Date - November 2006

This Microsoft blog written by a Microsoft employee accidently said Vista will be launched in November. It now says second half of the year. Is it me or do the screenshots look like OS X in terms of finger licking candy graphics user interface?

The Xbox 360 Experience by Arogan

This was written by FA member Arogan from Arogan's World blog.

Xbox 360 has been really great for me so far and this month has made it even better.

Current games I own:
* Ghost Recon Advance Warfighter
Burnout Revenge
* Fight Night Round 3
Need for Speed Most Wanted
King Kong
Call of Duty 2
Dead or Alive 4
* Kameo
Ridge Racer 6
* Condemned
* Project Gotham Racing 3
* Perfect Dark Zero

* = finished single player

You know I've always considered myself primarily a PC gamer in the past. I pretty much buy all the consoles and loads of games but I always find myself coming back to the PC after a month or so with a new console. I only play the AAA titles that really interest me and then I'm usually right back on the computer for the majority of my gaming. I'm a big fan of FPS and I do prefer the mouse/keyboard control.

Having said that I think I've gamed on the PC all of about 1 hr total since I got my X360 back in December. Now granted that is partly due to the fact there hasn't been any killer PC titles released recently that interest me. The X360 has been getting some very top grade titles especially recently.

Don't let the Internet hype on faulty machines, etc scare you. It is all very greatly exaggerated. Just use common sense. Keep it in a well ventilated area (including power supply), don't move the console while a disc is spinning, etc. I personally know two other people who also have no issues at all (my other friends are still having issues finding the premium pack). Early lock up problems like viewing the gamer card in pgr3 while online were dashboard related bugs which have been now patched. The system isn't perfect but I wouldn't call it glitchy either. As far as fan noise goes I guess it is louder than current gen but I can't tell. I've got three 24/7 computers in the same room so I can't hear it over the pc's anyways :-)

I built my a64 with ati x800xl not 10 months ago (for quite a bit more cash too) and already my x360 looks better and plays at a better frame rate at an equivalent resolution than my pc.

I think the other big factor for me is getting that 40" LCD HDTV. Don't under estimate the impact of gaming at 1280X720 with 40" widescreen with a nice dd5.1 sound system. Trust me, it's hard to go back to even our nice 20" dell 2001fp. It makes a bigger difference than you think.

I've really enjoyed the games so far and the quality just keeps getting better with recent releases like fight night round 3, graw, burnout revenge, and very soon Oblivion and far cry (must buy!). further out you've got Gears of war! Then you also have the incredible live integration, live arcade (geowars! and sf2 and Texas holdem poker soon), playable demos (I would not have considered buying FNR3 if it wasn't for the excellent demo), and those darn addictive achievements/gamer score.

Also, don't forget the great media capabilities like streaming music and photos. Add HD video to the list if you've got a MCE PC. The x360 has become my center piece for providing hdtv content to my HDTV: games, dvd progressive scan movies, local broad cast HDTV tv shows recorded on my MCE and streamed over my network to the x360, and HD WMV files like the entire terminator 2 movie (only $10 at http://www.deepdiscountdvd.com/dvd.cfm?itemID=LVD014098).

For me the decision was simple. I pretty much buy all the consoles. Now if you only plan to get one next gen console then the decision gets tougher. I would wait at least until march 15 when sony is suppose to make some big ps3 announcements. If the ps3 gets pushed back to xmas or even next year then I see no reason to wait. Get the x360 now. Enjoy nextgen gaming now because make no mistake it has arrived. By next year you will probably have the budget to get the ps3. Besides you can justify it by saying it's a "cheap" blu ray movie player oh and it also plays games :-)
If the ps3 is still going to hit the spring date (even if it is only in japan) then I would wait. At least you'll have a lot more hard facts to compare the two consoles and make a more informed decision.

So far I've felt it's been worth the $400. Also, check frys ad often (wed, fri)! You can almost get every major x360 release for $45-50. I got FNR3, GRAW and burnout revenge for $48 each. The Outfit which comes out this week is onsale for $50. You can even just buy it at best buy (which gets it a day earlier than frys usually) and just bring in the ad to price match. Gamestop sometimes runs a buy 2 get 1 free on used games. Also, check out gamefly.com for more used x360 games.

