Copyright in Europe

I came across an interesting article on Wired a few minutes ago. I thought I'd post a link to it in case anyone else is interested in copyright, and what's going on in the rest of the world with regard to it. You can find the article at http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.01/view.html?pg=5.

If you're not much for clicking on strange links, then I'll summarize the situation. According to the article, copyrights on television and music will expire on New Year's Day. This is limited to those copyrights from the year 1953 and before, though. So, any song or TV show that was copywritten in that year will become part of the public domain. *Note: becoming part of the public domain basically just means that you don't have to pay a fee or get permission to use a formerly copyrighted work anymore*

<rant>
If all this sounds kind of unfamiliar, it may be because you live in the U.S., where Congress is continually passing copyright extension acts to extend the copyright protection period.

You may ask yourself, "Why do we want to keep extending copyright terms on old music, TV shows, and movies that have been around for half a century?" Well, the answer is simple. We don't want to. Copyright owners (Generally corporations like MGM, Disney, SONY, etc.) are the only ones who want to keep extending the copyright protection period. While the films, tv shows, and movies are protected under copyright, no one else can use them without permission, or paying a fee of some sort to these corporations and (like paying for a cd/movie ticket/cable subscription). Once that protection period ends, everyone can use their copyrighted materials without worrying about the copyright (i.e. paying to use the materials).

You see, we as the American people would love to have free access to classic movies, TV shows, and music that we've all probably already paid to see over and over. However, when there's money to be made, corporations and other copyright holders will leave no stone unturned in trying to make sure they get more money. Companies like Disney would lose the copyright to their century old characters, such as Mickey Mouse and the gang. They would actually have to create new characters and create more good movies for us to buy...*Gasp*!

If you've been following my points here, you may see that the American people would benefit from old movies and songs going in to the public domain. After all, it's kind of a rip off to have to buy the same recordings over and over from 8-track version, to Tape, to CD, to DVD Audio. The corporations who own most of the copyrights in the US could still make money by creating new products and material. They'd be able to have a monopoly on those works for the next 75 years or so, so they could still make money the usual way. So, you may be wondering, if it would be beneficial to us, and the corporations would still survive and do well, why aren't copyrighted materials entering the public domain every year?

This question brings us to the last part of my rant. Congress. Congress has the ability to pass (or not pass) laws to extend the copyright protection term for as long as they please, and they have consistently chosen to extend these copyright terms (11 times in recent history). Why would congress, the people who are in Washington to represent us, go against what's best for us?

It's frustrating, but the answer goes back to the corporations. They donate money to congressmen for their campaigns, and in turn the congressmen who get donations from Disney, Sony, MGM, etc. will vote to extend the copyrights. It's nothing short of bribery, but it's legal. They, of course, don't call it bribery, because that would look bad. It IS bribery though, make no mistake about it.
</rant>

If you'd like to gripe to someone who can actually do something about this, write your congressman. They listen... especially if you give them money.

Christmas with the family

The family took the annual trip to Dallas this year. As usual, everyone had a good time. There were no drunken brawls, no shootings or stabbings, and no heart attacks, so I have to consider the event a resounding success.

Here are a few pics of the weekend.

I had a great time this weekend, as usual. I hope everyone else enjoyed their time too. Oh, and I hope Mammaw and Pappaw can learn to use their new digital camera.

I'll get to my Christmas later... for now, Wholesale Marketer

I wrote a post a few weeks ago about the evil organization, Wholesale Marketer. They are an online "wholesaler". I put wholesaler in quotes for a reason. I believe that had they explained their services to me in person, they may have been required by law to make the quote symbol with their fingers in the air and wink at me at the same time. You can read my previous post if you'd like to find out more about how they operate.

I'm on hold at the moment with Wholesale Marketer's customer service because I forgot to cancel my membership after I wrote the post. I'd like to say it was because I've had so much stuff going on, but I should've just taken care of it immediately. Now, I've been charged twenty dollars and am being forced to wait for 10 minutes on the phone to make sure they don't do it again.

