Stormcaller.net

Wednesday, January 26, 2005 - "If you do me a disgrace, I will rearrange you..."

> Quotes

I'm an evil mastermind; and I'm not listening.
Gypsy Ninja Kittens aren't supposed to bend that way.
If you hadn't died of Syphillis, then you ought to have done.
Is it wrong of me to read Keiichi as Menchi? (Obscure enough for you, much?)
Jesus loves you! Your hair is sinful!
Ronald Reagan knocked down the Berlin Wall by smacking it with his penis and crafted new jobs from pure nothingness. His awesome powers could only be maintained by the spinal fluid of latino infants.
> Serious

Just another ploy to cover up for their refusal to pay royalties. Must be said, however, that if they did, we'd not be seeing sub thirty quid DVD players. [Details]
EULA's are enforcable? Hah! [Details]
You can't advertise your product under someone elses name? Quel surprise! You can't realistically enforce your national will on the international internet? Merde. [Details]
They forgot to turn it on. That's all. They forgot. Gah. Someone just isn't going to be able to live with themselves. [Details]
Also known as: DoH! [Details]
School's out for summer... [Details]
... and summer school starts up. [Details]
Being abducted can be a life affirming circumstance?! Too many french stories this week. [Details]
I'll just note that this IS illegal, so it's not as bad as it seems, and quashes my obvious complaint. [Details]
> Humour

Rocky told me there'd be days like this... [Details]
Finally! A USE for the iPod! [Details]
Lots of shop robbery humour this week. [Details]
Chick magnet for a paedophile. [Details]
You a nerd? [Details]
It makes sense, it does. [Details]
Screen slurper. [Destroy]
Ohkayy.... [Details]
Wait - they're calling us elitist? Wow, guess what. The idiots got something right. That means they're not entirely stupid? [Details]
My first 'I can access dll resources' program. Still nice to have. [Destroy]
Fancy killing some Americans, but don't know where to start? The net is here to help! [Details]
Nothing funnier than winding up news anchors :) [Destroy]
> Gaming

Have the good bit of evercrack 2. [Details]
Darwinia. By the people who brought you uplink. A kind of an RTS. Without much R or S. Or resource limits. [Download]
Chinese sliding block puzzles, sorta. [Destroy]
Net radio - in mmorpg form. Nifty. Shame it's for an mmorpg which will die before release. [Details]
Um. Few gaming links this week, so let's be tangential and get some shadowrun in. There was a SNES game of it way back, right? [Details]
> Stuff

Taoism. A religion in which you get to arrange furniture in order to repel zombies, and rebury vampires using nothing more dangerous than stick rice. got to respect that. [Details]
Have a cat. A metallicat. And if you know that reference, I shall hide in shame. [Display]
Have some hard computing tasks. Go for it. (pdf) [Destroy]
> Comics

Ozy and millie. Haiku battle for eyeballs. Stormnews rewards them. [Display]
Those who know will understand. Those who understand shall fear. Hello Cthulhu. [Display]
And since I'm on a run... Chugworth. [Display]

Posted by Vitenka at 5:37 PM GMT [Link]

Saturday, January 22, 2005 - "Normality returning? Surely not."

> Science/Tech

The Huygens probe finally landed on Saturn's moon Titan after seven years of deep sleep attached to the Cassini spacecraft. [Details]
...Some of the videos of the major events to do with the landing as they happened. [Download]
This page gives a good overview of all the space missions that NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) has some planned involvement in over the next 10 years or so. [Details]
The Theory of Relativity, explained in words of four letters or less. I've definitely linked this before, but I just came across it again. [Details]
The Opportunity Mars rover is almost back to the full solar power generating capacity that it landed with, after both rovers had been degrading over time. Feather dusters on Mars? [Details]
NASA are now planning a much bigger rover for a 2009 launch, to go on a mission to search specifically for sign of life, past or present. [Details]
In a few years, you might be hoping for "coal" for Christmas. Thanks, MC. [Details]
How to make someone into a real zombie, Haitian witch doctor style. [Details]
The largest explosion in the known universe has been spotted by the Chandra x-ray space telescope. Some nice animations also available. [Details]
> Geek

