Shopping v3112! (BFM_Dept.)

As I said before, shopping during christmas time and the end of the year sales can be very damaging on your financial status if you do not spend sensibly. Of course, then again if one does accidentally fall into this category, loans are the best way to go. A financial advisor told me that personal loans is what one should be looking into over secured loans. I came across this website that provides a loan comparison so that you can pick the one most suitable for you according to what you need it for. Just remember, shop smartly and sensibly in the future!

Basketball! (BFM_Dept.)

My parents and my school coach always told me to get into basketball because I was reasonably tall for my age back then. Now, I'm probably the average height, and thus basketball isn't going to work. Besides that, the University of Alberta and Canada in general doesn't have what we would call the best collegiate association! For instance, the United States has the National Collegiate Athletic Association of America (NCAA) which is made up of about 1200 institutions and organizations and individuals. Its all voluntary, so it means that these groups do actually want to join them. Their size overall? They are the largest athletic organization in the world! Yeah, they are pretty big. I mean, how can you now know of them. In March Lister Center is pretty much glued to the television sets watching the games, more commonly known as the March Madness. The last three games are the most insane of them all as students sometimes skip classes to watch the games. Of course, most of us would rather be there that watch it on a television set, but getting NCAA Final Four Tickets is far from easy as they are sold out quite in advance. Albeit, March Madness provides us with a well deserved break from the other nonsense that's on the airwaves all the other time.

Yup, once more! (Cool_Stuff_Dept.)

Yeah, its that time of the week again where I bombard you with all the links to stuff that I found interesting this week:

+++ Microsoft came out with a new Internet Explorer 7 advertisement a few days back. Its pretty cool, but c'mon, if IE7 doesn't work that well, what's the point of an advertisement about it? +++ I always use this cheat sheet when I want to enter symbols and characters other than the ordinary using my keyboard. Its even printable! +++ There has been some news going around where Google has been deleting complete GMail inboxes for no reason. I think there is a flaw with some of the browsers that are causing it, but then again, its Google. +++ Without a doubt, these are the top 10 astronomy images from 2006. Fantabulous! +++ Didn't ever think that there would be concept trucks, but here they are! +++

Gym? (BFM_Dept.)

People on my floor are always telling me that I need to get in shape. Its not that I am over weight and need to go on a diet. Believe me, if anything, I need to gain some weight. The thing is that I may be thin, but I need some training to build up my muscles they say, and I guess in the process gain the well needed weight. They gave me quite a few options actually. One told me that I should focus on basic exercise and fitness training, as that is the best way to go, and that it has always helped him out and worked for him. I might take that up as this guy is really built. And I mean really built! My neighbour had difference advice for me though. According to him, running and doing weight training is the best as it not only increases your fitness level, but it also increases your muscle strength along the way. Its a 'two for one' offer he said. It seems that when it comes to helping other people out with gym training, everyone thinks that they are an expert just because they have been to the gym a few times. With all the different advice going around, I think need to take up professional personal training to help me instead!

GMod! (Cool_Stuff_Dept.)

People are always telling me that I spend my time doing things that aren't particularly useful to anyone, sometimes not even to myself. I never had a decent answer to give them, until now. This is my answer to all of you: you think I waste time, imagine the time spent making this below, I'm no where close...

Video: Tyrannis - Garry's Mod

Atlanta Condos! (BFM_Dept.)

My parents wanted to move the US and they asked me to find a suitable place for them to stay. I always wanted to live in Atlanta because there is so much to see and do over there. For instance they have the Martin Luther King Jr. Center there, and the CNN Center as well. While looking for a place for them to stay, I came across the 'CondoList'. Its was launched and is maintained by the CondoCompany and this is basically a site set up for only one reason: condominiums! They receive thousands of visits daily from people wanted to buy or sell condos in Atlanta. There are also sections where people can rent condos off to other people for a short period of time, for instance for a holiday trip. Another good thing I found on this website is that since the ads are posted directly by buyers and sellers, the middlemen are eliminated, thus making the whole process a whole lot easier and faster and cheaper! But here is what interested my parents the most: CondoCompany recently launched a program called the 'Building Specialists' who are companies who specialise in building luxury condos, and since not everyone can become one, the ones listed are one of the best. I've given the link to the website to my parents, and they have been checking it out ever since looking for a condo that's suitable for them, and in the process saving me time. (P.S. Atlanta Condos are the best condos ever!)

LEDs! (Cool_Stuff_Dept.)

I'm not going to lie, I got involved LEDs only recently. I used to use the normal bulbs for the christmas lights that decorate my room until my neighbour showed me the LED lights he picked up for a few dollars extra. LEDs are pretty cool and generally work a lot longer than normal lights, and I mean a lot longer. I then came across LEDs when I was buying parts for my computer. Specifically my case and my extra fans have LEDs in them to make them glow and to make my computer look pimping! Then, recently I remembered that I had an exit sign from a building on campus. Yeah, its somewhat illegal to have one in your room, but nonetheless I have one and it has a bunch of LEDs in it. By bunch I mean a few hundred. I now only have to figure out how to get the wiring set up to make it work properly, but that shouldn't be too much of a problem seeing that I'm an Electrical Engineer student here at the University of Alberta. Of course, then again, I'm only in my second year. Anyways, here is a pretty good article to get you a somewhat understanding on how to get your LEDs to work (assuming you have some lying around somewhere) and the required resistors and currents for each of them. Instructables, you gotta love them!

If we don't believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don't believe in it at all. -- Noam Chomsky (b. 1928)

Financial Advice! (BFM_Dept.)

This was my second year in Edmonton, and as the last, I religiously woke up early in the morning on Boxing Day to go shopping!! There are so many fabulous deals that I find waking up early and getting there first is worth it as the door crashers are simply amazing. As you can clearly see, anyone can easily spend too much. Of course one might say that the deals are so good that taking out loans to go shopping is worth it. Obviously it is not! One way that I make sure that I do not go overboard is by keeping a low limit on my card. For those of you who do not know, a 'limit' as the name suggests is a limit on the amount of money you can spend with you credit card over the period of a day to a month. This limit makes you think every time you decide to swipe your card as not only does your shopping have to be accommodated, but also your day-to-day living expenses like groceries. Therefore, putting a reasonable limit on your card is a better way of 'shopping' than taking out personal loans just for shopping! Then again, almost every person has to take out a personal loan at least once in their life. Maybe it be for buying a house, or buying a car. It is another source of income other than putting mortgages on your house. When one does have a loan, the best way to pay it off is by making sure you do not buy what you do not need, and instead use that money to pay off your loan as soon as possible. There are many financial advisers out there to help you, but one way to getting through a loan by yourself is putting about 25-50% of your monthly income towards the repayment. If you do this, you'll be debt-free within no time!

