Atari in trouble: Story here. But the story understates Atari's effect in home computers. For a brief period in the early 1980's Atari outsold Apple. Then Atari (which had it's own version of Visicalc) concentrated on games and ignored productivity software. And then they made matters worse by concentrating on games for their game systems rather than their home computers. Eventually they were sold off by Warner to the founder of Commodore Computers who later in the 80's introduced the first mass computer with a full megabyte of ram, back when ram was $300 per megabyte.

MovieBeam - DOA - Again? With Cable, DirecTv, Echostar, Netflix and Blockbuster; why would you pay for a set-top box that will only store the newest Disney Movies, and then charge you to see those movies. Whats wrong with Moviebeam?
1. You have to pay for a set top box.
2. You have to pay an activation fee.
3. You have to pay for each movie you wish to view. Currently $3.98 for new releases.
4. Only Disney Movies are available as current releases. Some older Warner titles also available. At present no Sony movies are available. Other studio movies
will be available later, as they are released to Pay-per-view.
5. "Upto" 10% of 100 movies stored on Moviebeam are replaced each week,
if it's one you rented POOF, you can't watch it anymore.
6. You can watch a rented movie as many times as you want, but only for 24 hours.
7. If you live out in the stix, you can't receive OTA datacasts to update the box.
Elsewhere, hopefully the antenna will work OK.
8. Will they leave you holding the bag when they shut down again?
9. Why does the 800 number on their website not work?
10. CNN panned it on their morning news show on 2/14.
11. Why does 100 movies seem like less than 50,000 of Netflix?
12. Only some of the movies are HD format, and their rental currently is $1 extra.
13. You have a 14 day trial period, during which you can opt out and return the hardware, BUT there's a $39.99 restocking charge in the fine print.

Great cell phone: I ended up with a Sony/Ericsson w600i to replace my Motorola v600 which at 20 months age started having reception issues. The Sony phone is mahlvelous.
Sony calls it a Walkman phone, but its everything an iTunes phone should have been but wasn't. Only shortcoming is you can't add memory.

w600i .......................................v600
256 Megs Memory .................5 Megs Memory
400 Hours Standby ..............175 Hours Standby
.....battery Life .............................battery Life
Infrared
18 bit color screen ...................16 bit color screen
1.3 Megapixel Camera ................VGA Camera
Flash for Camera
FM Radio
Supplied USB Cable......................USB Cable extra cost
Supplied software .......................software extra cost
for PC transfer

Firefox minor fix out. Firefox 1.501 is now available, even in custom builds for Macintosh G4 or G5, available here. For the rest of you folks, it's here.

First report of running Windows XP on an Intel Mac: Someone has figured out how to do it. Whether its an easily reproducable technique is another matter. In theory, it should be easier to run XP on the new Macs, than run Mac OS X on a PC. Story here:

Fake MSN phishing web Pages shut down : Guess they weren't bribing enough. Bulgaria shut down some scammers. Story here.

New Firefox Browser for Intel Macintosh : Read about it here. Download it here.

Outrageous fear mongering : A storage "Expert" with perhaps a vested interest in Backup Tape solutions warns that CDs can have a 2 year life span, maximum 5 years. Story here. Silly me, despite the lack of credibility of the story, I pulled out some 5 and 6 year old CDs, and they were ALL perfectly 100% as readable as one created yesterday.

Google Earth - The Killer App for 2006. Totally awesome. And free for the Basic version. With the $200 add-on for the $400 Pro version you could plan a trip, make a video of the route, export it to a wmv, and then to a Podcast? Get the software (Windows or Macintosh) at earth.google.com

Same Tune, different verse - I'm sorry, I'm underwhelmed by new "Intel" Macintosh computers with Intel Dual core processors. If I thought it was bogus talking how much faster these processors make your computer before, it's still the same if they're in a formerly single processor Macintosh. Folks with an iMac tend not to be the one's doing commercial movie editing where (when it comes out in March) there's a high-priced application that can take advantage of the dual core Intel processor. Indeed, for now, most Macintosh applications are in worse shape. Not only don't they take advantage of the dual core processor, they don't even run directly on the Intel processor, but have the added overhead of "Rosetta" which translates PowerPC apps for Intel on the fly. It was sad watching Steve Jobs trying to double talk his way through using Photoshop that was struggling on a new Intel iMac. And of course forget about "Classic", as there's now no way of running OS 9 aplications on the Intel Macs. Real Soon Now, however, you will be able to run PC apps on such a Macintosh.

Free is Good - Thank you Google: Google announced that it will give away free software to help folks with their PCs. Story here:

Intel trickery - Fast new dual core Pentium D chips allow parallel processiing. Too bad no extant software you are likely to use gets any benefit from the more expensive chip. Read here:

Where's the Beef? of VISTA Bill Gates gave a "keynote" speech at yesterday's opening of the CES. It was largely a commercial for the next version of Windows : "VISTA", which has already been delayed. Microsoft is now in a lose-lose situation. It's credibility is suffering by the continued delays in anticipated release dates for VISTA (not to mention patching serious bugs in Windows WMF files). Microsoft already has web pages urging people upgrade to this vaporware OS. Computer sales will soon start to slump as folks will hold off buying Windows XP loaded computer(s), but rather have a VISTA loaded computer, thereby saving $200 per machine. Very soon, if not already, it will be time for Microsoft to issue "Technology Guarantee Upgrade" coupons for free upgrades to Windows VISTA with each new computer loaded with XP.