If you can't afford an HDTV and the x360 you might want to wait a bit. I finished a few games on the x360 before I got my hdtv and it looked and played great. But when I got the hdtv I felt like I got a new console all over again.

I highly recommend the X360 (premium only, tard pack is a rip off). [Discuss]

Sony Delays Playstation 3 Till November

Japanese newspaper Nihon Keizai Shimbun has gone on record that Sony will delay the Playstation 3 till November of this year in Japan due to problems finalizing details on their Blu-ray drives and copy protection. This is a bit scary as Sony has never done a simultaneous worldwide launch (like Microsoft did with Xbox 360). This could mean the PS3 launch for the USA may be pushed back to 2007. Ouch. Time for me to consider getting a 360.

Dell Acquires Alienware?

CNET is reporting according to their sources, Dell has acquired the leading gaming PC maker Alienware. Rahul Sood, the CTO of VoodooPC, speculated that this would happen on his blog some time ago. It totally makes sense as Dell is looking for places to add revenue growth as their core commercial business is slowing down and their foray into consumer electronics has given them a black eye.

Google Hires 15 Year Old

I don't know if this is a publicity stunt, but Google has supposedly hired a 15 year old to work at his own home to work on Gmail security. He is an expert in Javascript and AJAX.

"15 year old student, Tom Vendetta has been hired by search engine giant Google Inc. The student will receive a lowered salary, which will be placed into a bank account for future education, said Google CEO Larry Page. When asked what role Vendetta will play at the Tech Giant's offices, Page said he wouldnt have a role at the Main Offices. Instead he would work from his home in the New Jersey suburbs. Vendetta will be incharge of working with recent security flaw's in Google's beta e-mail service, "Gmail". Google said they first found out about him when they discovered the student's blog, at http://tomvendetta.be. The media giant said they looked forward to working with Vendetta's expertise in JavaScript and AJAX."

How Google does it?

One of the great wonders of the world is how Google can search billions of web pages and come back with its results so quickly. They also talk about how redundant their system is where all the data is replicated at different geographic locations. I thing is for sure, they aren't using Microsoft operating and file systems.

To deal with the more than 10 billion Web pages and tens of terabytes of information on Google's servers, the company combines cheap machines with plenty of redundancy, Hoelzle said. Its commodity servers cost around $1,000 apiece, and Google's architecture places them into interconnected nodes. All machines run on a stripped-down Linux kernel. The distribution is Red Hat (Quote, Chart), but Hoelzle said Google doesn't use much of the distro. Moreover, Google has created its own patches for things that haven't been fixed in the original kernel.

2560x1600 Gaming Performance Benchmarks

Firingsquad has the skinny on 2560x1600 gaming goodness. It looks like you really need an SLI solution to have playable first person shooter frame-rates. I think 30 inches is over-kill for gaming as I like my 2001FP gaming just fine. 1600x1200 with better graphic detail is fine for me.

If you saw our GeForce 7600 and 7900 articles yesterday, you’re probably not too surprised by our final results at 2560x1600 – the overall winners and losers didn’t change much at the higher res, just the margin of victory. For instance, NVIDIA clearly dominates in Quake 4 and Pacific Fighters.

CIA Agent Cover Blown by the Internet

With the advent of the Google search, it seems that CIA agents have no where to hide anymore. Front companies and the travels of secret jets is all out there for the world to see in the age of the information.

The Chicago Tribune says it has compiled a list of 2,653 CIA employees, just by searching the internet. The newspaper said it gathered the information from online services that compile public data, that any fee-paying subscriber can access. It did not publish the names, at the CIA's request. Many of the agents are believed to be covert. The paper also located two dozen "secret" facilities.

New Super Mario Brothers DS Screenshots

With all the next generation console hoopla, new processors, SLI graphic cards, etc. I found these days most of my gaming on my Nintendo DS with its primitive graphics and focus on pure gameplay bliss. It's not the graphics or sound, it gameplay that matters from Mario Kart DS to Age of Empires. Now we await the sequel of the grand-daddy of awesome game play in the new Super Mario Brothers (screenshots). I am very very psyched. You should be too.