Flowers v1.1 (BFM_Dept.)

It was a good friend's birthday yesterday, and I really wanted to let her know that I remembered. The thing is that all these years I used to go over to her place on her birthday and give her a card then, so I completely forgot that I was miles away (she is in Chicago by the way) and it would take quite a while for the card to reach her. Luckily for me, I came across DotFlowers. DotFlowers has wonderful baskets of flowers set up for almost any occasion thinkable. The good thing is that they provide same day delivery to almost anywhere in the United States and thus I was in luck! You might think that they have the flowers pre-set-up and ready to ship with my word, and thus resulting in old flowers. But you are wrong! They provide the freshest flowers available and these are usually termed as 'Field Fresh' flowers! Another cool thing was that they had other savoury items as well that I could send, so I decided to send her some wonderful cookies as well! DotFlowers specialises in online flower delivery and thus the customer service was wonderful and I'm sure that the flowers sent will make a great impression! So if you ever need to send flowers to anyone, that's the place to go!

PPP + Performancing = Whoo Hoo! (BFM_Dept.)

PPP recently acquired Performancing.com. For those of you who do not know, here is what Performancing is about: its basically a "group weblog of professional bloggers, for professional bloggers,” and that has been their main goal every since their launch. They publish articles on how bloggers should write well on their blogs and provide great advice to all bloggers, and sometime back they introduced what we all wanted, a stats system called Performancing Metrics. Unlike other statistics service, Performancing Metrics is very very sleek looking. I'm not an expert, but I think they use everything from CSS to Ajax to PHP. Cool features they have is the ability to not count your IP address as the list of visitors, or the ability to get geographical data along with the stats to your blogs. It also is more of a whole blogging service as it can also track comments and well as show which posts are popular than the others. Currently there are around a hundred thousand blogs using the service, and still the service is ridiculously fast. Also professional bloggers can track all their blogs in one place as the system has no limit on the number of blogs a user can track. They also have plug-ins for Firefox so that one can use it using Firefox and their extension also allows users to use FireFox as a blog-editor, where one can write and edit posts from within the browser. This is one thing that I hope PPP can improve Performancing on. They really need to develop the extension even further so that users can not only use it to write posts, but it can also provide a word-count, spell check and other basic features. A cool development would be the ability to add images to the post via the extension. Performancing can also be improved in many ways, the most subtle being the interface. Its all sleek looking, but it really needs more explanation. There really needs to be a FAQ that provides real answers. Overall, its a good service, but there is always room for improvement.

Fanboys! (Linux) (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.))

Fanboys. I love all aspects of technology. But the one thing I hate, are the fanboys. There never used to be a problem with fanboys before, but recently with the ease of use of blogs, fanboys are becoming more outspoken and ridiculous as ever. It started with Linux fanboys. These are people who didn't really know what the hell Linux was, but just used it as it was 'not Microsoft'. I mean how stupid do you have to be? Firstly what shows that they are complete idiots is their poor knowledge of English. It should be 'non-Microsoft', not 'not Microsoft'. Go to school fools. Secondly, Linux is by far the stupidest OS I've ever used. Its as un-secure (not insecure) as a gate with no lock. The source code is available to everyone fools, even the hackers. All the hackers have to do is go through the source code, find vulnerabilities and then exploit them. I mean, if hackers can find explots for Windows who doesn't have their source code available to the public, how hard will it be to find exploits for open-source software? The only reason the hackers don't care much about exploits for Linux is because only idiots who have no important information to hide use them. So STFU Linux Fanboys!! STFU!

Postie Patrol (HP)! (BFM_Dept.)

PPP recently had another Postie Patrol, this time sponsored by HP. They headed to Chicago and pretty much gave Robyn Nykaza $1000 for doing funny things. HP gave away a ton of gear - mainly those related to Digital Photo Printing, and overall it was a fun time for those involved. There wasn't a favorite part as such, but what was nice was that in the end, Robyn needed a few 'photo-points' to get the money, but instead of taking the easy way out and writing "I (heart) HP" on her forehead, she tried to do something more challenging. That shows the true spirit of the event, and not that she was there for the money and the gear. Sure, in the end that's what she did, but she made an attempt to do something else first. I've embedded the video below - "Brought to you by HP".

Cool Stuff (29/12/2006) (Cool_Stuff_Dept.)

There have been a crazy amount of things happening this few days on the Internet. Not sure if it is related to each other or not, but first Microsoft's Xbox Live Marketplace went offline and then as you read this, Google's Orkut service is down. Not sure, but a few days back, Steams servers were down. Besides that 'botnets' are on the increase and that might be crippling the Internet minute by minute. Something has to be done. Anyways here is some of the other stuff I came across:

+++ Send Anonymous Text Messages to anyone in USA and Canada. Oh! I love this service +++ Top 10 blogger babes. Geeky Girls are awesome!! +++ A gallery of the replacement Wii Straps +++ Time's top 50 websites of 2006. Don't bother looking, I'm not there +++ Women cheat more than Men. Need I say more? +++ Stop giving me tickets!! Glad to see other University students are short of cash as well! +++ Screenshots of Gmail's new Email Fetcher!! +++

Now thats what I call a bike! (BFM_Dept.)

I wish there was a beach in Edmonton. Unfortunately there isn't. Its weird as back home we had tons of beaches. In fact the shore line of Dubai and Sharjah was a beach. So when I came to Edmonton I always expected there to be a beach, at least one. But unfortunately there isn't. Although when I go back home this summer one things for certain: I'm going to spend a lot of time on the beach! Of course, when I get to the beach the thing that fancies me quite a bit are the cycles, more commonly known as 'Beach Cruisers'. I would love to have one and will probably buy one as I'm saving up quite a bit with my part-time student job. After searching around a little bit on the Internet, I came across this Beach cruiser shop. They manufacture and retail cruiser bikes and have a lot of style-color combinations to go around. After browsing through their catalog, I found the Firmstrong Urban Delux Chopper Cruiser most appealing. I guess its because I've been watching too much of OCC on Discovery Channel lately, and also it features 36H alloy rims! Albeit, riding with that on the beach would surely turn some heads! The color? Well, I'm not going to lie. A pink cruiser would be awesome. I can just imagine the look on peoples faces when they see me riding a pink 'manly' cruiser! I think it would be pretty cool. Obviously some people would prefer other colors, and the site has a neat color chart/table that users can go through to find the color that suits them the most. One thing's for sure, as soon as I make a few dollars more, that's where its going to go to: A chopper style beach cruiser bike.

