Dubai » Ponderings Of Guy

I didn't get a toy train like the other kids. I got a toy subway instead. You couldn't see anything, but every now and then you'd hear this rumbling noise go by.

Steven Wright

24th September 2008

Ponderings For 2008-09-24

This site may continue to be a bit flaky for a little while. I’m having problems with the server that hosts this site, with it crashing once every day or two. I’m trying to narrow down the issue, but until then, there may be some random times where you can’t get at the site. This is the primary reason I haven’t started to get the movie reviews posted that I was intending to finally get started on.
As if Dubai needed even more extravagance when it comes to hotels, there’s no denying that this is some pretty impressive stuff.
Google has a nice 10th Anniversary web site setup. The time line is quite cool.
Congrats to MiniNova.org for not only crossing that 6 billionth download mark, but doing 10 million of them in one day (both of which set new records).
Anyway, very short post for today. Back soon with more. And if I figure out the server problems, hopefully some movie reviews as well (finally).

posted in Ponderings | 0 Comments

20th August 2008

Ponderings For 2008-08-20

OK, the Ponderings postings are gonna have to be split up for the rest of the week. After the long down time, things have built up to the point where I don’t wanna overwhelm you with too much at once. So, let’s see if I can sufficiently whelm you. And I’m hoping to catch up on a number of movie reviews throughout the rest of the week.
RIP: Isaac Hayes & Bernie Mac
Check out this fantastic Willy Wonka recut trailer perfectly titled “Wonka” - it’s so awesome, I wish I had thought to do it first.
Happy 100th birthday to animated film
I can’t wait to see James Cameron’s new, technology-pushing, state-of-the-art, 3D extravaganza Avatar. Here’s an interesting article on it.
Speaking of 3D, The Polar Express is coming to Blu-Ray in 3D! Now I’d like to see Monster House and Beowulf get 3D releases on BD.
Holy cow! 9/11 really was a conspiracy…
Now this is one very impressive obituary
The crazy Burj Dubai skyscraper is nearly finished. This thing is insane. Check out these photos.
Here’s some very cool lightning photos from the massive lightning storm that rolled through here in the Chicago area a couple weeks ago.
Speaking of lightning, you’ve gotta check out this awesome slo-mo footage of a lightning strike
Still speaking of lightning, here’s one crazy video of a CLOSE strike (warning: strong language)
And if you think that lightning strike was close, how bout being on a bus as it’s hit by a tornado (or grazed pretty darn close, at the very least)
Google Insights is a pretty cool new service
Now here’s some awesome chess set design
Too cool - Yoda The Cat
Warp Drive: yet another Star Trek technology that scientists are determined to actually make possible
In the market for a new car?
Here’s a vantage point that I bet you’ve never seen a shuttle launch from before
Slightly older news that somehow got past me, which I had to learn about in print form in Doctor Who Magazine. Anwyay, something I’ve been wanting since Doctor Who returned to the airwaves is to have Nicholas Courtney return as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. I’m finally getting my wish. Well, almost - he’s appearing on spin-off series The Sarah Jane Adventures. Frankly, that’s almost a better show for him to appear on, as he has a direct history with actress Elizabeth Sladen as Sarah Jane.
Speaking of Doctor Who, congratulations are due for the brilliant Steven Moffat for winning his third consecutive Hugo Award for Doctor Who. This time for the episode titled Blink, which is possbily my all-time favorite episode of the series (new or old). I’ve watched it dozens and dozens of times.
Composer Bear McCreary hasn’t done as much posting to his blog over the summer, what with Battlestar between episode runs and him being busy on multiple other shows. However, he just popped in with this amusing bit of trivia that was brought to his attention. As always, the stuff he posts is fascinating in its detail. Not only does he point out and provide clips of the two versions of the sequence, but he even provides the clip with the rejected original cue. This is what us film score nut-jobs geek out on (and BSG fans). Yeah, I’m a dork. A dork who’s anxiously awaiting the new CD release of Bear’s score for Eureka, which I’ve ordered, and will be winging its way to my door very soon.

