The Hooliosphere

I'm Back!

2010-05-25T03:45:00.001-04:00

I haven't posted in two and a half years, but I'm back... stay tuned.

Pretty Good Video for 1981

2007-09-25T16:01:00.000-04:00

US and Canadian Dollars equal, but not really

2007-09-22T03:08:00.000-04:00

For the first time in my lifetime the good old Canadian Dollar is worth about the same as the U.S. Dollar.

Woot!

But wait a second... If that "golden bird coin" flopping around in my pocket is worth more than the "greenback" then why am I still seeing prices that are much higher than in the U.S.

Take for example the iPod Touch ( I still want one, but might hold off for 2nd generation). In the U.S. the 16GB iPod Touch retails for $399USD. In Canada, $449CAD! Where did my $50 go to.... plus I have to pay more in tax.... where's the justice?

I'm tired of getting the old screw job, especially on electronics. Now that the Loonie is rising I think were are going to see more Canadians demand more fair pricing

Anti-Piracy Ads (Updated)

2007-09-09T12:26:00.000-04:00

Too funny.
Thanks John at Daringfireball.net

But I think the Software Industry does it better.

iPod Touch kills my desire for an iPhone

2007-09-08T01:44:00.000-04:00

Ok, it was never going to happen. Even if the iPhone came to Canada I just don't have the cash to pay that kind of phone plan. Then along comes iPod Touch..... I was totally caught off guard. Not by the touch interface.... the rumour sites had been predicting that for awhile, but rather by the Wi-Fi capabilities.

I had predicted the iPod Touch would have Wi-Fi in the capacity of buying songs from the iTunes store.... it was only natural. I had not counted on the iPod coming with Safari! That, coupled with the new higher paying job I just landed, has sealed the deal. I'll be buying the iPod Touch, my first iPod in 5 long years. I'm sure I'll still use old clunky from time to time.

Touchscreen iPods TOUCHSCREEN iPODS

2007-09-05T13:37:00.001-04:00

I'm freakin' out. iPhone-what? Touchscreen iPods!!!!!

and it have frickin' Wi-Fi

Rejected Wii Games

2007-08-31T12:38:00.000-04:00

I know some people who'd probably play a few of these

The Nokia iPhone

2007-08-30T13:19:00.001-04:00

It'll probably be overpriced and buggy...... will it be available outside the U.S.?

Treehugger.com not green enough

2007-08-28T13:13:00.000-04:00

A random thought came to me today while I was surfing treehugger.com. I remembered reading somewhere that using black on a website instead of white saves power. In fact, 'eco friendly' users of Google may wants to give Blackle.com a go. It depends on who you ask, but a white screen uses up to 25% more power than a black screen when viewed on a CRT. Well, lots of people still use CRTs, some even visit treehugger.com. Treehugger's site design uses lots of white and very little pure black. The Hooliosphere, on the other hand, has been mostly black since the beginning. It's minor, but perhaps the folks over at Treehugger should practice what they preach and choose a more 'eco-friendly' web design.

American Education

2007-08-26T20:34:00.000-04:00

Wow.... that's all I have to say

Chic and Geek Hotel

2007-08-22T14:39:00.000-04:00

A film I edited was in the YoungCuts Film Festival in Montreal, QC. My girlfriend and I decided to make a weekend out of it and stayed at a hotel that cost more than I care to mention. We checked in, the valet took my car and then we went up to our room. The television, lights, and radio were on . There was a little chocolate on our pillow. When I took a closer look at the TV I saw that it wasn't your average Hotel TV setup.

There was internet, video games, the option to order food and other hotel services, all at the click of a button. I was in geek heaven. Of course, My girlfriends stern stare warned me that we weren't here for nerdiness so I quickly put the remote down and we left to get some dinner. The next day as she lay asleep I got out of bed, grab the wireless keyboard that came with the TV and kicked it old school, playing Pac-man...... wirelessly...... from my hotel bed...... Sweet!

The hotel also had the greatest shower I've ever used in my life. If you are ever in Montreal I highly recommend the Opus Hotel.

You can see more photos on my Flickr account

Calling All Mashup Musicians

2007-08-14T20:16:00.000-04:00

I have a song stuck in my head. This song exists.... sorta. I keep hearing the vocals from The Raconteurs track "Steady as she goes" mixed with the melody of another song. The two play in perfect harmony.... but it's only in my head. I've looked at trying to make a mashup of the two, but extracting the vocals from a song is a difficult process as I've come to discover.

