Flowers

The creator of Gran Turismo 6 likes Bad Piggies

http://www.gtplanet.net/kazunori-yamauchi-interview-track-design-bad-piggies/

It would figure that Kaz Yamauchi would like bad piggies...

The *NEW* XBOX

So... here's my thoughts on the new XBOX:

1. I won't call it by that unfortunate name they've given it for a publicity stunt, I've got an xbox 1 in my closet gathering dust already why would I need another?
2. When I asked my fiancee what it looked like she told me "It looks like a Playstation."  When I showed her  a Wii U, she told me "That's a Wii U" and when I showed her the picture of a PS4 she said "That's definitely a Playstation."  A picture of an XBOX 360 "That's an XBOX".  She knows her consoles.  My point is that XBOX looks like a Playstation, not an XBOX.  The soul is gone in the design.
3. The specs of the controller say it's bigger and heavier than the XBOX 360 controller, which is already too big and too heavy, and it puts my left hand to sleep with that awkwardly placed thumb stick.
4. I already have a tv box from bell, why do I need another?
5. Most of my family and friends already have a Playstation 3, and so do I.  If I switch to XBOX Live, I'll have to get new friends and family to play video games with....
6. My fiancee panics that when I am watching a livestream people can see and hear her, how do you think she'll feel about a video game console that sees and hears her?  (she has spent more time with skype and phones than livestreams, she expects it to be a two way conversation that way)
7. XBOX 360s UI was so hard to figure out that I usually just gave up and gavve the controller to someone else and told them what to find for me.  Most of the time they couldn't find it either.
8. They are using DDR3 for the system memory.  Now this isn't a bad thing, but DDR3 comes in 6 different flavours, how much would you like to bet that Microsoft will cheap out and buy the slow one?
9. AMD APU. Again not a bad thing, in fact it's a pretty good idea, having CPU and GPU on the same chip means less worries about bus length, latency, and timing.  The less you have to worry about differing clock speeds between PCI-e bus and CPU-RAM bus the smoother the operation.  But it comes at a cost, less room for GPU and less room for CPU.  They share space, so are therefore smaller.  An APU just simply won't perform as fast as that Intel i7 and Nvidia GeForce GT 680.  I have the same beef with PS4
10. Operating system:  XBOX 1 came with Windows CE, XBOX 360 came with Windows CE, what do you suppose they will put on the new one? Windows 8 I'll bet, with no desktop, make it look more like a windows phone so more people will try to buy one of the 3 windows 8 phones out there. Or a surface.  Blech, I'm tired ot people complaining to me that their new computer doesn't work how they want it to, go buy a Mac at least then you expect it to be different.
11. I don't like XBOX to begin with, so I'm already biased against it.  There's only one or two titles I actually enjoy playing on either XBOX and that was the  Forza Motorsport games, and Fusion Frenzy.  I'm not a Halo fan, I don't like Madden, I dislike how Call of Duty is okay for teenagers to play even though there's a big white M on the box, and I find it quite uncomfortable to have to give a thumbs up with my left hand and a thumbs down with my right hand in order to play anything on that huge controller they have.  I have pictures showing just how bad it is in my hands, I can't reach X or Y with my thumb if my index and middle finger are on RB and RT at a comfortable place.  In order to reach those two buttons I have to choke up on the controller so I'm pushing RT with the inside of the second knuckle of my middle finger, and RB with the inside of the second knuckle of my index finger.  Now to move the right thumbstick I have to reach down further than before, arching my wrist, and giving my hand a claw-like appearance.  Trying to hit the B button like this is a nightmare, so I usually have to pretty much let go of the controller with my right hand to tap it.  My left hand has to do all the heavy lifting then, so I need to grip it harder with my left hand, which in turn means due to the wedge shape of the XBOX 360 controller I have to grab low and really reach high with my thumb the move the left stick around. I can't reach LT with my middle finger either, because it's holding up the entire weight of the controller.  All in all a very uncomfortable design, and it looks to be more of the same this time around.
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    

Bitcoins, a talking about, not like last time...

