It's Out There!

Simply wonderful .. classical music not only for the concert halls:

29/31

Funny & fabulous:

Odin & Fenrir

Into Darkness

For the Love of .. Physics

Brilliant, brilliant teacher/professor:

BSG: Blood & Chrome

Wow, I hadn't really noticed the BSG spinoff "Blood & Chrome", and that the webisodes are up on YouTube:

Possible but Pointless

"Ein Leben ohne Mops ist möglich, aber sinnlos." -- Loriot

Exclusive Buzzword Sh .. enanigans

Oh, I hate this buzzword bingo trying to make us customers pay a premium price for stuff you actually won't want or need:

• Exclusive Content
• Premium Access
• Season Pass
• ...

The same applies when reviewers uses the following to characterize a movie, book, etc.

• Instant Classic
• Cult Movie/Book 
• ...

And then there's the endless variation of the same story .. err movie.

• extended edition
• director's cut
• extended director's cut
• alternate endings
• additional footage
• definitive edition
• final version
• ... ad nauseum

I can't remember which director it was, who said that the cut/version he made for the movie will be the only the version. That this version is the director's cut. Good man, this director.

Can you think of a book which has the same kind of variations? Lord of the Rings -- the definitive version (with 3 extra chapters) or War and Peace -- the ultimate edition (with two alternate endings).

Little Lion Man

Engineering Failure

New Blogger Editor Enforced .. Grrr

The new editor for Blogger (Blogspot) has become mandatory since September 19th, 2012 .. again (like with the recent Firefox versions) a step backward. Why changing a working system, when the old one was (almost) perfect. Why is it not possible to update the editor where it is deemed necessary, why switching the whole editor? Things to hate in the new editor:

• You have to remove the link break option (br tags) for each post individually.
• The posting overview has now two lines for each post (feels like three), so the overview is just less efficient.
• Low, low contrast in most (all?) of the editor pages ...
• No filtering of posts except for clicking the label next to the post.
• ...

I am really considering switching to another blogging platform,  but after some tests it does some it's just too much work involved when moving all the existing (1800+) posts to WordPress (despite what WordPress will tell you). Some things I found quickly:

• Links are not converted completely (e.g. for internal references).
• Pictures are not aligned in the same way (compared to the original).
• Colors for fonts are transferred at all.

So I am stuck with this inferior piece of blogger s..oftware .. at least for the moment.

Switch Status Bar (Status-4-Evar)

After Firefox/Mozilla in its infinite wisdom decided to drop the status bar, I had to resort to using Status-4-Evar. From time to time the status bar for no apparent reason disappears and fiddling with the options of the add-on doesn't change a thing. But .. using CTRL + / brings it back to the front.

Remove low disk space warning

On both Windows Vista and Windows 7 you can remove the rather annoying "Low Disk Space Warning" by modifying the Windows registry (adding a new registry key).

• Start --> Run --> Regedit --> OK
• Now navigate to the following location:
  HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\ Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
• Right click on the blank area of the right pane of the registry editor and create a new DWORD value by selecting "New --> DWORD Value".
• Name this newly created DWORD Value "NoLowDiscSpaceChecks"
• Double-click on the new DWORD and assign it the value 1.
• Close the registry editor and reboot Windows.

P.S.: Apparently this didn't work at all ... have to reevaluate a different solution.

Ghost in the Shell SAC

Euler's Disk

Good Guy Chris Nolan

"The question of 3-D is a very straightforward one. I never meet anybody who actually likes the format, and it's always a source of great concern to me when you're charging a higher price for something that nobody seems to really say they have any great love for.

It's up to the audience to tell us how they want to watch the movies. More people go see these films in 2-D, and so it's difficult data to interpret. And I certainly don't want to shoot in a format just to charge people a higher ticket price." -- Christopher Nolan on the question of Batman: The Dark Knight Rises and 3D.

Parasites .. Parasites Everywhere!

Thanks for this veritable hint, I have updated my host file with information about which ad/malware/... websites I want to block/redirect to 127.0.0.1. The bulk of the information (although a bit hard to swallow if you're a non-IT person) is from this website (although the site could use some cleanup/structuring).

Not sure If I will keep it this way, since I am not sure about any negative effects when browsing, playing online games, etc.