People Dying (Misc_Dept.)

It seems this year that a lot of important people want to die during the holidays, especially around Christmas. A few days back James Brown died. For those of you who do not know, James Brown was the godfather of soul. Just look him up and hear his tunes and you will be amazed at the talents of the chap. A few weeks back there were rumours going around that Castro was dead, or was on the verge of dying in Cuba. Sure no one really cares about Castro you might say, but nonetheless he was a President of a country. It doesn't matter if the country was one that the United States didn't like. Albeit, these were just rumours and he isn't really dead. Then I wake up from my nap today, Boxing Day, decide to read some news, and I read that Gerald Ford is dead. Gerald Ford was the only unelected President of America, and that's why I find him the best. He didn't have to lie to the people to get their votes, he just became the President. And the odd thing is that he was by far one of the best America has ever had (yes, I realize that this sentence started with an 'and' which is horrible English, I'll fix it later). Its a shame that the most influential people decide to die at a time when the world is celebrating holidays. This results in people not caring as much, and thus they do not sit back and think about they have just lost. They just continue with their holidays...

Security! (BFM_Dept.)

Ever since the new Windows Vista was announced, tech 'experts' have been debating whether or not Vista is more secure and immune for viruses or not. The thing is, it doesn't really matter nowadays because as long as a user has a decent firewall and anti-virus that updates itself frequently, their systems will be almost immune from all attacks, may it viruses, takeovers, or spyware. The good thing is that most of these anti-virus packages should not only work with current operating systems like Windows XP and the Mac OS X, they will also work with Windows Vista and Leopard (if Apple ever decided to release it). One of the most reliable antivirus solutions currently out there are the packages released by Symantec. They have different suites available for the general public. For instance they have the standalone Norton AntiVirus, which as the name suggests provides only virus protection software, or they have the whole suite called Norton Internet Security which provides a firewall along with the antivirus. I came across a website from where you can download Norton Antivirus or download Norton Internet Security with a few clicks. The thing that interested me was that they have a forum set up where you can ask them questions about problems you might face when installing the software, or any general problems with the software at all. Overall its a easy-to-use website set up to suit your antivirus needs!

Videos!! (Cool_Stuff_Dept.)

I usually at least twice a week post links about what has attracted my interest over the few days, but last week someone asked me to post links to videos that captured my interest as well. Well, here they are:

+++ Jaguar vs. Anaconda. Who wins? +++ F1 vs. Bike vs. Boat. Who wins? +++ Water in zero gravity (space) +++ Shaq bringing down the basketball post +++ An interview with teen conjoined twins at the head. Inspiring and heartbreaking at the same time. But since they seemed really happy and full of excitement in the video, I'm not that heart broken, but rather more inspired. A lot more inspired. +++ The worst fight scene ever. Believe me. +++ Half Life beaten in 30 minutes. Leet. +++ Hilarious video. Conan's Christmas Cards. He basically shows Christmas cards he received from celebrities. +++ Hugh Laurie's audition's for the popular show House. +++ Another funny video. A video spoof released by Microsoft celebrating Bill Gate's reign of Microsoft. +++

Webhosting! (BFM_Dept.)

Sometime back I wrote about how difficult it is to set up a web 2.0 company and the challenges that one faces when trying to find clients. As with all companies, a web 2.0 company obviously needs a well designed and reliable website to serve the customers. This means finding the best web hosting available. There are many websites offering such services, but I found CheapHostingDirectory to be the best of them all. The site is well organised in order to make your search a whole lot easier. It lists hundreds of web host services and anyone can easily find cheap providers that offer the best services currently on the market. Most of the web hosts listed offer affordable prices for even the smallest of businesses, and besides all this, one can even find domain names that are about to expire and get great deals on them (obviously these domain names are ones that have a lot of traffic to them already, thus exposing your website to the public right away).
CheapHostingDirectory also has a list of recommended web hosts compiled from feedback of users. This ensures that new customers can choose the web host that provides the best customer service in order to make the whole process a lot easier and stress-free. Another feature that attracted me was that they have a list of current and latest domain and webhosting news for consumers so that they can keep in touch with what is currently happening and choose web hosts accordingly.
With websites like these, anyone can find the best deals currently out there. Consumers can also compare deals and features of a particular web host with another and choose the best one accordingly, taking into the needs. Therefore if you deciding to set up a company that needs a website, or even just a personal website, CheapHostingDirectory is the place to go to find the best of the best web hosting deals!

Back Again! (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

Haven't done this in a long time, so here goes:

+++ Xbox 360 to get a CPU change. The new one will basically be quieter and will draw less power and thus be cooler. Price drop? Maybe. +++ A new patch to activate Windows Visa permanently is out. Pretty sure Microsoft is going to find a patch for it soon. Its basically going to become a patch for a patch situation. +++ Awesome photograph of Denver Airport covered in snow +++ Some Calvin and Hobbes snowman art +++

Photography Contest!! (BFM_Dept.)

A few days back I wrote about how entering a photography competition two years back and coming in second introduced me to the world of photography. In lieu of that, I came across the Photograph of the Year Contest on PhotographyCorner. The contest is open to anyone of all ages, and they will be accepting submissions no later than midnight, GMT on Friday, January 12th, 2007. Obviously, each photograph submitted must follow the rules as in all competitions, and to make things simpler, PhotographyCorner has put together a small well detailed guide on how to submit a photograph for the competition. There are $14,000 to be won, and the details of the prizes can be found here. All of the prizes have been funded from the sponsors from the competion. Another good thing is that there aren't many requirements, and basically if you have a camera, you should be able to enter! If you still have questions, a forum has also been set up for participants to ask away and get their queries answered. It sure is a lot advanced than the competition that I took part in, but nonetheless, if one doesn't win, he/she is sure to learn quite a bit from looking at other entries.