Symantec doesn't understand how a calendar works. My Macintosh has one of their products installed, Norton AntiVirus 10.0.2, and today Jan 1, 2006, it says "Your virus definitions appear to be out of date", despite the fact their date is 12/28/2005.

Cables 25 years ago when a parallel cable was only available as a hand made item from the United States, it cost $40. These days, mass produced in China, even the best are under $10. So it amazes me that stores would charge (and get) $29.99 for a USB 2 cable, when they are also available at your local 99 Cent store for 99 cents.

FOLLOWUP: For 99 cents, its an "Office Essentials USB 2.0 Device Cable"; fine print on the back of the package says "Manufactured by Belkin Corporation", the very same folks who make the $29.99 cables others sell.

HAPPY FESTIVUS - If you forgot about Festivus remind yourself here.

DirecTv rollout of their own DVR - It's not going so well. Story here . DirecTv could break their arms patting themselves on their backs as they try to spin it that its going well, when even the DVR newbies are complaining. It's gotten so bad that if you buy the unit on their website it's now FREE. How good can it be if they have to give it away to get people to take it. Smart folks still ask for TiVo.

Problem with Apple Powerbook screens : New 15 inch screens on Powerbooks are (in a word) defective. Story here. I assume Apple will do their usual stonewall, and then after a month capitulate and do the right thing. I had the identical problem with a Sony 19 inch standalone LCD monitor and ClubMac took it back and gave me full credit.

New use for Cell Phones - As a wireless pong paddle. It's called Gesture-based technology.
Georgia Tech folks developed it using the cell phone's camera as a motion detector. Their link is here.

BellSouth uses strong arm tactics to try to stop New Orleans WiFi - The only way I know how to protest is to complain to Cingular, since I do not live in "BellSouth" territory. Story here.

BETTER THAN THE BEST - I've already decided that Firefox 1.5 is the best browser out there. I can finally check email at mail.com without the myriad pop-under ads they have appearing. hurrah! But now if you own a G5 Apple Macintosh, there is a "G5 optimized version" available here.

64 Bit Windows grief: Those on the bleeding edge of Windows technology with the 64 bit version of Windows XP Pro have been complaining about the lack of hardware drivers. Some help is available. An excellent compatibility chart is here.

JUST LIKE TiVo - The Houston Office a a Major DISH Network supplier now has radio ads incorrectly (and illegally) describing the DISH DVR as just like TiVo. We'll see what TiVo has to say about that. They already have a pending lawsuit against Echostar for patent infrongement.

No Christmas for Sony, they've been very bad : is what some people say after what Sony/BMG did with CD copy protection. They have an image here. Sony has yet to deliver the promised simple uninstaller for their rootkit.

Microsoft delays next beta of Windows VISTA: Now in 2006. Read about it here.

Excellent summary story of Sony's hubris in the CD DRM fiasco. Thanks to Cpt. Spaulding for alerting me to the story here.

Advances in Browsing the Internet: Firefox 1.5 is due out this afternoon. Get it here. Which sometime this afternoon (November 29, 2005) will redirect to the Firefox 1.5 download page. Available as of 3:30 PM CST here.

Followup: Installed, and loving it! I love the tabbed browsing! FAQ on Mozilla Firefox 1.5 is here.

Apple's future plans?: Apple has worked hard to prevent leaks, even suing some folks, but the "rumors" continue, usually pretty accurate. One of the best places to get predictions is here.

On the Xbox 360 front (glad I don't have one) more reports of their crashing are posting, and a possible solution. Some sources say its due to an overheating powersupply,
so put the large brick of a powersupply where its not on the floor.

The grief of being a Diabetic. Read this

Give yourself a stock market tip today: Drive by some retail stores and note which ones have full parking lots with people streaming out of the store carrying many items, and which ones have half empty parking lots with folks walking out empty handed. Call your cousin over 1000 miles away and see if the situation is the same by them.

The Bleeding edge: Some of those that had to be first with an X-Box 360, are paying the price. Reports are coming in of crashing units. The rest of you are advised.

Beat the Customer Service System: Major corporations are being penny wize and pound foolish by trying to cut corners on customer service. Most annoying is the difficulty getting past an automated phone system to a human being. One web site has a list a "secret numbers" to get past the system. Merely getting past the automated system doesn't help with most companies. The frontline CSRs have near zero authority, and have handle time limits, quotas on # of escalations, and quotas on upsells. Often they happily lie to you to get you off the phone so the phone call is short. Worse yet they may be in India, and barely speak understandable English.

One gets FAR better results starting at top, rather than at bottom. This is where GOOGLE saves the day. Google "name of company Executive services" or "Name of company presidents office", google both the web and groups.

