Nüb of the Week: Microsoft

How do I nüb thee? Let me count the ways!

Microsoft. Can they do anything right?

Engadget's article a few nights ago, entitled Latest Xbox 360 update causing problems for some describes symptoms from the latest firmware update ranging from random crashes to bricked consoles! Uh, Microsoft? Beta test? It's not a new concept. Even you were paying attention when Google Labs changed some projects over from "beta" to "labs" status. Although traveling to labs.microsoft.com only shows a page with a paragraph of lame-ass text. Way to go, M$.

A few months back, reading some del.icio.us feeds, I came upon a link for a video at Microsoft discussing a project of theirs, called Photosynth. I was excited about the project because I recognized the concept, and had a fleeting idea of the same idea. "The Making of Photosynth" is now different from what I watched months ago. Bits of them still there, but not so many of the parts that annoyed me. Here's some comments of mine reacting to the original video.

The opening was good, I was excited about the project because I've had fleeting ideas of the same thing. BUT, half of this friggen video is Microsoft saying, "Hey! We did a LABS just like Google!! But it's Live Labs, so it's speeecial!!"

Two very special complaints about Microsoft's latest venture into an already well-saturated market. First, Andy Ihnatko from the Chicago Sun-Times had the following opinion to share.

"The Zune is a square wheel, a product that's so absurd and so obviously immune to success that it evokes something akin to a sense of pity."

Ouch. Pwned.
Way to go Microsoft. Got it wrong, again.

One more way to screw it up, Microsoft. Their release of the Zune includes 100 players with a surprise, the color, not indicated on the outside of the box, is Pink. Yes, Pink. Pepto-Bismol Pink.

I learned of this holiday surprise from a wonderfully-written article, titled "How to Crap All Over a Product Launch, by Microsoft Corp." which even was so generous as to provide us with a photo.

Nüb of the Week: Good Morning America

Good Morning America has a special segment this week, discussing America's Secret Prejudice. I saw a commercial for it on TV, and something sounded familiar. Kind of reminded me of a song I had heard. I tried to find some information about it on Good Morning America's website, and found only one line:

"Be Seen, Be Heard Race in America: Is Everyone a Little Bit Racist?"

My God! They are ripping off Avenue Q! Either that, or they're major n000bs!

Avenue Q pointed out "Everyone's A Little Bit Racist." as early as July 31st, 2003 when it debuted on Broadway.

My apologies for choosing a source video which, inexplicably, was dubbed over scenes from Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith

Control a Roomba with MacBook Tilt Sensor

Pretty neat concept. Personally, I think the MacBook is the wrong device to be controlling the Roomba. I thought someone who had commented was on the same track, but only commenting on interfacing the Mac with the Wii. Tsk tsk! The Roomba needs to be controlled with either the WiiMote or the PS3 SixAxis controller!!

The PC driver for the Bluetooth PS3 SixAxis controller was recently released on a PS3 news site recently. I myself, don't have a PS3 so I cannot test it. *sniff* But I would imagine it would be simple to write code to do such a thing!

Maybe the WiiMote would be your preference? PC Drivers for the Bluetooth WiiMote were released as well. Again, I am unable to test, for I have no Wii. Maybe I should set up a fund? A video demonstation of the WiiMote being used in windows is on YouTube.

Another very cool thing about the WiiMote, it is Bluetooth and triangulates the position of the controller via two sets of infrared LEDs on the sensor bar that comes with the Wii. The sensor bar only plugs in to the Wii for power. I was waay confused when I first read that someone made a wireless version of the sensor bar, but it made more sense and is really impressive to see photos of. Okay it looks kind of ghetto. But it's functional, it can always be prettied up later.

Thanks go to Wired: The Cult of Mac for starting me on this rant :)

Pwn of the week: rm -r *

Reading this really gets your imagination and paranoia going. I think she mega-pwned whomever was on the other end of that line. There are a few scenarios where it would be pretty harmless, but most of the ones that come to mind, it was an act of malice.

rm -r *

I was waiting for a friend in the lobby of the Hilton down at Union Square. Near me was a middle-aged woman speaking loudly into a pay phone.

"Yes, yes, that's right. You've got it. Now, here's what I want you to type. 'are em' ... yes. The letter 'r' and the letter 'm', together. Now type a dash. Yes, like a hyphen. OK, and then another 'r'. Yes rm space hyphen r. OK, now another space and then a star. Shift 8. Yes. Now read it back to me. [pause] OK perfect. Hit return and tell me what happens. [pause] [pause] OK. Thank you. Goodbye."

And she hung up and walked away while the command-line geek inside of me stood paralyzed with fear.

!337$p34K is Evil! OmG!

Leet Speak, is apparently a cryptic language that parents are unable to understand! It can be used to mask conversations from parents so that kids can go out and be little net whores.

Okay, first of all, the newscasters are dumb, and the kid giving them information is dumb. Acronyms are not leet speak. It's not cryptic, AT ALL. It's stupid and pointless, on purpose. The "secret codes" in this newscast are perfectly readable to anyone with a few extra brain cells.

Dear parents, the awful truth is, your kids are WAY better than you at computers. Sure you can get software to filter how and what they look at, but nothing is foolproof. I was installing a program I consider to be a well-designed, powerful computer management software. The person who took the order for me to install the software, knew the customer's child was better at computers than she was, suggested I enable a BIOS password. Good thinking, but, I realized if the kid is smart enough to try and do something like change the OS, he's smart enough to download and burn a live Linux CD. Pop it in, it auto-configures the OS and network card. Boom! Filter-free computer usage and internet. Now what does Mom do?

So, if you're a parent, I hope you have a good enough relationship with your child to either trust them to manage their own computer use. I also hope you trust your child enough to ask them questions and get a truthful answer.

Pwn of the week: iPod

From The Simpsons. A citizen of the future laments: "If only we'd known that iPods would unite and overthrow the very humans they entertained..."

Okay fine, it's a fictional Pwn. But still, damn funny.

Nüb of the week: Worlds Worst Hacker

Oh man. n000b alert. See what happens when real hackers make the automatic hacking programs too good. Put in an IP, and go. There he goes, that is.

shut up i hack you
ok, i'm quiet, hope you don't show us how good a hacker you are ^^
tell me your network number man then you're dead
Eh, it's 129.0.0.1
or maybe 127.0.0.1
yes exactly that's it: 127.0.0.1 I'm waiting for you great attack
in five minutes your hard drive is deleted
Now I'm frightened
shut up you'll be gone
i have a program where i enter your ip and you're dead
say goodbye
to whom?
to you man
buy buy
I'm shivering thinking about such great Hack0rs like you
* bitchchecker (~java@euirc-61a2169c.dip.t-dialin.net) Quit (Ping timeout#)

Noobs and Ebay

Noobs do not belong on the internet. The point is proven recently on Ebay. Some guy purchased a picture of a PS3 for over $800. A PICTURE. FROM CNET.COM's SITE. Can't really blame the guy though, there were 21 bids before him. At least he tried to snipe the item (not exactly a n00b tactic). It just backfired this time. The link is above. More to come.