Computer Parts Shopping!! (Cool_Stuff_Dept.)

The Boxing Day online deals started today (December 24th) and boy oh boy did my hands work fast. This is what I picked up:

AMD X2 3800+
Nikao 8009D computer case
Thermaltake TRU2 430W Power Supply
4 Case Fans
Maxtor 500GB SATA2 7200RPM HDD
BenQ BMW Design Keyboard

Still need to buy:
MSI K9N NEO-F Motherboard
BFG 7900GS
4x512MB DDR2 PC5300 RAM
21" CRT Flat Monitor
Belkin UPS 900VA

Can't wait for it all to come in!!

RockStartUp Ep. 3 (BFM_Dept.)

Sometime back I wrote about RockStartUp, a reality TV show that follows the tides and tribulations of PPP. Well, episode 3 was released some days back and it was awesome. By awesome, I don't mean that it has special effects or a lot of pretty action scenes, by awesome I mean it provides what its supposed to - a real take on setting up a web 2.0 company. This episode covers the setting up of a new office and the troubles faced along the way. Its nice to see that no matter how easy it may seem to hire people to set up an office, in reality it isn't. Its shows like this that ready us future entrepreneurs for the challenges that we are going to face when we enter the corporate world. I did 'learn' quite a bit from this episode. The best part was Ted's response that "if there was that much concern that we might not make the deadline, then maybe you shouldn't have taken this contract and gotten it done in 30 days." The thing that struck me the most was that there was no sadness in leaving the old office. I mean it was the place that PPP started off at, thus I'm sure that they felt sad leaving it, but they didn't show that in the episode. All in all, its another good episode in the series. I've embedded episode 3 below, while all the other payperpost videos can be found here.

Recent rounds of DDoS attacks (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

It recently came to my attention that CafePress was under heavy DDoS attacks. Its a real shame that hackers take down popular websites for no good reason whatsoever. Especially taking down a website like CafePress just before Christmas and New Years is certainly going to cost them a lot of money, may it be even for an hour. Not only that, but people who were hoping to place orders in order to get gifts ready in time are going to be in for a surprise when they find out that they cannot access the website. The good thing is that CafePress has responded quickly and has started to work on the case with some 'friends'.

Photography revisited! (BFM_Dept.)

As many of you know from my previous posts that I love photography. I didn't always know that I was a good photographer until I won second place in the Students Digital Photographer of the Year 2004 competition back home. After that digital photography played a significant part of my life. I used to look at the simplest things with a different view. An ant carrying food, walking on the sidewalk never used to amaze before. But after that day it was more than just an ant with food. It was life, and as all living things it was complex, and thus it was something I could photograph. It was an ant carrying food to feed his colony, his Queen. It strained under the weight of the food, and yet it continued. Thus it was something that I could photograph.
Not only did living things appear different to me. Even inanimate things, such as a rock would attract my attention if it was properly located, and if the sun shone on it with a particular angle. It was no longer a rock then, it was instead an object that quietly watched the world go by, recording the actions that the world around him made. I know this sounds crazy, but a simple rock attracted me. It seems like an art piece all of a sudden.
Unfortunately over a year back my first camera, the one I won for the Student Photographer of Year competition broke down. Amazingly, I didn't break it, but it was actually a manufacturing defect. It was the Konica Minolta DiMage X20 camera, and it faced the CCD error (the alert can be found here). Konica Minolta were willing to repair it for free, but a proof of purchase was required, and it being won as a prize had none. Therefore, the very first camera, that brought me into the world of photography, sits on my shelf as a memento. I never could buy another one as being a University student with tuition on the increase every year along with living costs, buying a new camera to fill a passion unfortunately doesn't top the list.
It recently came to my attention that Ted of PPP has his hands on 5 HP cameras and photo printers and is willing to give it away to the bloggers who write the best reason for needing one. Thus, I hope my passion for photography is a good enough reason, if not, I sure hope I get a raise at either one of my two part-time student jobs to save up to buy one! - "HP sponsored this post."

Quotes! (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

Just came across this website that has a nice list of quotes. In fact, the article is supposed to consist of the 25 best quotes said by anybody period! Of course that isn't true as I'm pretty sure there a few better ones out there. Nonetheless, here is the one I liked the best from the site:

"It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows." -- Epictetus (c.55-c.135)

I've found quite a few others, and they can be found here.

Flowers! (BFM_Dept.)

It was a good friend's birthday yesterday, and I really wanted to let her know that I remembered. The thing is that all these years I used to go over to her place on her birthday and give her a card then, so I completely forgot that I was miles away (she is in Chicago by the way) and it would take quite a while for the card to reach her. Luckily for me, I came across DotFlowers. DotFlowers has wonderful baskets of flowers set up for almost any occasion thinkable. The good thing is that they provide same day delivery to almost anywhere in the United States and thus I was in luck! You might think that they have the flowers pre-set-up and ready to ship with my word, and thus resulting in old flowers. But you are wrong! They provide the freshest flowers available and these are usually termed as 'Field Fresh' flowers! Another cool thing was that they had other savoury items as well that I could send, so I decided to send her some wonderful cookies as well! DotFlowers specialises in online flower delivery and thus the customer service was wonderful and I'm sure that the flowers sent will make a great impression! So if you ever need to send flowers to anyone, that's the place to go!

Travel in confidence! (BFM_Dept.)

I travel between countries a lot. And I don't mean short trips, but rather trips that take me days and even weeks. Thus for me finding a good place to rest everyday is perhaps the most important thing. Unfortunately it seems I always pick the worst hotel and pay the highest rates for them. But I'm sure its not just me, but many of the other travelers out there as well. Luckily for us, I found a new site called Hotel Reservations which will meet all our needs. Don't let the name mislead you. It does a whole lot more than just make Hotel Reservations for you!
The site has offerings from hotels, to resorts to vacations rentals as well! And it being a new website entering the market, its attracting customers by keeping the prices very very competitive, and it even has some of the lowest rates around.
What interested me quite the most was the 'destination guide'. Hotel Reservations has a guide set up that helps consumers decide when to visit a certain place and what all should be visited and eaten there. They also provide a short history of a place. Another cool feature of the website is that it is made for about 10-15 different languages. Thus if you are a German or a Spanish speaker instead, just go and change the options and you can see the whole site in whichever language you choose!
This is definitely a place to start at when planning a trip to wherever you want!