FOLLOWUP: It's been suggested to me that it may not be appropriate to suggest harrassing executives. To which I reply and further explain:

The people I suggest getting to are most certainly not executives, just sometimes labeled as such, merely third level support people that often:

1. Do have the authority to ignore stupid guidelines, or grant compensation.
2. Are not subject to handle time limits.
3. Will take ownership of an unique issue.

The "top" I referred to is top of the telephone support chain, not top of company chain of command, I regret any confusion. And where did I say harrass anyone? Any more than talking to a support person when an automated telephone system might more readily find your answer isn't also "harrassment"???

TIME Magazine person of the year for 2005: My nominees:

1. GOOGLE
2. A chicken with the flu in China
3. ipod
4. Valerie Plame

Cardinal arguing against evoluton doesn't know squat about science: "Common sense tells us that matter cannot organize itself" says Cardinal Scoenborn arguing for "Intelligent Design". Since he apparently never took a collegiate class in Geology or heard the lecture in week 2 about minerals and crystals, he doesn't know that matter certainly does organize itself, and all the time. It's the very definition of a mineral "A substance with definite chemical composition and characteristic physical properties", or another definition includes "orderly internal structure" such as the organized way atoms arrange into molecules, and can be so identified by crystal shape, hardness, cleavage or x-ray. Some of us learned Moh's hardness scale: Talc, Gypsum, Calcite, Fluorite, Apatite, Orthoclase, Quartz, Topaz, Corundum, Diamond. Or for the layperson, how about how carbon organizes itself into the mineral "Diamond" ???? These aren't theories, they are established fact. And matter certainly organizes itself when DNA replicates.

Ban drugs with side effects?: If you really want to ban drugs with potential dangerous side effects like Vioxx, then maybe ban ASPIRIN too. Story here.

Just say no to Microsoft - How to ditch Microsoft and why it's not as hard as you think. That's the title of a new book, available at discount from Amazon.

Warning for Roadrunner Subscribers in Houston - You heard it here first. Warner cable is going after folks for theft of cable service. That is their right, problem is what will likely happen is their auditors will spot taps into their lines going to houses not subscribed to Cable Television Service, and they'll file legal charges against some folks that have Roadrunner and not Cable TV. Such situations are not new, and I guarantee some innocent folks will get hurt again this time.

OS X 10.4.3 upgrade grief: My Macintosh crashes
panic(cpu 0 caller 0x000E7FF4): vnode_put(371a108): iocount < 1
Latest stack backtrace for cpu 0:
Backtrace:
0x00095698 0x00095BB0 0x0002683C 0x000E7FF4 0x000E7FA0 0x000EE960 0x000EECE0 0x000EED80
0x002A9BF4 0x000ABE30 0x0043006F
Proceeding back via exception chain:
Exception state (sv=0x2EEB2500)
PC=0x90021A4C; MSR=0x0000D030; DAR=0x038B0018; DSISR=0x40000000; LR=0x918F7F7C; R1=0xBFFFF410; XCP=0x00000030 (0xC00 - System call)

Kernel version:
Darwin Kernel Version 8.3.0: Mon Oct 3 20:04:04 PDT 2005; root:xnu-792.6.22.obj~2/RELEASE

_PPCModel: PowerMac7,3, BootROM 5.1.8f7, 2 processors, PowerPC G5 (2.2), 1.8 GHz, 1 GB
Graphics: ATI Radeon 9600 XT, ATY,RV360, AGP, 128 MB

Nothing I try works. Not either the Combo or Incremental Update to 10.4.3, not turning off Norton antiVirus, not deleting all third party widgets, not uninstalling Stuff-It Deluxe. 30 Seconds after a Boot-Up finishes, it crashes.

FOLLOWUP:
email to Support@apple.com brought an automated form letter answer telling me to go away, but a Google search of "panic(cpu 0 caller 0x000E7FF4)" led me to the Ars Technica forum where a poster wrote that it was a "permissions" issue, so running Disk Utility from my backup drive to "Repair Permissions" on the crashing drive, brought 2 pages of repairs, and a reboot of original drive now works. With 100 repaired permissions, no telling which one(s) fixed it, but all is OK now.

New larger capacity Cingular SIM card: FREE: While I was on the phone last week with Cingular's "Office of the President" getting in writing the status of International Calling on my cell phone (I had it turned off so if my phone is lost or stolen, a multi-thousand dollar bill couldn't result from International calls), I complained about their somewhat dishonest commercials, which tell of the new improved Network resulting from the combination of AT&T Wireless and Cingular. In point of fact one needs to replace their 32K SIM with a 64K SIM to achieve the new improved coverage. Phones sold by Cingular before the merger had 32K SIMs, now they all have 64K SIMs. Oh, by the way, Cingular wants $25 for a 64K SIM if you don't have one. I suggested I should get one for free since the commercials said I had better coverage now, which I don't with my former 32K SIM, and it was agreed I'd be sent a 64 K SIM for free.

Digital output from DirecTv with TiVo units: These units record digitally but if you want to save or archive a recording, the output goes through a digital to analog conversion that adulerates the quality. Luckily with millions sold, and the TiVo boxes being programmed in Linux, some folks have figured out how to add software to their boxes to allow for "video extraction". And in some cases the procedure for doing so has been carefully documented, or even automated. A simple Google search can find it.

