On the subject of Adobe and Flash and Apple
Posted by lars | Filed under Gadgets, Mac, Software
I just read a little something by Grant Skinner and what I don’t get is why not open source the player if it’s such a head ache for Adobe that some people make it seem? Because of course its profitable not to. See if it was open source there would be a LOT more “respect” throwed around than when you essentially lock your customers in and dont give them a choice. This is why I am frustrated with Adobe as with many other companies that has any form of monopoly, a history thereof or are part of an ogliopoly. This is why customers used to (and a lot still) dislike Microsoft, AT&T, Vattenfall, ComCast and even my own employer Telia.
This is why I dig companies such as MindTouch and others that have an open source core with Enterprise options/closed source built around it, and has a product that generates an output built in standards readable by all (in MindTouch case XML/XHTML).
To say that Adobe deserve respect and so on is true, all human beings deserve respect (plus Photoshop kicks ass…even though they are really bloating down their CS). To say that Adobe deserves CREDIT for being business savvy, buying up sweet IP, developing this IP and making good decions to get where they are now is equally true. But we are all doing them a HUGE favor by bitching and moaning. This all helps to give rise to popular opinion and in the end – options. For Adobe, just like with any other company that gets negative attention from its customers, it becomes crystal – it’s do or die time. And yes, everyone using a Flash Player IS a customer.
In the end I think Apple are actually doing the web as a tool for communication a favor by NOT including support for a closed prop. system that is A) WIDELY misused and B) a resource hog that for me in 90% of the time is making my browser blink, pop and crackle when I don’t want it too (ads). And I really couldn’t care less about Flash games.
To say that a user can uninstall Flash on their workstation/laptop if they don’t like it..well that’s kind of childish, that’s like me not getting any electricity from a company I dislike – see I can’t.. because I like hot showers .. just like to watch embedded web video. But believe me when those video sites go full frontal HTML5, my Flash player will go the same way Macromedia Shockwave player did a long time ago. Or maybe I won’t, maybe things will shape up and they will kick ass. Just look at what their doing with Flash 5 and converting AS to IPA.
Anyway. I don’t mind the “i-platform”, here I do get a choice because companies are FORCED to open up and build more effecient no-nonsense ways to deliver HQ video. And it doesn’t really matter if it’s Android or Iphone OS, you can bet your ass they will reuse those HQ streams in fast, efficient native apps for those platforms.
Hulk explains why the Hulk iPod Touch (iPad) will rock
Posted by lars | Filed under Gadgets, Mac, Software
Kapow bitches! The Hulk is sick of puny homans whining!
- “It’s just a big iPod Touch”
Yeah? So? What were you expecting? Mac OS X + touch? So you’re telling me that if you could use your fingers on your laptop…that would be better than using the mouse? HAHA PUNY BRAIN! - “It’s got no camera”
Hulk SAD about this too. Was expecting to cyber with She-Hulk….he he. But will probably be in next version. HULK IS HULK! - “No multitasking!”
Puny! Hulk doesn’t care! Only time Hulk wants to multitask is to listen to music while bashing skulls. No biggie. NOT LIKE HULK! - “No really cool software”
That’s why there is an App Store. HULK SMASH! - “No USB ports”
PUNY! HULK IS NOT AFRAID…HULK IS STRONGEST ONE THERE IS!!! YOU WANT USB IN YOUR IPOD TOO? IT’S NOT A LAPTOP. USB YOUR FACE!
NOW Hulk says ENOUGH!
No News Day tomorrow
Posted by lars | Filed under Gadgets, Mac, Personal
As usual I will wait for the Quicktime to be posted from Apples event tomorrow and stay away from online news sites, live blogs, email, chat, blahblah.