posted in Ponderings | 0 Comments

12th July 2008

Ponderings For 2008-07-12

Today was one of those days where nothing could go quite right for me. Not that it was filled with major problems, just lots of bad bits of timing and other stupidities. So, I’ll try and end the day by digging through some fun stuff and sharing it with y’all…
NASA has mapped out the final flights of the space shuttles through 2010. Only 10 more launches, then the remaining 3 shuttles of the fleet will be retired. It’ll be the end of an era.
Good ol’ Darth Mojo has done an excellent, detailed write-up of the Battlestar Galactica wrap-party (well, part one of his write-up, with more parts to follow soon)
So, will The Dark Knight meet the $130 million opening weekend expectations? As the article says, WB is predicting $100 to make it easier for expectations to be met. It’s amazing for some of these films to be able to low ball conservative numbers at $100 million. My prediction will be somewhere around $140 million. I’m absolutely going to be seeing The Dark Knight in IMAX form (with some scenes featuring native IMAX filming with full IMAX screen aspect), but I’m not crazy enough to try the IMAX screenings on opening weekend. If the fan anticipation of this movie wasn’t high enough, the critic response so far has been through the roof.
In a neato marketing move, Warner Bros is promoting The Dark Knight with an actual bat signal.
A nice list of Firefox 3 features most folks don’t know about. Multi-select is my favorite
Here’s a stunning shot of Dubai covered in fog, taken from the very high Burj Dubai Tower
An amusing photo lampooning the questionable recent missile test photos from Iran
DrivePricing.com is a nifty mash-up of Google maps with gas pricing and such
Or if you’d prefer something a little more cheerful than gas pricing in your Google Maps mash-up, try HealthMap.org.
So, Windows for Workgroups 3.11 has truly hit the end of life cycle
This is just too good - Buzz Aldrin decks a very annoying conspiracy theorist
Google is making a nice change to GMail’s contact system, introducting a new version of the contact manager that doesn’t automatically add everyone you send an e-mail to into your contacts. It’ll have a new “suggested contacts.”
Mary Parent, who was the studio exec at Universal who green lit Joss Whedon’s long-shot Serenity, has given the green light to a script by Joss & writer Drew Goddard called The Cabin In The Woods now that she’s over at MGM. This is quite cool. Goddard has become quite the collaborator with both Joss Whedon (formerly working on Buffy & Angel) as well as JJ Abrams (working on Alias & Lost, and the feature film Cloverfield).

posted in Ponderings | 0 Comments

20th May 2008

Ponderings For 2008-05-20

Man, I’m realizing that Speed Racer is quickly becoming one of those movies I’m gonna spend my life defending. The audience seems to be completely split on this one, either loving or hating it. And I guess I can understand that, cause it’s definitely a movie that you have to get into the right mindset for. It’s not a realistic movie, intentionally so, and many people just have trouble engaging it on the right wavelength. For my part, I completely love it. I’ve seen it 3 times now, in IMAX, DLP and on standard 35mm film. It looks awesome in all three forms, but the IMAX and DLP presentations are truly breathtaking to see. I’m sad that so many people are going to miss the opportunity to see it theatrically, seeing as it’s completely crashing and burning at the box office. It’s my favorite movie of the year so far, though we’ll see how Indy 4 holds up to it tomorrow night.
WOO HOO! The replacement for Russell T. Davies as show runner/head writer of Doctor Who has been announced. And it’s none other than Steven Moffat. If I were able to chose anyone on the face of the Earth to give that job to, it would be Moffat. I’d been hoping he’d be the one to get the job for a while now. The episodes he’s written for the relaunched series have been some of my favorite episodes. His episode titled “Blink” from last year is my favorite episode of the relaunched show, and a contender for my favorite episode of the entire run of the series. His other episodes, “The Empty Child,” “The Doctor Dances” and “The Girl In The Fireplace” are all right up near the top of the list as well. And he’s somebody that really knows his classic Who. The show couldn’t possibly be put into better hands. As Moffat says in the press release, “My entire career has been a Secret Plan to get this job. I applied before but I got knocked back ‘cos the BBC wanted someone else. Also I was seven.”
So how are users of NetFlix’s new streaming system going to get past the retards at Comcast who randomly apply bandwidth rules to their connections?
A hilarious string of vending machine notes. Actually, that whole site is worth browsing around. Funny stuff. (some of the others come with a language warning)
“Monkey on a goat on a cup on a tight rope” - a perfect title
Here’s a pretty cool idea: YouTomb
Yet more evidence of Sprint’s wonderful customer service.
Here’s a staggeringly massive forum thread about the also-massive Burj Dubai skyscraper. It’s a thread full of cool photos and info. What an insane city.
If you liked the HDR wallpaper from InterfaceLIFT.com I linked to in yesterday’s post, you’ll also like this one