Is Sony finally getting a clue? Sony has now agreed to swap out its badly protected CDs for normal ones. Story here.

Arrogant Web Programmers: I go to pay my Car insurance on the web, and am presented with : "Sorry. The application is unavailable at this time. Please try again later. Click here to return to the our homepage." So I call their 800 number, and am told: "I am showing that the Auto Policy should be viewable and available for bill pay.", Well it wasn't. An hour later, I get an email telling me I must use Browser "Q". Why they would want to limit their customers that way is beyond my comprehension. It's certainly customer unfriendly. It's also obvious their programmers never visited http://www.anybrowser.org so they could learn simple programming techniques to make their web payment Browser independant.

DirecTv and their Bedbug letter: Tradition has it that the first boilerplate form letter was sent by a Railroad to a gentleman complaining about finding bedbugs in his sleeper compartment. Attached to the apologetic letter he received was the note: "Send this jerk the bedbug letter".

So when DirecTv wrote me back when I complained that after 2 months a promised call from the Presidents Office had never come, the letter contained:

Thank you again for contacting us, and I'm sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused you.

Sincerely,

Jennifer
DIRECTV Customer Service


Thank you for writing. <<ADD EMPATHY STATEMENT>>.

Sony admits defeat (at least for now): Saturday - Sony announces it's stopping using copy protection on its Music CDs. Story here. Their copy protection really only hurt their honest customers, not the pirates selling bootleg copies on street corners.

Intelligunt Desine: In case anyone didnt realize it. So called Intelligent Design, another cloaking device for attempts to use a Christian Bible as a Scientific Textbook and force it into secular public schools, formerly under the guise of "Creationism"; Pat Robertson's over the top comments Thursday is proof once and for all, that its all about getting his brand of religion into secular schools.

Another "fun" cellular fact: Cell phone warranties are worthless. They sell you a phone with a 1 year warranty and a 2 year plan. That makes no sense to me. But if something goes wrong with phone it will almost always be labeled "Customer Abuse". Warranty stories are here, and here, and here.

Report from SBC conversations: SBC, still blaming Cingular for their problems, calls me and gives me the number to "The Office of the President" at Cingular. Problem is the number given me is busy 24 hours a day. So I Google "Cingular Office of the President", and come up with a variety of phone numbers. Seems Cingular still has not fully integrated all the pieces from when it was created by the merger of several local cellular carriers back in 2000; and every area (maybe Call Center) has its own "Office of the President". I am finally directed to the one for Texas, and actually on my third try get a helpful lady who agrees to put in writing that my account can not make or receive any International Phone calls. She seems to take seriously the issue of SBC incorrectly reporting Cingular cell usage on its combined billing web page. She looks up distance to a tower for my sons' new address, and she agrees to give me a free upgrade to a 64K SIM so my phone can better use the new "combined" ATT Wireless/Cingular" Network. Finally she pushes a new software roaming profile to my phone. It'd all be great if regular CSRs had this much authority, knowledge and freedom from handle time contraints without upsell quotas.

Anger at Sony continued arrogance builds momentum. Lawsuits. Trojans hiding behind Sony DRM software. Consumer group rallying.

Did you feel that? Distant major astronomical catastrophes generate gravity waves that scientists are now trying to document to prove part of Einstein's theories on general relativity.
Story here.

Buy puts on SBC !! At least based on my experience with them they are needlessly generating thousands of extra support calls requiring extra support personnel.

I had signed up for combined billing of Cingular and SBC "POTS" (Plain Old Telephone Service), and dsl. The web site promised $4/month discount. Previously I refused because you would lose the ability to track your Cingular minutes used if you went to combined SBC billing. But by now I have banked over 5,000 rollover minutes, so I no longer need to track the minutes.

Meanwhile today the Cingular site shows 5,929 Rollover Minutes available, the SBC site shows 404 minutes. a minor discrepency. Ask anyone at SBC, they say "Talk to Cingular". Ask anyone at Cingular, they say "Talk to SBC". Turns out SBC is now duplicating the effort of Cingular and they are BOTH showing the status of your Cingular usage. Too Bad the SBC effort is now superfluous, and needs to be shut down as it is pulling over the WRONG information. I got to a senior Customer Service Manager at SBC, and she still says "I'll call Cingular". Can you say "Lilly Tomlin lives"?

Luckily I follow my own advice: It's been said the three most important things you can do with a desktop computer are:
1. Backup

2. Backup

3. Backup

So this morning when a power glitch shut down my Macintosh G-5, I rebooted. Within 30 seconds after rebooting it crashed, and repeated that action after subsequent reboots. Two possible causes. Memory failure, corrupted system software. I had installed a 2nd Hard Drive and using Apple's provided software had done a "Restore" of one hard drive to another. So I rebooted from a backup clone of my Hard Drive (about 2 weeks old) and all is good. And with Gmail, saving all my mail to its servers, and just a few data files easily recovered from the original hard Drive, all is well ! !