Microsoft kills Sony
Posted by lars | Filed under Gadgets, Games, Playstation
Microsoft eats them up. Seriously Sony. Do you have any idea how much you suck? Fix the following and all is forgiven:
- Universal voice. As it is we use Ichat or Skype to smoothly get a game started.. on a separate laptop. It’s embarrassing. Seriously what function does your current voice/video support fill? Do you think you can compete with Skype and so on? You think I want to have your power hungry, quite noisy beast running all damn day when I can just use my laptop or Mac Mini which consumes about as much power as a couple of light bulbs.
- I don’t want to login to some stupid webpage to see if my PSN friends are online. Ever heard of Jabber? Please make it so I can use any damn IM client (basically) to see my PSN friends.
- Nobody cares about Home. You fooled us somehow to believe in the hype. Home is shit. Admit it. And nobody wants to start a game to enter a game. Weak.
- Give us access to the RSX in Linux so we actually can use it for something.
- Add support for all codecs. It’s..beyond moronic to have to transcode on a PC to play something on a machine which could play 6+ 1080P streams simultaneously.
- Give us access to atleast the entire Sony Library of movies and music. And don’t just launch shit for the US. And make the EU Store as good as the US one. We also want a “demos” section and clear labels. God you suck so much.
- Make producers of games on your platform understand that Mouse & Keyboard is something a lot of gamers want to use. And no it doesn’t have to be unfair, look at UT3 from Epic. When you start a server it’s a simple “Yes/No” checkbox to allow players with M+K.
- Ffs add support for USB headsets, enable output of sound through USB – not only input. Are you retarded?
- Stop the bullshit about “only possible on Playstation”. A lot of your consumers aren’t fourteen you know, we’re not dumb as bricks.
Tags: Playstation, sony
Split Fish Frag FX Rev 2 Review
Posted by lars | Filed under Gadgets, Games, Playstation
So I just got my Frag Fx Rev 2 yesterday and it performs a lot better than I actually expected (then again, I was NOT expecting a true mouse/keyboard emulator). In general looking up/down works somewhat less as well as looking to the sides..but it still works a WHOLE lot better than the PS3 controls for an old PC FPS gamer. Here are the list of games (most of em the demos) I have tried it with so far along with my reactions:
Killzone 2
Sluggish, not the best of the bunch that’s for sure. 4/10 (doubtful if the fx will actually improve things much here). boring game though so i dont care
WarHawk
Pretty decent, much better than KZ2
7/10
Mirror’s Edge
Really great actually, I ran through the demo quickly.
8/10
Battlefield Bad Company
Awesome much.
9/10
QuakeWars Enemy Territory
Felt very nice.
8/10
In general it feels like where the games have been made for multi-platform in mind – the control works much better, like if the game were designed around a mouse and keyboard this control will work better. My guess is that’s because on those games they start out with mouse/keyboard and then add support for the PS3 control as where with a native PS3 only title they might never involve the M/K in the same way. Me guesses this will mean that most games will work pretty darn great with the Frag FX. For me it was certainly a halleluljah moment since I have completley given up FPS on the PS3 (can’t stand it).
Tags: frag fx, lars recommends, review, splitfish
Dreambox 800 HD beats a bench
Posted by lars | Filed under Gadgets, Personal
Today I was first looking to buy a bench to workout/benchpress on but since Intersport didn’t have the model I was interested in I decided to hold off on my plans and instead get the Dreambox that I have been planning to get for a long while now :) Should be getting it within the week or something.
Getting a bench isn’t really necceary right now either, I can just go to the gym instead. Our gym here in Stöde isn’t much and I really, really do not like the lack of a proper bench and good barbells and proper weights (they use machines with compressed air which I really don’t like).. but the gym will do the trick. Basically right now I just have to move my ass to loose some freaking weight. The 10kg+ that I put on when I stopped doing snus still haunts my ass..
Anyway..I have been reading up on the Dreambox and I am mentally preparing myself for a frustrating time learning how to upgrade/flash and manage my Dreambox.