posted in Ponderings | 0 Comments

18th February 2008

Ponderings For 2008-02-18

It looks like tomorrow, Tuesday, February 19, 2008, will be the official TOD for the HD-DVD format, as Toshiba has scheduled a press conference to be held at 5:00 PM Tokyo time. It’s assumed this will be to declare the death of the format.
On the subject of the death of HD-DVD, looks like a second season set of the original Star Trek series HD remasters have hit a major snag. We’re not going to be seeing that release for a while, from the sound of it. Ah well, I’ve been going rather slowly through the first season set, so I’ll continue to pace myself.
Hurray! Tremors: The Series is heading for DVD on July 22nd! (tentative)
I’ve mentioned it here before a handful of times, and Dubai continues their insanity (here’s a mirror copy, as the original page is getting hammered pretty hard). Frankly, if you take a step back and think about it, all of this is brilliant. It’s some of the only aggressive, intelligent, long-term thinking going on in the world right now. The folks in Dubai clearly know where the oil industry is headed. And while their piece of that pie is at its height, they are transforming themselves into the single most impressive tourist spot on the face of the Earth. Few governments and/or companies are anywhere this forward thinking or self-aware. The stats on Dubai are purely mind-blowing. Seriously, read throught that whole page. This is the first city that TRULY looks like it is from a 1950’s sci-fi landscape. This *IS* “the future.”
Meanwhile, here’s an article I very much agree with as to the dumbing down of folks domestically here in “The States.” Now admittedly, I was somebody who intentionally coasted by through high school with little effort, and dropped out of college (admittedly, it was primarily due to boredome). I think the modern education system is broken beyond repair. But I’m a naturally curious person (in many areas - there are numerous areas I will never care about in the slightest, like sports, fashion or the like). They touch on it in the article, and I completely believe it to be one of the primary reasons, which is the attention span of the modern American citizen. It’s truly alarming. I was recently watching The Truman Show (an awesome movie), and it honestly scared me to realize just how likely the scenario of that plot now seems (particularly in light of looking at the immensity of the stuff they are building in Dubai, referenced in the above post). It was far fetched 10 years ago when it first came out. As usual, writer Andrew Niccol was ahead of his time. The rise in “reality TV” (one of the greatest misnomers, or so I would like to think) is an obvious result of this epidemic. I loathe reality TV. It’s depressing that what Max Headroom (the series, not the specific character) had to say more than 20 years ago is now true today. The majority of broadcast/cable/satellite TV is now Network 23 (or Network 66, for that matter).
Christopher Lloyd is to briefly repirse his role of Doc Brown
Knight Rider did very impressively in the ratings. I haven’t watched it yet, but probably will tomorrow.
Speaking of doing well, Jumper did decently opening in #1 with around $27 million for the weekend ($33 million if you count Thursday as well). I like the movie well enough. Not awesome, but pretty good.

posted in Ponderings | 0 Comments

5th November 2007

Ponderings For 2007-11-05

Hope y’all had a happy Guy Fawkes Day
Today’s big news is Google’s amusingly off-center announcement of their open platform initiative for mobile devices called Android. People were expecting the announcement of a “GPhone” and instead got the reality of hundreds of them. Meanwhile, Google stock continues it’s meteoric climb.
Speaking of which, Engadget has this great article about Palm in light of Android. I completely agree with the write-up. I gave up trying to figure out Palm years ago. That company seems determined to nuke itself into oblivion.
So, the writers strike official kicked in today. It’ll be fun to see how the TV/Movie landscape shifts. Many things have already begun feeling the pressure. Heroes may end their second season with the mid-season finale (not to mention the death of Heroes: Origins).
Interesting local news. Microsoft is launching a $500 million data center in Northlake (A Chicago suburb just south of O’Hare airport)
Speaking of Microsoft, here’s some fun internal stats for you fellow IT nerds
Awesome! Check out the Last Starfighter arcade machine. Too bad those never quite made it to production. I’ve got a prototype Atari 5200 cart of the also-unreleased home version.
Check out 8 insane videos of twisters. Warning - plenty of language in the clips. Amazing footage, to be sure. And I love how being in the path of one ‘em turns anyone into a blithering lunatic.
On a more calm and collected note, how about some funny headstones?
You’ll have to confirm your age/consent to watch this video, but it’s absolutely amazing. Just wait for it. Don’t worry, it’s not gory or anything. They just have it flagged for the very nature of what it is - just shown at a distance. Wouldn’t that be classified as something a bit better than the average IED?
This just in from the “what the…?” department
And in case that one wasn’t enough, try this one - also from the same department.
A kinda nifty approach to measuring time in base-10
Hey hey, one of the universities has denied the RIAA outright
Here’s a collection of awesomely timed photos
No big surprise that Blockbuster is in such a tail spin
NBC to launch a spin-off of The Office? You know, if there was one show that I truly wish I could like, but just can’t after repeated attempts, it’s The Office. I don’t know why it fails so completely for me.
Looks like Shia LaBeouf’s fame finally caught up with him, as I’m sure most figured it would.
For anyone interested in a quick breakdown of Dubai and what makes it tick. Sure does make Vegas look like a theme park.
And, I swear I’m gonna try to get at least one movie review posted per day for the rest of the week. I’m falling behind…

posted in Ponderings | 0 Comments

up to content »

Ponderings For 2008-09-24

Ponderings For 2008-08-20

Ponderings For 2008-07-12

Ponderings For 2008-05-20

Ponderings For 2008-02-18

Ponderings For 2007-11-05

Calendar

Categories

Meta

Spam Blocked

35 Days Against DRM

Dilbert

Tags

December 2008
M	T	W	T	F	S	S
« Nov
1	2	3	4	5	6	7
8	9	10	11	12	13	14
15	16	17	18	19	20	21
22	23	24	25	26	27	28
29	30	31