The people behind the now-dead Suprnova.org bring you the first public beta version of eXeem. This is a peer to peer network/program that they have been working on for some time which is a cross between BitTorrent and common KaZaA/Gnutella-style P2P networks. It could well be the next big thing in filesharing, now that Suprnova itself is defunct. However, I'm so far unconvinced. For a start, it comes bundled with compulsory Cydoor adware. It is already full of spoofed/fake files. Most significantly, though, is that the kind of people who are likely to use eXeem are the same as the KaZaA crowd, and will be essentially selfish. For a BitTorrent-esque system that relies on users seeding files for longer than it takes to download them, this may turn out to be a big problem. [Download]
...Interestingly, there's already an eXeem Lite project which removes the Cydoor software and the program's dependence on it to run. It already has its first release out. Get this instead of eXeem. [Download]
If you're a heavy user of P2P or other TCP/IP-based networking, you might be hitting Windows XP Service Pack 2's limitation of your system to just 10 TCP/IP connection attempts per second. Check in the Event Viewer (under Administrative Tools), as detailed in the article. As long as you're not a moron and can be trusted with a computer and an internet connection, you might need this fix - if necessary, which it isn't for most users. [Details]
Microsoft have bought up GIANT Software, a company specialising in anti-spyware software. They've now released a beta version of Windows AntiSpyware - try it out here. [Details]
Use your Gmail account as a virtual hard drive (literally - it adds a Gmail drive to your drive list) with this very clever little utility. Shame Gmail itself has a filesize limit of 10mb. If anyone wants a Gmail account, by the way, I have plenty of invites - drop me an email or leave a comment. [Download]
Some people read too much into random data. [Details]
> Stuff

I was going to mention how irritated I've been with the media (and the UN) recently regarding their accusations of various countries, notably Britain and America, being "stingy" over relief aid for the tsunami crisis. Instead, I'll just post this link. This was the article Mark Steyn (my favourite columnist) wrote in the Telegraph recently. You might need to sign up (free) to read the article. [Details]
Pure and absolute genius from the Irish. You must see these pictures. [Display]
Diesel have put together this great website featuring... well, 30 odd but rather cool videos. For some reason I can't quite fathom. The first one is brilliant, the second not, and I skimmed after that. [Destroy]
One going around the web at the moment, and with good reason: Huhcorp, the greatest consultancy firm in the world. [Details]
Straight from the horse's mouth, the twenty movies that Harry Knowles, movie king, is looking forward to most this year. [Details]
On the plus side, us lot who bought the "Lord of the Rings" extended edition DVDs as they came out don't get screwed. On the minus, it's U.S. only. Bastards. [Details]
The world's largest burger, an 11-pound (6 pounds of beef plus all the other fillings) monster that had previously defeated all the champion eaters and professional fatties who had tried in vain to finish it has finally been conquered - by a slim, female college student. [Details]
Play.com's January sale started in mid-December and is still looking good. [Details]
What celebrity/character/historical/biblical figure would you like floating with you in the bath tub? [Details]
We already know that Samuel L. Jackson is the coolest cat on the planet, but he still proves it over and over again. [Details]
Photos! Specifically, all the ones I've taken since November that were worth putting up. Mostly pictures from uni and the Christmas holidays. [Display]

Posted by Stormcaller at 4:48 PM GMT [Link]

Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - "Folk music! Headbangin!"

> Quotes

The title makes sense if you've heard (of) the "simply {foo} moods" collections.
Did I think that, or just type it?
Today, you will find yourself vastly more decapitated than you heretofore have been.
More zippers, mule!
Justice is cute. (To go with 'brazil thinks you are cute, I guess)
> Important

You know how your data on the internet is never safe? And you'd be a fool to use it for anything important? Guess how mobile phones are routed... [Details]
The worst thing? The thousands of kids who get adopted and are happy will get hassled by social workers. Even so, this is hideous. [Details]
They are touting this as gender equality (which is important) - but notice the rider which is intended to put 'horse-face' bowles on the throne. [Details]
Patent and Copyright. And irony. Well, poetic justice, at least. [Details] [Details]
Mannering to you too. [Details]
> Gaming

The best thing? This means we'll be seeing small boxed PCs of vast power easily available for less real soon now. We've been able to make them for a while now, but easy to get and cheap is importnat. [Details] [Details]
You need the platform - but it's good to see content being released for use. [Download] [Download]
Learning AI by min-maxing an RPG. Class. [Details]
It's like a shoot em up, but actually isn't. [Download]
Fancy playing with the entire worlds weather, in some kind of feidnish overvillain plot? [Download]
Monkey rampage, monkey rampage, monkey rampage - ooh, monkey rampage (dah dah, DAH DAH...) [Destroy]
I linked this a while ago, but then it was a freespace2 mod, limiting how many of you wanted it. Babylon 5 space pilot game - now standalone. [Details]
> Stuff

I haven't linked to fiction in quite a while. This puts the creepy right where it belongs. [Details]
Awww. [Details]
A speech. On.. damn, I forget. Something worth lnking to an mp3 of, anyway. [Destroy]
So sad. The impetus for developing closed systems seems to be somewhat lacking - so you'd better invent ftl sometime soon. [Details]
Smoodge peoples faces. Yes, smoodge. [Destroy]
Fancy learning about data communications? (which encompasses networking) [Details]
Hmmm. Whatever this was, it's died. Maybe it will come back, and then this secret link will work. [Destroy]
As they say - 78% of all stats are made up on the spot. You should all know all of this stuff already, and enjoy laughing about the deliberately obscure graphs on the back of boxes. [Details]
Here, have some music. [Destroy]
You know the promise of the internet was that it would have everything? Well, everything includes some very very odd things. [Display]
Some cats in a fishbowl. [Display]
> Humour