Cingular, International Long Distance: So I was concerned about the $24,000 cell bill if your phone gets lost and the finder calls Guatemala a lot before you realize phone is lost. So I call Cingular Monday to ask if International Long Distance can be blocked on my cell phone. I'm told it can't. I ask for a supervisor, who then tells me "It already is". So which is the truth, and which CSR lied to me to keep their handle time down? I'll call again today, and call everyday, until they agree to put it in writing for me.

Sony to get sued, bigtime. Story here.

Cellular carriers back off if you go public : Unlike credit cards, that limit you to $50 liability if you lose it, and have some simple "Fraud Alert" software in place, Cellular Carriers love trying to rip you off if your phone gets lost or stolen and a large bill results. They lobby state governments to keep it that way, but know they are the bad guys as if it gets out, and the customer goes public, they waive the charges. Story here.

Sony DRM Decloaking Patch Might Crash Windows - Story here

Best story on Sony perfidy: Sony DRM is worse than you might think

Building out Wi-Fi coverage - Some colleges may have it for a department, or a floor or rarely even a building or Library. Some are needlessly paranoid about security. M.I.T. is close to having it everywhere. A map of their coverage (802.11a,b,g) is here.

More on Sony perfidy: Sony is backing down somewhat. Their patch to reveal the hidden software is here. Contrary to some reports, that "patch" only removes the cloaking, not the previously hidden DRM software. Sony falsely claims there are no security concerns. Indeed it is the security concerns that caused the uproar. Four solutions to keep Sony from messing up your computer. Any PC running the MS Vista beta gets royally messed up if the a Sony "protected" CD gets to do its thing.

1. Don't buy these Copyprotected CDs. Amazon usually indicates if DRM software is present.

2. Use a Macintosh

3. On a PC running Windows XP - Turn off CD Autoplay

4. After using the Sony patch, "according to Mikko Hypponen, director of research for Finnish antivirus company F-Secure Corp., users who want to remove the program may not do so directly, but must fill out a form on Sony's Web site, download additional software, wait for a phone call from a technical support specialist, and then download and install yet another program that removes the files."

If Sony needs such a HUGE FAQ to try to explain their copy protection, it's obvious at the very least that the copy protection is bad news and customer unfriendly. Further they deny the correct claim that their software is spyware. It is installed secretly with no way to uninstall. Fits most any standard definition of spyware/malware.

Here's a real world tale of what happens when a buyer is turned off by DRM on a CD.

"The cover-up is the crime": Wired.

Others suggest boycotting the Playstation 3 until Sony withdraws its DRM.

Firestorm erupts over Sony's Spyware! Sure to discourage folks from buying legal copies of music is Sony's over the top DRM software secretly installed on ones PC. First reported here.

My Inventions - Like Ralph Cramden I sometimes have "brilliant" ideas. One recent one, a cell phone for women with a built in Mace Sprayer. A device halfway there is now being marketed. A pepper spray in the shape of a cell phone. A bogus phone however, not a real one like my idea.

Any trick or treaters dressed as Bloggers ? Allegedly thats a 21st century costume.
"Pajamas, a laptop, and no shower are all you need to complete the look..." — and this link, of course.

Goodwrench or Rookiewrench

Goodwrench ??- In Houston, TX at my Pontiac, Buick,
Cadillar, Hummer Dealer they have Mr. Rookiewrench, at usual outrageous
dealer pricing. I do my own service work, and get it right.

On a 2005 Vibe, they were prepared to install the wrong oil filter, the
wrong oil, and the WRONG transmission fluid. The Service Manager had no
clue. I had to teach him to read an owners manual.

And then GM ignores this complaint, and wonders why it continues to lose sales to Japanese companies.

Great New York City street vendor Hotdogs now available in Houston, TX An upscale supermarket - Central Market is now carrying Sabrett brand products. YUM! Skinless Beef Hot Dogs, and condiments: Onions in Sauce (Pushcart Style), Sweet Relish, and Spicy Brown Mustard. It's almost 1968 again on 45th street and 6th Avenue. And this (and more) could even all be ordered over the web.

GLOBAL WARMING:

We know that in recent Geologic History the climate has changed to far greater degrees than we have measured in last 200 years. Witness 4 "Ice Ages" in the Pleistocene, and higher sea levels in the past as evidenced by Gravel Terraces throught the world.

So while current climate change is a concern, it is the height of human arrogance to assume that "man" has caused it all, when we KNOW of a greater range of climatic change before humankind was a factor. With 80 % of the Earth covered by Oceans, that water absorbs more Carbon Dioxide than we can ever calculate, and the Carbon Dioxide becomes part of Calcium Carbonate in skeletons of micro and macro creatures, settling to the ocean floor and forming beds of limestone, freeing the oceans to absorb ever more Carbon Dioxide as it has throughout Geologic History, i.e. Chalk of Dover

Geologists and Paleontologists have used the remains in such Limestone beds to track the evolution of life in the past Billion years, and such evidence provides part of the proof that gives the lie to "Creationism".

Watch what you print, the government is now watching you. Can one partially get around this by buying anonymously with cash, and not registering their printer with manufacturer?

Save on an HDTV Apparently incentives given to managers at BestBuy to move high margin accesories can distort the buying process, and an astute buyer can use that to their advantage. Read about it here.