I extend my hand to the blogosphere, asking for help from anyone with the chops. I need the vocals from "Steady a she goes". Let's collaborate. Email me at hooliosphere@gmail.com

A John Chow Contest

2007-08-13T23:02:00.000-04:00

Disclaimer: I am making this blog post as part of a contest with John Chow dot Com. I could win a new 24" widescreen LCD monitor. I need this monitor because my old CRT is on the fritz and has always kinda sucked. The screen is too dark and can't be brighten without washing out the colour and I've noticed that lately it will spontaneously start pulsing and making strange buzzing sounds. Kinda like a Bee in heat. As a nice bonus, I could also win a signed copy of 'The 4-Hour Workweek'. If you feel so inclined you could enter too, but don't because I really, really need that monitor. The contest is being sponsered by The Million Dollar Wiki. If you use coupon code JohnChow, you can save $10 on a page.

If I don't end up winning you could always help me with my purchase of a new monitor by clicking the donate button over on the right-hand navigation

Happy surfing -- Peace, Love, and Tacos

My 2G iPod and I celebrate 5 years and counting...

2007-08-12T10:20:00.000-04:00

I've been listening to music and podcasts off 'Old Clunky' for 5 years now. My 2nd generation iPod and I first met on my trip to New York City in August 2002. I went to the Soho Apple store, excited about the new mp3 player I was about to purchase. She was Mac only at the time and was able to amaze people when I told them that it could hold 10GB of storage in such a tiny unit. It's kinda funny when you consider today you can get a slightly smaller unit that holds 80GB and plays video.

What I like best about 'Old Clunky' is that she still works, quite well actually. I've heard the many stories of people's iPods dying on them. In fact, my sister's iPod mini's battery died ages ago. Given my limited funds, I don't consider the iPod to be a disposable product and so the thought of having to replace it every 2 to 3 years seems unbelievable to me.

So how did I get so lucky?

Well, part of it might be that Apple changed the type of battery used in the 1st & 2nd generation iPods and the generations that came next. 'Old Clunky' uses a Lithium polymer battery while 3rd generation and beyond iPods use a Lithium ion battery. What's the difference? Well, I'm too lazy to find out, but apparently the Lithium Polymer batteries are a newer technology. So why did Apple make the switch? Probably cost.

Another reason for my iPods resilience might have been the way in which I used it. I was a commuter for most of the past 5 years. My iPod was mostly used in my car, constantly charged with my Griffin PowerPod car charger. 'Old Clunky' was receiving a steady flow of power, at least 5 days a week, while playing my tunes (and later podcasts). So you might ask, 'What happens if you aren't plugged in'? Well, I moved to Toronto in February and have been using my iPod on the subway, unplugged, for the past couple months. My commute time is about 1.5 hours to work and back. I mostly listen to podcasts and since I don't like losing my spot, I leave 'Old Clunky' in a paused mode all day so I can quickly resume playback when I leave work. I can generally go a couple of days before I need to charge again.

The firewire flap might have broken off (the 2G iPods had a regular firewire port), the screen might be a little scuffed, and my crappy, white iPod earbuds stopped working ages ago, but 'Old Clunky' and I are still rockin' out.

She's even still able to amaze people with her design...... they can't believe the iPod used to look like that. I don't mind though. I intend on using her until the battery finally gives out or Apple releases a touch screen iPod (fingers crossed).

Here's some photos

My reaction to Apple's Aug 7 Event

2007-08-07T20:57:00.000-04:00

iMacs

Apple really seemed to be putting the emphasis on the fact that these new iMacs use recyclable materials such as aluminum and glass. Although the iMac doesn't meet my computing needs it is a beautiful machine. The glossy screen shouldn't be a problem for those who complain about glare with their laptops, since the iMacs aren't mobile you should be able to set them up in a place where glare won't be an issue.

I'm not entirely sold on this new keyboard. It's great that they added the dashboard and exposé buttons as well as the new buttons for iTunes, but it looks like a laptop keyboard..... I hate laptop keyboards. I like my big chunky keys. I like how they sound. I like how they feel. However, I'll reserve final judgement until I can get down to an Apple store and try it out.

iLife '08

I wasn't entirely impressed with the updates for iLife.