Oh yes. I can envisage this. [Details]
Woman jailed for haunting castle. Sometimes you can't top the BBC headlines. [Details]
It's cute, it's round it bounces on the ground - tennis ball, tennis ball! With exceptionally belated apologies to someone I knew at school. [Display]
Oh, some prisoners are gonna get laughed out of jail. That could be good for them, actually. [Details]
Something tells me these were mostly frauds [Details]
We're only getting half the story - perhaps they were actually being a nuisance? [Details]
I like that 'run away' is an advised part of the usage. [Details]
The sequel to the mockingbird? [Destroy]
> Comics

I won't spoil the punchline, but I almost quoted it. You damn kid. [Display]
Hey, do you remember when comics were things printed out on paper? Me either. [Display]
The family circus rewrite project - long forgotton. [Display]
The term 'paragator' MUST enter the lexicon. DMFA demands it. [Display]
Look and you will see dead people. [Display]
Interpretive dance cat. Neko the kitty. [Display]
Substitute celebs of choice. Ozy and Millie. [Display]

Posted by Vitenka at 8:52 PM GMT [Link]

Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - "Whatsa matter you, eh? Don't got no respect?"

> Quotes

If it's any consolation, I found your ashes relatively innofensive.
I have a magic item that lets me hate even when dead.
Simplicate your life!
On occasion...one of my 'creative rings' (to follow the Olympic metaphor) accidentally unlinks, and falls to the metaphorical floor, shattering into a dozen metaphoric pieces.
> Important

No no no no no no ... oh ye gods, they've pulled a Blunkett - what're they slipping through in its stead? Only small parts of the country getting elections despite promises of freedom? Well, that's ok then - at least they aren't unleashing death squads. [Details]
Can they do that? Why can they do that? Why shouldn't they do that? Ethics can be tricksy, if you're not allowed to just shoot them all. [Details]
I hope this goes all the way to the lords. And.. oh heck. The bbc has gone and changed the content at the link. The quote I was going to take, something like: "If this is not blashphemous then nothing is" was just perfect. Some peoples cheerios need peeing in on principle.
Here, have some history. Sadly, it's the unimportant "we seceeded and now we can't run ourselves peacefully just like you said" war, not the "Which shall we rule, scotland or france?" war. [Details]
School sucks - and then you have to work. [Details]
> Gaming

Obsess much? [Details]
Sir Lord British! [Details]
Completely untrue - but wouldn't it be fantastic? Nintendo and microsoft at the negotiating table. [Details]
Other stuff whose sequels set in the far future with spirits inhabiting robotic panthers should not be allowed to exist. Luckily, this stuff doens't exist. [Details]
Hmm - I think I already linked to most of these, but maybe I missed some and it's handy to have them all with potted reviews. So a bunch of allegedly good shareware (and most of it IS good) [Download]
> Stuff

Warning - I'm not sure WHAT these links are, my works firewall stops me from going there. It's probably something evil. [Destroy] [Destroy]
Here, have a tool to tweak XP a bit. (Damn, where's the simple power toy?) [Download]
Tell your fortune, guv? [Destroy]
Lots of free piccies [Display]
Have a music video. Someone on a random forum said it was good. But it's wmv so I've not seen it. [Destroy]
Thank MC for these. First, self heating coffee - at last. [Details]
Pretty neighbours? [Details]
Apparantly not awful. [Destroy]
Fancy flinging stuff? [Details]
> Humour

Minature and sweet. But may I suggest tigers instead? [Details]
Ah, courts. Rightly bankrupt. [Details]
Hmmm... No. Or yes, in that it shows how worthless those 'moon certificates' are. [Details]
Ah, law is just SUCH a good subject for mockery, I can't bring myself to stop. [Details]
Or, as they call it nowadays, to cease and desist. [Details]
Bizarre. Just... bizarre. [Destroy]
The definition of kleptomania. Fantastic story for her, had she got away with it. [Details]
So, um - why did you buy it then, idiot? [Details]
> Comics

A bad pun. With kitties. It's the devils panties and a famous card game. [Display]
Catharsis. With another cat. And a sarcastic talking squirrel. [Display]
Hallmarks of felinity. Are we seeing a pattern yet? [Display]
More days should be like this one. [Display]
Bunny bunny bunny bunny bunny bunny bunny bunny bunny bunny bunny bunny bunny. Operating Bunny. [Display] [Display]

Posted by Vitenka at 9:04 PM GMT [Link]