As I type, I'm being told my estimated wait time is 4 minutes (for the last 5 minutes), and that I can choose to leave a message if I wish. Each time this message interrupts the peaceful muzak being played while I hold, a small part of me dies. The funny thing is that I think that they're increasing the muzak volume after each "your estimated wait time is 4 minutes" message. It's psychological warfare if you ask me.

Ah... finally a real live Wholesale Marketer customer service representative. He's not nearly as cheery as the girl before. I don't like him. He probably brushes his teeth with toilet water. Well, I'm done. That's the last time I'll write about them.

Another Christmas function

Katie decided that she was going to brave the weather last night and drive to Shreveport to have a small Christmas activity with the people in her family who are gonna be leaving soon to spend Christmas elsewhere. It was just above freezing when we left the house, and there was an expectation of rain, sleet, or snow... some kind of moisture anyways. But, she wanted to go anyway, and Taylor wanted to ride home also. I also decided to go at the last minute despite the fact that I had a programming test to finish last night.

We all set out at about 5:45 or so, and drove the hour to Shreveport through a little rain and some sleet. We dropped Taylor off, and went to the Christmas function at Katie's grandma's house. The dinner wasn't very eventful, or at least not to anyone who will read the blog. It was the usual Christmas dinner, with a few gifts being opened for those family members who would be leaving. I did, however, manage to be mixed up with Katie's ex-boyfriend for the umpteenth time, but I'm used to that. In most relationships, for the first year or so I've been referred to by the last boyfriend's name.

Anywho, we left at about 9:30 or so, and for the first time in about 4 years we got to drive in snow. It was strange, because it wasn't just little snow flurries like I'm used to seeing once a year or so. There were loads of the stuff. When it hit the ground, steam came up. The wind would blow the steam around so it looked like we were driving on a moving, marbled road.

Well, we made it home fine. Now, we can look forward to having snow on Christmas... maybe.

Barnes and Noble coupon... and others

I've got a few coupons here around the house, and a few others I've seen online that I won't be using any time soon. So, if anyone else has some shopping to do, feel free to use them.

Barnes and Noble has a printable 10% off coupon for a single item. If you don't have a B&N in your area, there are two coupons available online. First, a 10% off coupon for one single item using coupon code H76LDQK, and another for $5 off a $50 purchase using coupon code BNNINST.

After buying a few things from amazon.com, I got a little insert with my package for discounts. I'm assuming the codes will work multiple times because they don't seem to be printed with a random code. If it does only allow one use, that's fine... I probably won't be using them.

• 10% off purchase at Target.com: TCAMAZNBBCPN (Exp 12/31/2004).
• Hickory Farms Holiday Happiness Pack, 1 lb. Chocolates, free shipping for $39.99 (supposedly a 46% discount). Go to www.hickoryfarms.com/amazon
• 15% off 1800Flowers purchase: promotion code 92A (Exp 2/28/05)
• Omaha Steaks: 6 (6 oz.) Top Sirloin Steaks, 6 burgers, FREE cutlery set, FREE cutting board. $29.99 total. Just go to www.omahasteaks.com/amazon. Limit 2, free gifts will ship per address. So, to get two sets of free gifts ship to two different addresses. (Exp 1/31/05)

Enjoy.

Christmas came early this year.

Katie and I decided to exchange presents early this year because of technical difficulties in getting a Christmas event planned for each other. I'm gonna be in Dallas for Christmas beginning as early as Christmas Eve morning. She has to stay in Ruston and work until noon on Christmas Eve. So, my idea was to just bring everything to Ruston and set it up. Well, according to her we couldn't do that... and she couldn't explain why.

I took her word for it and decided to give in and do Christmas last night with her. I gave her a few presents that I had in Shreveport. The first was a DVD player that plays Divx/MP3/DVD/VCD/PictureCD. I also had a stuffed animal there for her. We took a trip to her house so I could unwrap my present.

After trying to conceal the present and hide her tracks for a month or so, she gave me my brand new propane grill. It was stinking huge, so we couldn't very well bring it back to Ruston and do our gift exchange her. It just wouldn't have made it back in her car, and I would've probably guessed what it was before I actually got to open it.

Anywho, we got back tonight, and I gave her the last part of her present - a Beauty and the Beast DVD. Katie loves that movie, and since I bought her the DVD player, I figured it was a must have. I just didn't realize that they don't make them anymore, and that I'd have to find one on Ebay somewhere.