P.S.: And I bought winamp Pro 5.9something for about 15 EUR (after taxes).

And now back to my original task ...

Abridged Film Calendar 2012

Film Calendar for 2012 (in progress, of course):

• The Avengers -- 26.04.2012
• The Dark Knight Rises -- 26.07.2012
• Prometheus -- 09.08.2012
• The Hobbit (Part 1) -- 13.12.2012

.. to be continued!

Firefox Menu Editor

Another wasted two hours, after blindly updating from Firefox 10 to 13. Unfortunately, the Firefox 3 Theme for Firefox 4+ doesn't work currently for FF 13. The reason for the update where massive Adobe Flash problems (hangs & crashes), which sometimes even lead to slowing down the whole computer. So finding a Firefox 10.0.2 update was the task, which wasn't so easy since apparently it cannot be found on the Mozilla homepage (or it's hard to locate). The website "oldversion.com" saved the day.

At least I found some useful for Firefox in terms of add-ons. To remove annoying Firefox context menu entries (like "Send Link" or "Send Image"), I can recommend the Firefox Menu Editor. Instead of manually editing the configuration or some userchrome.css file, you can comfortably select the context menu entries you don't want to see any longer.

Deus Ex 3

After lying for more than 6 months on my desk, I finally played and finished Deus Ex 3 two days ago.

Write Like The Wind

Wade in the Water

See also Northern Soul.

Munchkin with Wil Wheaton and Steve Jackson

Keep Calm

.. Like a Girl

Oy with the poodles already

• Lorelai: "Heh, you know what I just realized? "Oy" is the funniest word in the entire world."
• Rory: "Hmm."
• Lorelai: "I mean think about it, you never hear the word "oy" and not smile. Impossible. Funny, funny word."
• Emily: "Oh dear God."
• Lorelai: "'Poodle' is another funny word."
• Emily: "Please drink your drink, Lorelai."
• Lorelai: "In fact, if you put 'oy' and 'poodle' together, in the same sentence, you'd have a great new catchphrase, you know? Like, 'Oy with the poodles already.'"

The Greatest Trick

"The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist." -- Verbal Kint in "The Usual Suspects"

"Mes chers frères, n'oubliez jamais, quand vous entendrez vanter le progrès des lumières, que la plus belle des ruses du diable est de vous persuader qu'il n'existe pas!" -- Charles Baudelaire in "Le Joueur généreux"

Form Follows Function

It is the pervading law of all things organic and inorganic,
Of all things physical and metaphysical,
Of all things human and all things super-human,
Of all true manifestations of the head,
Of the heart, of the soul,
That the life is recognizable in its expression,
That form ever follows function. This is the law."

-- Louis Sullivan in "The Tall Office Building Artistically Considered"

You broke the internet

The Save Sean Bean Campaign (Repost)

As originally posted on Rock Paper Cynic, please support this worthy cause:

Give 'em back their balls!

"All right, that's enough, break it up, you two! Rory Gilmore, you should be ashamed of yourself. Toying with these boys like this. They used to have pride. They used to have dignity. They used to have balls. Damn it Gilmore, give 'em back their balls!" -- Finn in "But Not As Cute As Pushkin" (Gilmore Girls)

Stoop

When in Rome ..

"When in Rome, do as the Romans do." -- attributed to Saint Ambrose (339–397), Bishop of Milano

Battlefield 3 Offline Mode

Start the offline mode by clicking the gearwheel symbol on the upper right side of the start menu. In the resulting pop-menu you can switch to "offline mode". This way you do not need to connect to Battlelog and can start the single player campaign directly.

Prometheus Trailer II

Ender's Game

"I am your enemy, the first one you've ever had who was smarter than you. There is no teacher but the enemy. No one but the enemy will ever tell you what the enemy is going to do. No one but the enemy will ever teach you how to destroy and conquer. Only the enemy shows you where you are weak. Only the enemy tells you when he is strong. And the rules of the game are what you can do to him and what you can stop him from doing to you. I am your enemy from now on. From now on, I am your teacher." -- Mazer Rackham in Ender's Game (1985) by Orson Scott Card.