I'm still waiting for them to improve the performance of iPhoto, although the ability to 'hide' photos might help if it means they aren't being loaded in when you launch the app.

As a video editor I thought the iMovie revision was interesting, but you can increase your productivity in FCP by learning shortcuts, but it's not an app geared toward someone like me.

I don't use iWeb because I don't want my site locked into a proprietary system. If you need an easy way to build a site that can grow with you or is just flexable enough to handle stuff like php and javascript, try Rapidweaver.

iDVD didn't really get much of a revision, but it's still a good app for making a decent DVD quickly. Details are a little vague on what they mean by 'professional encoding', but I'll assume they are giving you the option to encode at a higher bitrate.

Garageband has an interesting new feature called Magic Garageband which lets you 'audition' different instruments in a loop before sending the output to the timeline where it can then be edited.

.Mac

Once again, .Mac doesn't really offer much for the $100 USD price tag. The new web gallery is great, but you can just download a free Flickr plugin for iPhoto and quickly send you photos to the web. It's been awhile since I used iMovie, but I think there was an option to compress your video for the web. Take that video and upload it to YouTube. Sure it's an extra step, but a free one.

I'm not a .Mac subscriber. I just don't see the point unless you have mutliple Macs and need to sync them.

iWork '08

There is actually an exciting new app for iWork that might actually make it a worthwhile purchase. Numbers is a new spreadsheet app that makes using a spreadsheet easy and very 'Mac-like'. I don't use excel for anything heavy duty. In fact, I've been thinking about moving my spreadsheets needs over to something like Google Spreadsheet. However, Numbers just looked like using it would be *gasp* fun.

After the keynote

If you were watching the keynote it seemed to end with Steve about to say something else. Well he must have because the Mac Mini got a speed bump.

Also, the Airport Extreme now supports Gigabit Ethernet. I've been interested in switching to Gigabit Ethernet once I get my new Mac Pro. Any thoughts on Gigabit Ethernet, let me know.

Speaking of Mac Pros, they now have an option for a RAID card for $999 USD. It wasn't the Mac Pro update I was hoping for, but maybe in October when Leopard comes out (fingers crossed).

Checkout the Apple site for a more detailed description of all the updates

Tables turned on NBC reporter... the irony

2007-08-04T13:14:00.000-04:00

Canadians to pay Record Labels a $75 "iPod" fee?

2007-08-02T21:30:00.000-04:00

This morning I was standing in the Spadina station in Toronto, waiting for the streetcar and reading the "Metro". A small article caught my eye. Apparently, the geniuses at the Copyright Board of Canada have given the "OK" to charge a $75 fee on all mp3 players and give the funds to Canadian composers, recording artists, and record labels.

How much of those funds are the artists actually going to get?

Either way, It's absolutely ludicrous. We already pay a fee on blank media in this country, because it is assumed that anyone purchasing blank CDs and DVDs are going to use them for stealing music and movies.

When I was in University, part of our tuition included a fee that went to towards the replacement of cafeteria dishes. It was assumed that students would steal dishes for use at home. Guess what happened, students stole dishes. The most common excuse being that if we are already paying for it, might as well.

I suspect that the same will happen to music in Canada. For those who find that stealing music leaves them with a bad feeling in their gut... all guilt is about to be erased. It's not stealing if we are already paying for it.

When that sweet touchscreen iPod hits the shelves, I'll be loading $75 worth of music, guilt free. Thanks Copyright Board of Canada.

Outsourcing Child Care

2007-07-29T20:08:00.000-04:00

Report: Many U.S. Parents Outsourcing Child Care Overseas

Too funny

The 700 Mhz Spectrum in Canada

2007-07-24T01:57:00.000-04:00

As some of you may already know, Google announced that it would be bidding for the 700 Mhz spectrum that is set to be auctioned off in the United States. For more details on what all this 700 Mhz garbage is all about, you could read this article or listen to Leo Laporte's Tech Guy podcast at about the 1 hour 19 minute mark.

In 2011, Canada will be undergoing a similar change. The question is who will control it? Will it be auctioned off to the highest bidder without regard for "openess" and the competition that this country desperately needs. We are already ripped off for data and cellular by Bell and Rogers (see previous iPhone posting) , it would be wonderful to have a cheaper alternative that, in many parts of the country, would work better than today's options.