Attracting Tourists Apparently most California political entities don't do a very good job. I'm about to visit my son in Los Angeles. So 2 weeks ago, I filled out web forms to receive "tourist" information. They ought to jump on such live prospects, and send out mail immediately. Not so. It two weeks to receive my first tiny brochure. It was from Redondo Beach. Of course the brochure points to a dead "url" www.visitredondo.com/passport, when apparently its been changed to here.

A DirecTv HDTV Receiver with Tivo (HR10-250) runs on Linux, and as such can have software added to it to increase its' capabilities, like controlling it over the web. It's by now a well documented process, here, here, and here. That's just the tip of the iceberg of what can quickly be found with Google.

Yale Law School and Audio CD copy Protection: What they have to say is here

City of Houston misplaced priorities: Come to find out today that the City has secretly cancelled it's recycling program so it can devote more people and trucks to picking up Hurricane Rita debris. Some points:

1. Shouldn't the city be getting money from FEMA to cover overtime for Rita ?
2. Since when does the needs of the few (Rita trash holders) outweigh the needs of the many (every resident should have recycling).
3. Shouldn't picking up nonbiodegradable plastic (which the city sells) be a higher priority than biodegradable tree branches?

OUCH ! Just got my 2005-2006 Flu shot today, first day they were available. Just in case there's any problems this year I'm covered. This years' flu shot protects against:

• A/New Caledonia/20/99-like (H1N1),
• A/California/7/2004-like (H3N2), and
• B/Shanghai/361/2002-like viruses.
  

Thus any other type of flu outbreak isn't covered.

========================

As the Jewish holy days now unfold, in this season of repentance, let me ask for your forgiveness for my (blogging) sins (both commission and omission).

Upgrading my Macintosh G5 - It originally came with an 8x DVD burner, a Pioneer DVR-107; I have upgraded it by using a Pioneer DVR-110D 16x burner obtained cheap from Shop4Tech

Apple has instructions here.

Followup The Drive came with version 1.08 of firmware installed, which I immediately
updated to 1.17, only to have version 1.22 released on Sept. 30, so I got to update again. If I recall correctly version 1.22 allows me to read DVDs created on Rigel 4.

More HD stations for me from DirecTv, XM too: Thanks to Congress and FCC rules, you need a waiver from your local station to receive a National Network feed if you live in an area that has local channels. Independent locals usually deny them for fear of losing local ad revenue. Network owned stations usually grant them for HD channels.

Such was the case for me in Houston, TX. ABC and Fox, both owned by their respective Network granted a Waiver, and so I now receive channels 86 and 88. CBS and NBC denied waivers, so I do not receive channels 80 or 82.

It took 5 weeks from first requesting (through DirecTv) waivers, and final word from the 4 networks.

No added cost as long as you're paying for either local channels or the HD package.

XM Satellite radio will be on DirecTv for no extra cost starting November 15. Woo Hoo.
More information at directv.com/xm or their channel 800. For a standard "Total Choice" package that means 50 of the 150 XM stations, instead of the current 30 Music Choice stations.

POWER OUTAGES FROM RITA in Houston Area: Centerpoint Energy seems to be reducing by half the number of folks without power each day. One can appreciate the task seeing their map of outages.

Unloaded my Xbox on eBay today.

Post Rita : MONDAY: Almost back to normal now (on the West side of Houston), except most businesses and schools closed till Wednesday. Gasoline is now readily available, and supermarkets are open, just lacking beans, bread, milk and eggs.

If it ain't Boeing, I'm not going : Airbus Industries proves it can't keep its' planes safe.

Rita went East : Our west side of Houston got about 2" of rain (zero flooding) and wind gusts to 50 mph, and by 6:30 AM the rain which started 11 hours earlier was over although it is still windy, with gusts to maybe 30 mph. We still have power, telephone and water, so all in all the effect was far less than Alicia for our corner of the world. Only two minor issues. One, we will apparently have to wait a day or three for gasoline (although we don't need any at the moment), and a slight reallignment of the HDTV OTA antenna is in order.
Guaranteed later today and tomorrow the highways will be a mess as folks try to return home. It seems like the exodus was in stages. 900 folks in buses on Wednesday, 2,000,000 in their own cars on Thursday. Hundreds (or thousands) ran out of gas in the 2 mph traffic jam. In a last ditch effort to prevent potential tragedy, late Friday the Houston Mayor had the Transit Authority send buses out the highways to pick up motorists and get them to safety, and 90% + refused to leave their cars, as the cars were laden with valuables. Haven't heard yet if anyone stuck on the side of highway 59 NE of town suffered as a result of being stranded on the side of the road. The area around Lufkin, TX is still getting pounded by wind and rain.

FOLLOWUP: 2:45 PM, the sun is out, I've been encouraged to shelter in place and there is no gasoline in Houston. Walked 5 blocks to the local Quickey Mart and was told it would be Monday before they got Newspaper deliveries. How many tens of thousands of people will go to the web, and discover they dont need the newsprint hardcopy version, I wonder.