Hotel Reservations

Hidden Message! (Cool_Stuff_Dept.)

Just came across an article which states that Tom Bihn apparel (bags mostly) sold contains a hidden message. Someone called attention to the care instruction tags found on the backpacks and cases sold by Tom Bihn. Specifically, the English and the French States just didn't match up with each other. Both versions included the usual warnings on not to bleach, not to machine and not to iron the bags, the French version included an line: "NOUS SOMMES DESOLES QUE NOTRE PRESIDENT SOIT UN IDIOT. NOUS N'AVONS PAS VOTE POUR LUI." Translated to English it reads, "We're sorry our president is an idiot. We didn't vote for him."

Although most consumers have regarded this to be a slam at George W. Bush, staff at Tom Bihn simple say that 'it is an inside joke'.

Image courtesy Snopes.com

Keyloggers! (BFM_Dept.)

I remember a few years back when I heard about keyloggers and how they could record everything you were doing. As always, consumers got scared and thought of keystroke logger to be a bad thing. Times have changed, and now consumers are beginning to realise the potential of having a keystroke logger. For example, nowadays with IT expenses rising day by day for companies, network admins can use a keystroke keystroke logger to see which system accessed the network and what functions were performed. In this way managers can see whether their employees are wasting the Internet resource for personal uses or not. Similarly a growing use of a keystroke logger is with parents monitoring their kids. Parents are obviously scared of the Internet because of the wide range of content easily available out there, and one way to keep track of what their kids are doing is by using a keystroke logger to monitor their activities. Similarly, teachers in schools can use a keystroke logger to see what the students are using while using the computer. Without a doubt, keystroke logger are back, and unlike last time, its here for useful purposes that can benefit almost anyone.

Credit Cards - Good or Bad? (BFM_Dept.)

Sometime back I wrote about shopping online and how it has increased in the past few years. Well online shopping cannot be achieved without credit cards of course. Over the years, credit cards have become easier to use. With just one swipe and a signature (or entering a 16-digit number online) you can pretty much buy anything with it. But at the same time, credit card debt has also risen. The thing is that when one has the power to shop so easily using a credit card, one often does without realising the consequences. Thus credit cards are good things, but if used incorrectly, it easily becomes a bad thing. Of course, this can easily be avoided by lowering the credit limit on your card to a nominal limit. Many credit cards are often given out with insane credit limits, and thus the card holder has the urge to spend as much as he can. By setting a nominal credit limit, the card holder instead spends wisely and buys only what he needs in order to stay under the limit. Other credit card advice can be easily found around the Internet. Another reason why credit cards are good is that banks are coming out with a lot more benefits such as pay after 6 weeks instead of 4, and also the very useful 'buyers protection' in case of a fraud when shopping online. Before I decide to get another credit card, I usually check out this website for credit card news as its always useful to know what the current options are. Overall, credits are a good thing!

How did we really survive the last ice age? (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

I wonder. How did we humans really survive the last ice age. Looking at how stupid we are right now, there is no way that our ancestors could have made it through extreme cold temperatures. Why am I writing about this? Because just yesterday, a woman going through security at LAX (Los Angeles International Airport) put her month-old grandson into a plastic bin intended for carry-on items and slid it into an X-ray machine. Luckily the security official monitoring the machine saw the outline of a baby and immediately reversed the conveyor. Apparently she spoke Spanish, and that's why some people are saying that she didn't know. I find that response crazy as firstly, X-Ray scanners at the airports do not have signs in English which say "DO NOT PUT BABY IN SCANNER!". And secondly, c'mon. Its a baby! How stupid do you have to be?? The baby was taken to the hospital but seemed to be in good health. Lets hope that the baby gets supernatural powers - maybe when the baby is 2 and starts throwing a tantrum, it will turn into the Hulk. Albeit, I sure hope she didn't put the baby in the overhead compartment once she boarded the plane...

Anti-Spam!! (BFM_Dept.)

As most of you know, about 2 months back I wrote an article for The Gateway about spam (it can be found here). Unfortunately, since my article, spam has actually increased quite a bit. And by quite a bit I mean it has at least doubled. The newest threat to us is what is called 'Image Spam'. Luckily, BorderWare, a company focusing on anti image spam has created a new appliance called the BorderWare MXtreme. Unlike current anti-spam solutions that cannot tell the difference between normal spam and image spam, the MXtreme's "Intercept Image Analysis" system can detect and filter about 98% of all spam from email servers. Another cool thing is that the software learns and adopts itself as time goes by, thus being even more effective.

Read more about the software here.

Best and Worst Games - 2006 (Cool_Stuff_Dept.)

GameSpot came out with their list of the Best and Worst Games of 2006. The awards are given for the usual list of categories and some new ones for modern times as technology advances. The awards basically provide a detailed look at the year's titles. GameSpot considered every game (yes, every game) published in North America between December 20, 2005 to December 20, 2006.

Another cool thing this time is that users can vote on the best game in every category. This is inspired by what we call the Digg Revolution, where users have the ultimate say in everything. The awards will be published once the voting has ended (btw, voting ends on January 18th) on January 26th.

The official announcement is here

Disclosure Policy (Blog_Configuration_Dept.)

This policy is valid from 18 December 2006

This blog is a personal blog written and edited by me. For questions about this blog, please contact abdultaiyeb@gmail.com.

This blog accepts forms of cash advertising, sponsorship, paid insertions or other forms of compensation.

This blog abides by word of mouth marketing standards. We believe in honesty of relationship, opinion and identity. The compensation received may influence the advertising content, topics or posts made in this blog. That content, advertising space or post will be clearly identified as paid or sponsored content.

The owner(s) of this blog is compensated to provide opinion on products, services, websites and various other topics. Even though the owner(s) of this blog receives compensation for our posts or advertisements, we always give our honest opinions, findings, beliefs, or experiences on those topics or products. The views and opinions expressed on this blog are purely the bloggers' own. Any product claim, statistic, quote or other representation about a product or service should be verified with the manufacturer, provider or party in question.

This blog does not contain any content which might present a conflict of interest.

To get your own policy, go to http://www.disclosurepolicy.org

Shopping!! (Cool_Stuff_Dept.)

As Boxing Day approaches I get more and more excited as I am assembling my computer this winter. Not really sure about the specs, but one thing's for sure that its going to be an AMD. Cheaper, same performance, and overall a solid chipset.