Perhaps the government should consider setting up another crown corporation like the CBC or maybe federal regulation is a better route. Either way, we'll all just have to sit back and wait to see what the CRTC decides to do, which will likely be nothing until the debate is settled in the States.

REGARDING TRUE KNOWLEDGE: damn trebeck

2007-07-22T09:20:00.000-04:00

A funny webcomic. More at http://www.mulberrygallows.com

In honour of Hawk Wings - My Apple Mail setup

2007-07-21T19:22:00.000-04:00

One of my favourite blogs is back. Hawkwings.net. In celebration, I thought I'd share my Apple Mail setup. Most of these plugins were discovered through Hawkwings.

Freepops via MacFreepops
Over the years I have accumulated many email addresses, some of them through web based services like Hotmail and Yahoo!. I prefer to have all my email come to one central location and although these services offer POP access, it isn't free. Freepops to the rescue! It acts as an intermediate between the web interface of these email services and your Email program, allowing it to access your email the same way it would if it had true POP access. It runs on Mac, Windows, and Linux, but because I am a Mac user I use MacFreepops which wraps Freepops in a nice little GUI.

Spamsieve
This isn't free, but well worth the $30 USD to help get spam out of your hair. It's a Bayesian filter so it will learn over time and adapt to what YOU consider spam. Nice little tip: Use "Ctrl + Command + S" to quickly mark spam and "Ctrl + Command + G" to quickly mark good ones.

Mail Badger
Similar to Dockstar except FREE! This little app lets you display the number of new emails arriving to certain email accounts or folders in Apple Mail in seperate little icons on the main Mail icon. It's how I sort between emails from DVShop and emails like the ones from YOU.

Dr. Steve Jobs or: How I learned to stop worrying and love my bombed workflow

2007-07-17T10:47:00.000-04:00

Note about me - I work with video. I'm using Final Cut Pro 5.1.2 to cut, but I often review several quicktimes at a time coming off an ftp in Quicktime player.

Both of these applications were updated recently.

FINAL CUT PRO 6:

I found myself in a situation where I needed to load one of my FCP5 projects on a mac running FCP6. That's when the fun began. For some reason, exporting quicktimes from the FCP timeline caused some clips to substituted for others. That is to say that they appear and playback fine while in the timeline, but as soon as you export to another format it's as if FCP gets confused and decides to make up its own edits - HEY! Who's the Editor here? Furthermore, the fields seem to be out of alignment when exporting an MPEG2 for DVD. I'm sure this is just a glitch when using a FCP5 project. I do intend to upgrade to FCP6 once I can afford to buy a new Mac that can handle that program.

QUICKTIME 7.2:

More recently I mindlessly upgraded my Quicktime to 7.2. I haven't noticed any incompatibilities yet with websites as some users have mentioned on the Apple Forums, but I have noticed a huge difference in the way Quicktime hides itself. As mentioned earlier, I often review several QTs at once, hide the ones I want to review again, closing the ones I don't and moving on. With Quicktime 7.2, closing a QT brings up the last QT you hid as opposed to the next QT in line to be viewed. This is highly irritating as it means I am constantly re-hiding QTs that I've already reviewed.

Anyone else having this problem?

iPhone + Rogers will cost me my first born

2007-07-16T23:36:00.000-04:00

Ok, so until my girlfriend tells me differently, I'm not a father.

However, as Americans enjoy their new iPhones I'm stuck up here in the great white north wondering 'Where's mine?'. The real question isn't 'When is the iPhone is coming to Canada?', but rather 'Can I afford one?'

The obvious carrier is Rogers, but as Michael Geist points out in his blog, Rogers data rates are insanely over priced.

500 minutes (Canada-wide, no rollover) - $60
500 additional evening and weekend minutes - $25
500 MB of data (no unlimited data offered) - $210

$295 a month!!!!!!!!!! and that's not even with unlimited data!

I see one of two things happening here:

Apple drops its demand for unlimited data
Rogers cuts its prices

If Apple were to concede the unlimited data then the unless you are lucky enough to be by a wi-fi access point, your bills will still be too high to truly enjoy all that the iPhone has to offer

If Rogers cuts it data prices, even by 50%, that's still $190 a month.

Between saving for a down payment on a mortgage, finding money to buy webhosting (feel free to donate) and the burdens of a yet to be conceived child (I'm told her name will be Lillian) the iPhone will remain out of reach for me.