Hurricane Rita - Report from Houston: Not living by the coast (50 miles inland) or in a low lying area (I'm at 62' elevation) it was not suggested I evacuate by public officials, and I didn't. Nearly 2 million others have, and major interstates, now literally have a 100 mile backup/gridlock. Meanwhile back in Houston, all major roads out of town are moving at 2 mph, 95 % of gas stations are out of gas and/or are closed, and if one can get to the airport, it takes hours to get through security as TSA personnel either evacuated or couldn't get to the airport.
Heres what happened when regular people tried to evacuate. This prediction of RITAs path was spot on 36 hours before NOAA figured out the storm would land East of Galveston Bay.

How to BLOG: The definitive textbook on blogging has now been published. Read about it here.

Yellow journalism in Hurricane warnings : The local media in Houston loves to scare it listeners about potential Hurricane strikes; anything so you watch the 10:00 news, or buy tomorrows paper. Me, I just go to the National Hurricane Center web site. They've done an excellent job of predicting 3 days out, and do better than they know for 5 days out. I just extrapolate the direction of migration of the 5 day out prediction which is updated every 6 hours, and do quite well.

It's against their rules, so they let people die: At the New Orleans airport FEMA refused to allow an out-of-state doctor attend to sick (and dying) Katrina victims, as he had not done all the paperwork to be in their database, and later when he had, they never used him. Read about it here.

No more Fords for me: I am very happy with my new Pontiac Vibe, good gas mileage, plenty of interior space, and a great price. It's made at a joint GM-Toyota factory in California, and as such statistically has far better reliability than anything Ford makes. Anyway on Sept 17, I receive a mailing trying to lure me to a Ford dealer 50 miles from where I live. Absurd!! Ford marketing must not cross check their files for all the complaints I filed with their HQ about being unable to get warranty satisfaction on a defective Ford Escape Tire.

Why keep it a secret? I was pleased to figure out that apparently Fox TV Network has approved my request for Waiver from the FCC rules, and I now received Fox 5 (NYC channel) in HD via a DirecTv satellite on my DirecTv HD TiVo unit on channel 88. Why I have to discern this on my own, and DirecTv would not want to call or email me with the good news, is beyond my comprehension. Apparently company owned local stations grant waivers, and independent members of the network do not, not wanting to potentially lose local advertising revenue. In Houston that's Fox and ABC I've read elsewhere.

Doesn't sound like accidental mixup to me: Would be low-paid humanitarian workers get shanghaied into cleaning up Casino in Mississippi and treated like slaves. Only called a mixup because they went public? Read about it here in their hometown newspaper.

New Orleans 2 weeks later: 20 years ago I lived in New Orleans, so I have been following events with interest. By now there is a vast difference in what is happening to those who were well-to-do (usually translates to Caucasian), and those that were poor (usually translates as Black). A telling store is here. Get a password here if you choose not to register, and you are asked to.

Microsoft Windows monthly patch pulled: So many bugs in Windows are reported to Microsoft, that they have gotten in a cycle of writing monthly patches. This month, they discovered the September patch would do more harm than good, and didn't release it despite having announced they would. Story here.

DirecTv billing error As part of the deal I negotiated with DirecTv I was to get some parts of my programming free for 6 months. Comes the first bill and it wasn't free, and reps didn't know how to scroll back to find the notes of August 23 on my account, and when they did Supervisors refused to honor those promises. After 3 calls in, I found a representative that exhibited some common sense and adjusted things.

Antenna guaranteed to fail ?: Try and buy the Zenith GEMDTV1 antenna from Buy.com, and be presented with this return policy, in the event the antenna fails to be fit for purpose:

"Due to manufacturers' policies, Buy.com cannot accept returns on this item for any reason. The manufacturer will handle all exchanges and replacements. Please contact the manufacturer directly and they will assist you with repair or replacements. NO REFUNDS ARE AVAILABLE FOR THIS PRODUCT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES. THIS PRODUCT CAN ONLY BE RETURNED FOR REPAIR OR EXCHANGE."

I think in some states/cities, such limitations are not allowed.

For some strange reason Zenith has convinced me not to buy their antenna.

HDTV impressions: 8 months ago I got an HDTV to replace a 10 year old geriatric big screen. With the DirecTv HD receiver with TiVo I can now really get a full suite of HD reception.

Showtime HD - Mostly a waste of time. Half their movies aren't in HD. One that was and is in Dolby 5.1 even though the DirecTv guide failed to indicate it was "Ground Hog Day". I TiVoed it last night and in HD and surround it's awesome.

Local HD - The local amateurs at CBS decided to join David Letterman in progress for his
HD broadcast last night, even though they figured out how to delay it SD TV. Many other
local broadcasts seem like they're merely upconverted for HD, and are in SD.

DirecTech games continue: I just got a phone call from an installer on his way
over for my DirecTv install. "We brought the wrong antenna last time, I have the correct Winegard"; Strange they had been insisting the indoor antenna they previously brought
was the right one. Meanwhile I have my RadioShack antenna, so this could get
interesting. Stay tuned.