Some things I came across: Stalin and Borat from the same family? +++ Time names the Person of the Year 2006 - You! (I mean us). I wonder if I can include it my resume, "Awards: Time 2006 Person of the Year" +++ A crazy (but in some ways true) article about why Microsoft should buy Yahoo! in 2007 +++

Gout (BFM_Dept.)

I needed to write an essay about Medical conditions for my English class, and I decided to choose to write about Gout. Gout (also called metabolic arthritis) is a disease due to an inborn uric acid metabolism. These deposits often increase in size and burst through the skin to form sinuses discharging a chalky white material. I also came across Goutsolve. It is basically a way to initially stop Gout within a week. It is all-natural and works without any side effects. A cool thing about GoutSolve is that if it is used for 3-6 months, it can be completely reversed. According to clinical research, it is 99% effective and also side-effect free. And it is sure to reverse Gout completely if used for some time. The company that makes GoutSolve also has a list of gout foods to avoid in order to heal faster and better.

President Bush vs. Science (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

The White House has a new policy on Science. Basically all scientific data has to go through the White House first before being released to the public! In other words, it wants to filter scientific data. The new requirements require that all scientists submit reports to the White House (the agency) and thus be analyzed if it is against the White House's policy (they haven't mentioned which policy at all). The excuse? The White House says that scientists need to vigorously analyze data before releasing them to the public. That of course isn't true because as far as I know all reports already go through the AMA before being released. It seems that Bush really wants to get America to its knees...
Full Article here.

On something cool, it seems the Australians have built the impossible triangle. Don't think there is a name for it, but an article with pictures can be found here. Very cool indeed.

Projectors, Projectors, Projectors! (BFM_Dept.)

So I am deciding to buy myself a new computer and was told by a friend that instead of buying a monitor, I should buy a projector and thus project my screen directly onto a wall and end up with a gigantic virtual 'monitor'. So I decided to see if that could actually work, and while searching around I came across Projectors Center. They sell all types of projectors currently available on the market, from LCD Projectors to the more used DLP Projectors.

Besides this, they also sell replacement bulbs if your projectors bulb ever burnt out. The site is well designed and is very simple and easy to navigate. They have different types of projectors listed by Brand, Projector type, and Resolution of projectors. Another cool feature is that it has a Learning Centre where clients can find out which projector is right for them. I might buy one, maybe not to replace a monitor, but to use while watching movies. Projectors=Awesome!

Thin Clients (BFM_Dept.)

So in lieu of my previous posts about setting up a business and managing IT expenses, I came across another website that sells PC systems. Unlike traditional systems, ClearCube's blade PC systems provide the full functionality of a computer, but don't take up as much space. Thus your office or cubicle has a lot more space for important documents. How it works is that a user connects his monitor, keyboard, mouse and other peripherals to the blade via a wireless or wired network, and are able to access it as if it were right next to them. This helps IT administrators as all the blade systems can be in a centralised location and therefore the whole system and network can be managed more efficiently, and if there is a problem, it can also be fixed in one centralized location. The Blade server's contain the latest processors, disk drives, fast memory and the latest PCI Express Graphics cards. This system has found to be so efficient and beneficial, that industry experts have named it the Thin Client.

Managing IT expenses (BFM_Dept.)

I wrote about how difficult it is to set up a Web 2.0 company sometime back, but in reality it is difficult to set up any company and manage it. Companies face a lot of expenses and one of the main expenses nowadays in the technology friendly world is IT expenses. I came across Acorn Systems that helps companies reduce their IT expenses, or rather manage the consumption of their IT resources. They have a system set up that can be scaled to any size of company from the smallest to the biggest out there. What happens is that by using Acorn Systems, companies can achieve their management objectives in regards to performance, and also make higher profits for their companies. Acorn systems is basically focused on helping their customers reduce costs, so that they can increase the profits quickly and by a large margin. In fact, their system to help clients out so effective, that it has been nicknamed IT chargeback by many industry experts!

Blu-Ray, Take One (BFM_Dept.)

So Sony released the PS3 sometime back with a Blu-ray drive with it. Many end users complained that the Blu-Ray drive wasn't required as is just increased the price of the console and provides no functionality. That actually isn't true, and most of the complaints have come from users who don't even know what the Blu-Ray technology features. I came across this DVD Recorders and Players Guide while looking up Blur-Ray myself. The guide has been set up to basically offer advice to users about the latest DVD recorders and DVD players on the market. The good thing is that it is up-to-date and provides information about latest technology, including the Blu-Ray disc players. The players that interested me the most was the Samsung Blu-Ray Disc Player. The Samsung BD-P1000 was launched this year and it was the first blu-ray player launched by Samsung, but it sure as hell as all the features that you will ever need from recording in many formats, to playing almost all the formats out there. Anyways, you can check it out or check out many other DVD recorders and players at the DVD Recorders and Players Guide website.

WTF?? (Blog_Configuration_Dept.)

As many of you may have seen that something weird is going on with my blog over the past few days. This is because my blog's PR (Google Page Rank) rating has increased and therefore I decided to test something out. No worries, things will return to normal shortly.

Just check back later sometime instead.

I am really awesome?? (BFM_Dept.)

I came across some reviews about bloggers saying that they are really awesome, and by following one of the links, I came to Awesomemillion.com. This website allows you to have your own personal page certifying that you are a real awesome person, thing or band. It is open to only a million people and by paying $5.00 you can also upload a picture to personalize it furthur. You get a custom link (subdomain) at awesomemillion.com and its linked to your own blog/space as well (provided you provide a link of course). This is a pretty good way to improve traffic to your blog/space if nothing else. More information is provided on the site itself.

Here is a screenshot of my band CirclesandSquares that I wrote about a few weeks back. The post can be found here.

Screenshot (click to enlarge):

Poker Anyone?? (BFM_Dept.)

A few days back I wrote about how it seems that University Students love playing poker all the time to make extra pocket money, and to also pass their time with other activities than studying. I came across a service called PokerDIY today. Luckily PokerDIY is a free service and by using it you can connect to other poker players currently online, and you can even search for games that are currently being played in your area. You can set up games (by being the host and sending out invites) and thus can create a game for you and friends to play and can even start leagues and tournaments. If you are new to Poker, PokerDIY also teaches you the rules to help you get started playing online poker as quickly and effectively as possible! A webcam feature is also available, and forums are set up as well where you can ask other players for tips and help with the game.