Google Payment Screenshots

Techcrunch has some screenshots that show some features of the upcoming Google Payments service. They are going to have a seller rating feature (1 to 5) and also a feedback comment link. I hope they add an eBay like satisfaction percentage rating, along with number of transactions. Moreover Google needs to get a better web designer as this look is getting old. Google Video being the prime example of ugly looks and low utility.

Via C7-M ULV Processors

Via announced a new line of low power microprocessors. These might be perfect for your silent living room media PC/PVR.

VIA C7®-M Ultra Low Voltage (ULV) processors are custom tailored for a new generation of ultra small form factor x86 devices with leading performance-per-watt operation and the smallest footprint in the industry. The VIA C7-M ULV processors are available in frequency's from 1.0-1.5GHz with a full featured design, while boasting power consumption as low as 3.5 watts, and the smallest CPU package on the market measuring just 21mm x 21mm to enable designs with thinner and smaller components to reduce device weight, size, and thickness.

T-Mobile and Cingular Pull Motorola RAZR Phones

T-Mobile and Cingular have pulled the Motorola RAZR phone from their online and offline stores due to a faulty component that causes disconnected calls and phone crashes. Both companies vow to re-stock the hot phone once the problem is fixed. If you are experiencing these issues, please contact your local store or call in to get a fixed phone.

Free XM Satellite

With the news that XM is going to start putting commercials on a handful of their music channels and just the fact I rarely use it, I tried canceling my service. The operators are VERY persistent in giving away 3 months of free service, probably hoping you will forget to cancel in the future. So give it a try, try and cancel and I bet they will do the same for you.

Citibank Loses our Data AGAIN

Another day, another major security breach. When will these big companies learn that losing our data is not an option and when will the government clamp down on these guys other than a mere slap on the wrist?

Citibank, the consumer and corporate banking arm of Citigroup Inc., confirmed Wednesday that the bank and its customers were the victims of a third-party company information breach that has forced the bank to block PIN-based transactions for customers in Canada, Russia, and the U.K.

The bank did not disclose when the breach occurred. Once alerted to the breach, the company "began enhanced monitoring of the affected accounts for fraud" and in mid-February detected several hundred fraudulent cash withdrawals in the three countries, the company said in a statement. Citibank proceeded to block all transactions in those countries that rely on PIN authentication.

Play Ms. Pac Man on your iPod Nano

Yes you can play Ms. Pac Man on your iPod Nano now using iPod Linux. This is not a joke.

Intel Conroe Benchmark Debate

The internet is going bonkers over Anandtech's benchmarks of the new Intel Conroe CPUs slated to come out in 6 months.

1) Anandtech's Conroe Benchmark article

2) CTO of Voodoo PC's response

What do you guys think?

J-Mac Video

A story for the ages. Make sure you click on the video on the upper right. It will make you cry.

Flickr History

Learn how Flickr started. Like most innovations in life, they aren't planned. They just happen.

Caterina Fake knew she was onto something when one of the engineers at her Vancouver, British Columbia-based online game start-up created a cool tool to share photos and save them to a Web page while playing. "It turned out the fun was in the photo sharing," she says. Fake scrapped the game. She and her programmer husband, Stewart Butterfield, transformed the project into Flickr. In less than two years, the photo-sharing site — now owned by Internet giant Yahoo — has turned into one of the Web's fastest-growing properties.

In 2000, he happened to meet her at a San Francisco party, where she declined his request for a date, instead leaving with her then-beau Evan Williams, a co-creator of Google's Blogger. Six months later, Butterfield read on a blog that she'd broken up with Williams. He arranged to return to San Francisco and try his luck again. This time, he invited her to British Columbia to go skiing, and she said yes. On the slopes, he proposed they try creating a website together. The rest, as they say, is history.

Link Roundup

Nintendo DS Lite Review - brighter, brightest
Real-life Simpsons intro - uncanny real-life portrayal
Apple iPod Hi-Fi Review - one of the first
Buffet 2005 Letter - for you aspiring investors
Super Mario Real-time Race - Go go go