So I've been mining bitcoins for a little while now, and, yeah, it's not easy to make bitcoins.  Litecoins are neat, with a cryptography back-end that is intentionally hard to decrypt with current hardware.  In fact it's even hard to decrypt using a purpose built processor. which is supposed to extend the lifetime of mining.  Because of the way transactions in bitcoin and litecoin  work, they seem to be somewhat self-defeating, there is a point in time in the future where we can no longer make any new blocks at the current bit depth, and so no knew transactions can be completed.  This will be the complete and total end of bitcoin, and it's getting closer and closer with every hash created.

At this point I'd advise you not to go into bitcoins if you plan on only mining them for money.  They are money, don't think of them as a means to an end, I don't care that they are currently trading for $100 each, unless you invest thousands of dollars you won't be making thousands of dollars off of bitcoins by joining now.  Litecoins are a different thing entirely,  it is still early in it's mining so there's plenty of blocks out there to be found.  Solo mining of Litecoins is not working well any more, could take you a month or more, while pools from around the world will find a couple dozen.  I'm not going to tell you which pool to join (there's lots) but I will say this find a PPLNS pool for litecoins not PPS.  My reasoning isn't about  You can find all sorts of explanations of PPLNS and PPS on the interwebs somewhere, but my reasoning is that if the pool creators are concerned enough about how we are getting paid, they must be rather hands-on.

Bitcoins

What are they? Where do they come from? Are they valuable?  Most of these questions are easily answered:

1. They are a made up and digital only (with one exception) virtual currency.
2. They started at MIT as a simple idea, that blossomed to a full worldwide currency.
3. They are only as valuable as we (the people using them) decide.

These answers are both what's cool about bitcoins and what makes them a volatile, and risky, currency to invest in.  Because there is no backing to the currency, beyond the work put into mining, there really is no reason not to accept a single bitcoin unit (or 1.0BTC) for any monetary amount.  They have only the value we set for them, much the same as anything else.  A dollar is worth half a loaf of bread because we say it is.  same with the loaf of bread being worth $2.  Does this seem fair? Not when you aren't making the decisions, but of course you are because you still pay those $2 for a loaf of bread. Is a single bitcoin worth $100 CAD? Well, yes right now it is.  Why? because it's accepted as such.

I'd like to go on a rant and complain about the cost of bread, milk, cheese, even wine, but I won't.  You know just as well as I do how bad greed is, so I don't have to tell you.

Get Mac OS X in virtualbox.

http://www.macbreaker.com/2012/07/mountain-lion-virtualbox.html

So I was following this guide and a couple others, but for some reason or another all I get is a black screen when I try to get the installer open.  Anyone know of a working guide?

The job hunt continues?

So it was recently released that where I live has the most cut throat job market.  For every 1 job there are about 100 people for it.  If I am but one of 100 how can I stand out?  In a good way....  

I've heard those with jobs say "Just suck it up and do anything". This sentiment is shared by all sorts of people, young and old, but mostly they are people who never had a problem finding a job.  They go out, drop off a few resumes, and the next day everyone calls them.  They had a choice of jobs, and just went out and got one.  Well to all these people I say this:

I have applied to all sorts of jobs, as well as most Computer stores, department stores, EB Games, Best Buy, and all sorts of other places. DO you have any idea what it's like to hand out 100 resumes to 100 different stores and shops in 2 weeks to not hear anything from any of them ever. Even Tim Hortons won't even call me back... I've applied to restaurants, tourist traps, and construction sites, no one is hiring me.  It's to the point that I just don't know what employers want from me.  Why aren't they hiring me?  Is 32 too old for fast food? is my practicality of not driving because I have no job a hindrance? Does my goatee, or my love of computers keep me from getting the more menial jobs?  What about my resume? My online presence? My clothes? What is it that's keeping me out of work?

I still don't have an answer, but I feel that changing my very being just for a job is not a good idea.  Eventually I'l revert, or hate myself.  I need to be true to me, and I guess that means I need to do something other than "have a job".  I need another solution, if this recent study is correct.  So I've decided that I need to either have a home business or a paying hobby.  The difference? A home business you can live off of, a hobby you can't.