Travelling, anyone? (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

Travelling has always been a major part of my life. One reason being that I lived in Dubai, and all my relatives lived everywhere around the world but in Dubai. And secondly, because the University of Alberta is in Edmonton, far far away from Dubai. Thus looking up travel tips on travel websites has always been particularly useful as not only do you get the best deals, but also reviews from other customers who help you make your decision. Luggage Online (a website I frequently visit) has created a page called "50 Travel Sites You've Probably Never Heard Of". Oddly enough, even after being such a traveler, many of these sites are new to me. There are 50 websites, with details about each of them and what they provide to the consumer. Without a doubt, I'm going to be using this list next time I but tickets online!!

Photography (Cool_Stuff_Dept.)

Being a good photographer isn't an easy thing. I'm not one even after taking hunderds of photographs over many years. But there are nonetheless hundreds of professional photographers out there who never fail to amaze me. TIME has once again created their yearly "Year in Photographs" section, and have created "The Best Photos of the Year 2006". It can be found here. After watching the 24 stunning images, I was asked to vote on my favourite one. I chose "Landscape of Despair" as it shows how small an individual is when compared to things around him, and it also in a way showed me what chaos really was.

Digital Storage ($$ Dept.)

Taking photographs has always been my hobby, but storing them is always a problem expecially with digital cameras. The reason being that each image takes up a lot of harddrive space, and when you take as many photographs as I do, the only option was to back them up on DVDs. I knew that there should be a better more feasible way to store my pictures, and after a little searching, I came across BluBox. BlueBox is a simple easy-to-use software that compresses text and images. It boasts a capability to compress images upto 95% so that you can store bout 20 times more data on your harddrive and memory device. The good thing is that it never alters or deleted the original image. Images can be sent via email within the software, and besides all of this, BluBox can also encrypt your data using 256-bit encryption technology. So basically, if you have a digital camera you need this product!

Holy Shit! Drive Safely fools!! (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

Just read that there were 5 teen accidents in Edmonton last week, where 3 of the victims ended up dying. Did a little research, and found out that the United States is facing an increase of teen deaths due to driving accidents as well. GEICO recently added "Teens and Trucks" to its online library of safe driving materials for teen drivers. Its basically a brochure, developed with the American Moving and Storage Association. In simply includes valuable information for teens on how to safely share the highway with large trucks. The library can be found at http://www.geico.com/auto/safety. GEICO does provide information for drivers who have been driving for some time now, but it is very very interested in providing information for new drivers. They provide tips like "Stay out of a truck's blind spots or 'No Zones,'" and to "Be careful when attempting to pass a truck." Just wanted to note that, "This information is brought to you by CarInsurance.com. They provide online insurance to consumers and to insurance companies. They also provide an auto insurance quote online. Unlike other insurance companies, carinsurance.com provides insurance online, immediately. Its a lot smarter than driving your car to an insurance company to obtain insurance :p

Video Conferencing Equipment (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

A few days back I wrote about the problems of starting a web 2.0 company. I then realised that besides having a good team of people working with you, you need to be able to communicate with them effectively. While creating a web 2.0 company, many of your employees will be across the country giving presentations to individuals and trying to sell your product to them. You need to communicate and hold meetings with them effectively. Therefore, you will most probably need Video Conferencing Equipment. LifeSize seems to have the largest variety of Video Conferencing equipment I've seen so far and will probably fit all your needs. Not only that, but I also found some telephones being sold which have a lot better quality than phones from other brands. It doesn't seem to be too expensive in regards to the quality of equipment, and thus it seems to be a decent deal overall.

Good vs Bad? Bad vs Good? (Cool_Stuff_Dept.)

Last weekend the Swedish ISP Perspektiv decided to block their customers from visiting the music site allofmp3.com. What resulted was that a lot of people got pissed off and threatened to do something. Something did happen. ThePiratebay responded back and announced that they are blocking Perspektiv customers from using their site. ThePirateBay is one of the most controversial websites offering torrents to users. It has had numerous attempts to be shut down by International companies and the FBI, but since it is not breaking any Swedish law (the country where they are based), they usually get away with the upper hand. Not only is ThePirateBay not allowing users of that ISP visit their sites, they have also provided code that other webmasters can put on their website to block off those users as well. The outcome they hope to achieve? Either Perspecktiv will remove the censorship, or that the users of Perspecktiv will move to another ISP. Either way, ThePirateBay wins.

Other types of Gaming ($$ Dept.)

It seems that University life involves a lot of Poker playing to make easy and quick money. Of course, most students here have been playing Poker for quite some time, and thus know the game relatively well. For those looking to join, playing online would be a great way to start and to learn the rules of the game. PokerSavvy is a website I came across that has information on playing all types of Poker. It focuses on the most popular version of Poker, ie Hold'em, and provides users with the rules to get started. It also provides reviews of online casinos and provides special coupon codes and links to get discounts and bonuses on your accounts at those casinos. It also has Free Poker tables and thus users can learn the game for free before actually using real money. Thus if you are interested in Poker, PokerSavvy is the place to go!!

Play your games, and eat them too!! (Cool_Stuff_Dept.)

Being a gamer, anything to make my life more 'gamer-like' excites me. So what made me smile today? A wedding cake for a gamer! It has the Xbox, Xbox 360, PS2 and the GameCube stacked upon each other to produce the ultimate wedding cake!!

In other gaming news, Microsoft officially announced the release of the XNA Game Studio Express and XNA Creators Club. The program allows anyone with a Windows XP-based PC to create and develop their own games. The software is based on Visual C# 2005 Express Edition and Microsoft .NET Compact. Once the games are developed, they can be sold over the Microsoft Marketplace and can also be played over Xbox Live. What this means is that gamers can create that gamers like, and thus the end-users will receive finished games that could be suited for their likings. Another thing Microsoft has done right in regards to the Xbox 360.

Shipping to Canada made easy? (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

I wrote an article sometime back about how annoying it is for Canadians to buy items online as many websites refuse to ship to Canada. A user responded and told me about a website called MailDropGuide. MailDropGuide is the biggest internet directory of mail boxes, maildrops and remailing services. A mail drop is basically a service where you can rent a mail box somewhere (recognized by the Postal Service of course) and then provide that adress as your shipping address. All parcels/letters received at that address is then forwarded to your real address anywhere in the world. So basically, shoppers from Canada can get a mail drop address, buy online using that address, and then request the mail brop to forward all received post to their address in Canada! Also pointed out to me was that mail drops are also used to ensure privacy and reduce identity theft, as the company providing the mail drop service can also re-envelope letters and thus they seem to originate from the place the mail drop is located in. Overall, it seems to be a cool service.