Tags: benchpress, dreambox 800 hd, workout
Palm Pre ftw
Posted by lars | Filed under Gadgets, Video, iphone
I think it looks just awesome! So great to finally see something that really seems like a competitor to the iPhone (and no, I’m not counting the Storm as one since BlackBerries are rare here). Me thinks that Apple has a few tricks up their sleeve and as evident by their patents they were actually going to use that “dead” surface of their touch screen sooner or later. We’ll see when we get the “iPhone 2,1“
Tags: palm pre
Rix FM MMS Stream on Sony PSP
Posted by lars | Filed under Gadgets, Music, Personal, Playstation
Phew. That was a MAJOR pain in the ass. After going through all different kinds of solutions including the homebrews (PSPRadio and another one) and using the custom internet radio..and TVersity… and trying to transcode with VLC I finally….FINALLY got it to work.
My mission was simple, get the mms:// (windows media) stream of Rix FM to work on my Sony PSP (running the latest firmware). I really didn’t think it would take me like 10 hours :) What I am now using is Orb running on a virtualized XP install on my Mac Mini. Man alive..the freaking things you do so that your girl can listen to her favourite radio in the mornings…and for us not to having to shelve out for an internet radio.
Things would be SO much easier if stupid Rix FM would just go Shoutcast instead of RETARD windows media for their stream.
Update: I can soon get rid of running Orb in a virtual environment since an OS X version is around the corner
Tags: internet radio, mms, orb, psp, stream, transcode, tversity, vlc
Telia adjust prices for mobile surf and new iPhone plan emerges
Posted by lars | Filed under Gadgets, Swedish, iphone
Ah. Not a day too early. Telia, TeliaSoneras brand in Sweden are today adjusting their mobile surf prices and now you pay a maximum of 9 SEK (approx 1.1 USD) per day when you surf on your cell. This in stark contrast of before today when you were forced to use a custom portal called SurfPort in order not pay a steep price per MB when surfing online unless you had a special surf service.
SurfPort would have been a great idea a few years back, today it’s an outdated and confusing concept especially for a customer with a modern phone with a good browser such as the iPhone. It doesn’t make sense for people to be forced to go through some weird start page in order for them not to pay a premium for every megabyte. New subscription plans are also being launched for iPhone and new flat rate surf plans are also being made available. All in all I am very happy about the adjustments.
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Tags: abonnemang, iphone, plans, price, telia
Media execs, watch and learn from Crunchyroll.com
Posted by lars | Filed under Copyright, Gadgets, Music, Software, Video
Crunchyroll is a video site like YouTube but specialized in anime. I knew that Crunchyroll had been talking about going legit and that they were signing some content distribution deals but I really needed to see it to believe it. Before they worked sort of like YouTube (and in some ways I guess they still do) for anime and had quite a lot of questionable material (copyright-wise) on their site.
They now offer streaming shows in high quality from their site, one of the absolute coolest thing is something they call “simulacast”, this means you can one hour after the latest Naruto airs in Japan – watch it in 720P on their site. Naruto and many, many more (and more coming) are available for only like 60 bucks a year. THIS IS PROGRESS.
In fact this is such a good deal that the largest supplier of Naruto torrents, Dattebayo decided to close down their subtitling of Naruto and instead refer to Cruncyroll and Viz Media (distributor who also offers Naruto in streaming for free, but a week after airing).
Now a streaming option for video I am much more apt to pay for than a streaming option for music, I would just like to be able to bring it with me in a portable format – I’d even be fine with DRM downloads as long as they worked on my iPhone/iPod. (Oh and yes I know that you can rip streams but I’d rather not).
My only caveat with Crunchyrolls service is perhaps that they insist on using FLV which is not really a favorite and is a format that is also quite overly processor intensive. Then again I haven’t really checked..maybe their streams is MP4 compatible and I can watch them on my iPhone..I’m guessing not though. Anyway, since I do watch Naruto I will probably sign up for a year of Crunchyroll to try the service out.
Someone..please..launch world-wide TV series/movies “Spotify” service. I’d pay way more for such a service.
Tags: anime, crunchyroll, spotify