Followup: Took just over an hour, the Winegard antenna (Model GS-1100) does barely better than an indoor antenna, and without a rotator won't get all channels. The installer had to be shamed into grounding the OTA Antenna. I'm now negotiating with DirecTv about getting my Radio Shack antenna installed. The tech did a good job of running another phone line drop for the HR10-250. So far the HR10-250 works wonderfully. I also finally found out why DirecTv won't say boo about the poor job this installer company does. The tech let slip that DirecTv recently bought DirecTech.

More DirecTv sloth: Received the following email, again doesn't exactly engender
confidence that anyone there cares.

Thank you for writing. I apologize for any frustration this may have caused. I have forwarded your comments to the Office of the President. They will be contacting you within the next seven to ten business days, during standard business hours. Thank you for your patience.

Thanks again for writing.

Sincerely,

Lance
DIRECTV Customer Service

More Installer Games: Another Directech installer showed up. Two problems.
First - he tried to pretend he was a DirecTv employee
Second - He brought the same indoor antenna that was agreed unacceptable.
The indoor multidirectional antenna they claim is supplied by DirecTv, but
do they have a choice? In Houston where from my zip code HD is broadcast at
185 and 188 degrees, unidirectional is appropriate.

Followup: DirecTv has agreed to credit my account for $60, and I will buy a
unidirectional HDTV outdoor antenna to be installed by DirecTech with no
additional charge.

Let's see if they mess that up on Thursday.

2nd Followup : I now have a Radio Shack model VU-90 XR antenna sitting in
its box waiting for the Installer.

DirecTv's amateur Installers: Two of the Three Stooges showed up for an HD/OTA install. They didn't have an HDTV OTA antenna, didn't have a separate stand-alone mast, and didn't know how to install the substandard antenna they were told to install, a generic no name brand. Further searching on the Internet revealed it to be what's called a "Two Bow Tie Indoor Antenna". When I called DirecTv to complain even the DirecTv supervisor couldn't get to anyone in authority on the phone at the Installer's out of state office. While I was waiting until DirecTv instructed me to return the receiver the installer had handed me, the installer falsely reported I had taken it off their truck. I wish DirecTv could have seen the way they tossed the HR10-250 back into the back of their pickup. The Installer's company apparently has a standard policy of not answering their phone, and if you do get through, they falsely promise a manager will call right back so as to get you off the phone. Internet reports of poor morale and mistreatment of contract "employees" at the Installer company were found.

DirecTv needs an alternate installer for Houston, TX, so it can have some leverage over these clowns. The install has now been rescheduled, but with conflicting reports as to which day it will be, and of course promised phone calls never happened.

FOLLOWUP: DirecTv snaps into inaction. Twenty hours after emailing a version of the above, the following boilerplate was received:

"Thank you for writing. I have forwarded your message on to a manager who will contact you within the next few business days. We appreciate your patience.

Sincerely,

Christina
DIRECTV Customer Service"

Anyone care to bet that it won't be a "manager" who "contacts" me???

I know the Password See what happens when everyone in a school gets a laptop computer and Administrators go overboard trying to control everything.

Waiting for my Lightspeed: SBC is planning on building out it's fiber network to put all residential customers within 5,000 feet of a Fibre terminal, allowing for Internet connectivity at 15 mbps. Just 18 more months?

HDTV via satellite DirecTv will soon be going "live" with the first 2 of its 4 new "designed for HD" satellites. These satellites will be using different orbital slots and newer technology (MPEG4) in large part, that existing receivers can't handle. They have been misleading customners by saying "We're seeing if we can do a software upgrade"; when they know full well existing receivers don't have the horsepower to do MPEG4 decoding in software. Golly, you don't launch billion dollar satellites and not have everything all figured out.

Their current HD DirecTv receiver with TiVo (the HR10-250) had been selling for $999.99 in the year since it came to market. Suddenly it's down to $600 and a $100 rebate at BestBuy, etc. Then I read on USENET that their retention department is offering them to good customers for $299.99. Why the price drop, unless these models are being cleared out for new models that WILL handle additional HD channels from new satellites? Meanwhile someone is selling the 800 # into DirecTv Retention for $5.95 on eBay so others can get the $299.99 deal.

As I've been with DirecTv for 8 years and never paid a bill later than 2 weeks earlier, I figure I'm a good customer. After complaining about phone support going to Phillipines, and Echostar currently having more HD stations available, and the HR10-250 not being able to handle the new satellite, they agreed to sell me one for $299.99, and credit my account for $200. So after the $100 rebate, it'll be free. At that price I don't mind if it's obsolete in 6 months; besides my 2 1/2 year old HDVR2 (a non HD DirecTv-TiVo) is now acting flakey, so a free replacement is good.

Not buying an Ipod I was all set to buy a Photo Ipod until I realized Apple has pulled a fast one and replaced the 60 Gig Photo ipod model M9586 with the M9830. The difference? It now doesn't come with a dock, or a firewire cable, or a case, or an AV Cable.

I used the same monies to replace my old Peugeot Orient Express bicycle (mine was red) with a Trek 7300 FX bicycle (mine is silver). Amazing how much better bicycles are these days.

OS X on any PC - More reports on running the Intel version of Macintosh OS X on any regular PC are here . In at least one case, Apple cajoled the Web Site owner to take down detailed how-to instructions, but Google has them cached, so they remained in cyberspace.