Dealing with Hecklers (Cool_Stuff_Dept.)

;As most of you must know, Kramer from Seinfeld was recently involved in a racial tirade after members of his audience seemed to interrupt him during his performance at a comedy club (holy shit that was a long sentence). So I did a little digging up, and here are other outbreaks of anger from comedians that I have found. None of these are racial, but they are NSFW nonetheless:

Joe Rogan dealing with a heckler (video)
George Carlin dealing with one (only audio)
Bill Hicks vs. a heckler
Bull Burr versus the whole of Philidelphia!
Part 1
Part 2

Why these aren't on MSN Soapbox you ask? Well I frankly didn't have the time to!

Starting a Web 2.0 company (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

Nowadays as prices of everything go up (maybe somehow related to the increasing price of oil) people are out to make more money. Especially in the tech world where people decide to start up Web 2.0 companies. Of course it isn't as easy as it seems and it sure as hell needs a lot of behind the scenes planning and programming. Incoming: RockStartUp.com. RockStartUp.com is show based on reality tv. It "captures the promise, the perils, the pride, the pressure, the pain and pitfalls of launching a web 2.0 company." Specifically that of PPP. It basically outlines the journey of setting up a successful Web 2.0 company and how one must work with his team effectively in order to be successful. The show is packed with "precarious situations wherein hilarity ensues. It is punctured by Postie Patrols, parties, tradeshows, office escapades, love triangles, love squares, meetings, eatings, confessionals, contests, crying, and pretty much anything else you can ponder." The site currently has 2 episodes up, and they are both in HD format. The episodes aren't as long as you might think they are. In fact they are both about eight and half minutes each, and might just be the thing you need for inspiration for setting up your own Web 2.0 company.

Sunset Earth vs. Mars (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

Which is better? The sunset you see out your window? Or the sunset as seen from Mars here?

I hope to make a similar time lapse video someday:

Video: Time Lapse Sequences

Dot-Com boom returns ($$ Dept.)

The Dot-Com boom seems to be back and thus many sellers are deciding to sell their products and services online. Unfortunately most of these websites are not optimized and designed in such a way that consumers can find them easily. The solution? Apogee Search. Apogee Search is pretty much a company that optimizes your website for search engines such as Google and Yahoo! They are a AdWords Qualified Company and thus know what they are doing and thus its almost guaranteed that they can make the consumers find your website in no time. Simply said, Apogee Search is the place to go to for Search Engine Marketing.

Skulk 2007 (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

Skulk 2007 is a month away and the Henday FC's have received a list of events for this year. One event that interested me the most was...

EDIT: Content removed as requested by Skulk organizers. All comments posted are saved, but will not be shown until Skulk is over. Furthur comments cannot be made. Sorry, but this is to make the event more exciting and surprising...

Video: Capture the Flag - Toronto (2006)

Water on Mars? (Still_Not_Sure_Dept.)

So I decided to create a new Dept. for my blog called the 'Still_Not_Sure_Dept.). And how better to kick it off with the recent news that NASA is now closer to believing that not only is there water on Mars, but it is flowing! By comparing a picture NASA took of a certain location of suspected water deposits back in August 1999 with one taken in September 2005, NASA believes that water still flows on Mars, but in short spurts. All this is cool as it suggests that there might be smarter beings out there. But what does this mean for us? Well firstly I'm sure the United States Government is going to freak out. "Hell, if there is water on Mars, we are quite sure that there are beings [Martians?] who want to destroy America. Therefore we add Mars to the Axis of Evil" <-- they say. I'm also assuming that the CIA and the NSA will state that the Martians will go nuclear in a few years. Since I'm bashing the United States for no apparent reason, I might as well go on and say that they will probably bottle it and sell it to us for $15.00 a pop.

If I'm not incorrect, I think this is the 4th or the 5th announcement NASA made stating they think they found 'flowing' water on Mars. Doesn't the fact that their rovers landed in mud mean anything to them?

Live Telecast (maybe a rerun) from NASA TV here
Report/Article released by NASA here

Halo 3 (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

The Halo 3 TV advert was shown during Monday Night Football. I'm assuming most people missed the minute long commercial, but luckily Microsoft has it up on the Xbox website here. I wasn't a big fan of Halo 1 and I never played Halo 2. But I'm not going to lie. Halo 3 seems to be interesting. Although then again, trailers usually lie a lot. I've seen some games have the best trailers out there, but when you actually play the game do you realize that what a crappy game it really is. Hopefull Halo 3 will not be the same. I'm sure that die hard fans will buy the game even if it has the worst reviews.

Videos... (Lazy_Afternoons_Dept.)

It seems that nowadays almost everything can be found online. Not only in the form of articles and pictures, but also in the form of videos. The amount of online content in the form of videos has grown so much that I come across at least 5 clips of something interesting everyday. This is compared to a few years back where I rarely came across a video once a week, and the video probably never loaded as either the player wasn't coded properly, or my Internet connection refused to stream data at such a fast rate (yes, I have 56K back home...)
Albeit, here is a collection of video clips I came across that I found entertaining in the recent days.

+++ Kramers racist remarks on tape +++ Kramer apologizing on TV +++ Seinfeld : The Lost Episode (i.e. a spoof of the Kramer racist remarks +++ 40 deleted scenes from Family Guy Season 4 +++ F4 phantom crashes into a wall designed for a nuclear power plant. Awesome!!+++ Whiteboard art anyone? +++ Leet Speak is a dangerous code :D +++ A badly designed tunnel in Russia. It leaks and since its so cold the water turns to ice and makes the road slippery +++ A spoof of the "One Picture Every Day" videos. Original video can be found here +++ According to this video I am a computer hacker :p +++ A classic: Martians Descend on Sesame Street +++ NASA's future projects +++ Hamster video game?? +++ Some crazy science here. Apparently you can take a coin out of a plate with water in it by using a candle. Need to look up how this is done +++ Create music using bottles lined up correctly on the street +++ Video of a car drawn with Microsoft Paint +++ An awesome SimCity 4 trailer +++