Fan-tas-tic Military Science Fiction!

somebody I used to know

Another new annoying Firefox "feature" reversed

Remove those address bar shenanigans by changing

• browser.urlbar.formatting.enabled
• browser.urlbar.trimURLs

Update (Firefox 10)

• devtools.inspector.enabled

The Taking of Pelham One Two Three

In general, I have a neutral stance when it comes to remakes of movies. Sometimes the remakes is better, sometimes (actually more often) the original. Yesterday I was was watching the remake of "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three", the original with Walter Matthau & Robert Shaw from 1974, the remake from 2009 with Denzel Washington and John Travolta.

Wow, what a difference. The original has a good cast with two outstanding lead actors and the story develops nicely. The remake has an even better overall cast, but the performance is underwhelming, which I mainly blame on the script (not the actors). It simply seems that everything interesting about the original story has been stripped from the story, e.g. the military style gang (each of the gang members with some distinctive features), the trick employed by the motorman to overcome the dead-man's switch was much more detailed and finally the hunt for the fleeing gang is much more vivid.

Original:1 vs. Remake: 0

Game of Thrones Seven Devils Trailer (2nd Season)

'Nuff said.

Fortschritt

Be careful the cat!

"Don't say 'cat' if he's not in the sack."

"Be careful the cat! No say the cat is in the sack when you have not the cat in the sack!"

"The cat is in the sack, but the sack is not closed. The cat is in it, but [the sack] is open ... and it's a wild cat!"

-- Giovanni Trappatoni (Italian football coach)

Reference: Wall Street Journal.

Parachute (Original vs. Cover)

Game of Thrones Shadow Trailer (2nd Season)

Can't wait 'til April 1st, 2012.

The Hobbit (Trailer) 2012

O who rides by night thro' the woodland so wild?

"Wer reitet so spät durch Nacht und Wind?
Es ist der Vater mit seinem Kind.
Er hat den Knaben wohl in dem Arm,
Er faßt ihn sicher, er hält ihn warm.

2. Mein Sohn, was birgst du so bang dein Gesicht?
Siehst Vater, du den Erlkönig nicht!
Den Erlenkönig mit Kron' und Schweif?
Mein Sohn, es ist ein Nebelstreif.

3. Du liebes Kind, komm geh' mit mir!
Gar schöne Spiele, spiel ich mit dir,
Manch bunte Blumen sind an dem Strand,
Meine Mutter hat manch gülden Gewand.

4. Mein Vater, mein Vater, und hörest du nicht,
Was Erlenkönig mir leise verspricht?
Sei ruhig, bleibe ruhig, mein Kind,
In dürren Blättern säuselt der Wind.

5. Willst feiner Knabe du mit mir geh'n?
Meine Töchter sollen dich warten schön,
Meine Töchter führen den nächtlichen Reihn
Und wiegen und tanzen und singen dich ein.

6. Mein Vater, mein Vater, und siehst du nicht dort
Erlkönigs Töchter am düsteren Ort?
Mein Sohn, mein Sohn, ich seh'es genau:
Es scheinen die alten Weiden so grau.

7. Ich lieb dich, mich reizt deine schöne Gestalt,
Und bist du nicht willig, so brauch ich Gewalt!
Mein Vater, mein Vater, jetzt faßt er mich an,
Erlkönig hat mir ein Leids getan.

8. Dem Vater grauset's, er reitet geschwind,
Er hält in den Armen das ächzende Kind,
Erreicht den Hof mit Mühe und Not,
In seinen Armen das Kind war tot."

Clarke's Three Laws

1. When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
2. The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
3. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

Perfection & Excellence

"Gentlemen, we are going to relentlessly chase perfection, knowing full well we will not catch it, because nothing is perfect. But we are going to relentlessly chase it, because in the process we will catch excellence." -- Vince Lombardi (1959)

Die Autoscroll Die

To disable the most annoying autoscroll "feature" (should be quadruple quotation marks really) in Firefox, just open the "Options" dialog through "Tools --> Options". Then click on the "Advanced" tab, and uncheck the “Use autoscrolling” box.

Problem solved.

The Cold Winds Are Rising

Prometheus Trailer

Low-Tech Science Fiction. Aliens. Ridley Scott. What's not to like??