So, we got back in town tonight and Katie's in there watching her movie, cuddled up on the couch with her puppy dog (stuffed animal). I hope she really enjoyed the gifts. I know I enjoyed mine.

Song titles from TV commercials

If you've ever heard a song on TV that you liked but were unable to identify, here's a site that may help you find the names and artists.

http://www.songtitle.info/

Amazon.com home defribillator review.

I found a funny review for the home heart defibrillator on Amazon.com today.

I've already written the manufacturer recommending some sort of modulating device. I learned the hard way that the payload is specific to the human heart. You see, our beloved terrier, Kevin, had literally barked himself to death chasing the jingling Christmas tree ornament stuck to his tail. Not wanting my six year old's holiday to be forever tinged by death, I called out: "The AED! Stat!" I couldn't recall the specifics of that CPR/ First Aid class I took in college some years ago, but I've had to jump start my '62 VW Beetle at least once a week for the last 2 years. Well, we had our own little Christmas miracle that morning. Ol' Kev batted his eyes, struggled to his feet and licked my son's nose. Much like a microwave dinner, which does most of it's cooking AFTER the zap, Kevin then tore through the house like a cheetah on speed before exploding in the bathroom. (See my review for Dr. Easy's Biocleanser.)

No one reported this to Amazon.

SGABAA

The SGABAA is the Society for Greater Awareness of Baby Animal Attacks. Personally, I think it's a great organization. Everyone should be aware that certain baby animals are extremely dangerous.

Visit their website to see the most dangerous animals, and survivor stories.
I submitted my own story, so hopefully my tragic story will be put up on their site, and the dangers of baby squirrels will be known to all.

McCain will get my vote in 2008

Again this week, McCain reaffirmed my thoughts that I will be voting for him in the next election, should he run. It was his comments about Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, that have renewed my interest in seeing him voted into the presidency.

EA Games and NFL players association

Well, I won't be buying any more EA Sports games. Today, EA announced that it has reached an agreement with the NFL Player's association, granting EA the exclusive rights to the players names, team names, and stadiums in their games.

ESPN NFL 2k4, EA's main competitor to the madden series of games, was sold at almost half the price of the madden games. The games were cutting into EA's market share, so they secured and exclusive deal.

I'm not saying that it's wrong for EA to do what they did. They have every right to pay more money for exclusive rights. I'm just saying that I don't like it, so I won't be supporting any more of their games. ESPN and Sega put out a great game that was marketed in a better fashion than EA Sports, so instead of trying to compete through gameplay, they just threw their weight around and got the exclusive rights to the NFL's property.

Why doesn't EA just come out and say... "Our costs are too high. We can't and don't really want to lower our margins to ESPN's level. We don't want to have to actually compete to deliver a better product. That would be what's best for the consumer. So, we just decided to go ahead and create a monopoly on the players people idolize and make it that much harder for the other guys to compete on a level playing field. Consumers, your ability to choose is not our major concern."

Isn't that what capitalism is about? Another person/group comes along and offers a better product at a better price, so you have to either innovate, create a better product, or die? Well, not if you're EA. You're sitting on piles of cash, so just stuff the players association full of cash and make a large part of your problem go away.

Well, ESPN and Sega, I hope you get your heads together and offer people the ability to customize their rosters. Downloadable rosters will be available in no time. It's what we want. The ability to modify logos and rosters. The ability to choose a different style of gameplay and still play as the players we like, both at a low cost.

Walmart during the holidays

Katie and I took a trip to Wal-mart last night to get groceries for the week. Little did we know that the rest of Ruston had decided to go to wal-mart to shop for Christmas. We spent an hour and a half in Wal-mart getting $40 dollars worth of groceries.

Our trip consisted of three time wasting events. First, we went to the deli to get some lunch meat. There was only one lady back there, and she was in no hurry to meet our needs. We stood there for 15 minutes before we even got waited on, and during the process of her slicing the meats she had to take two phone calls.

We headed to the electronics department after getting the meat and saw that they were stocking the mario 64 DS games. Since we bought 5 more nintendo DS's this past Sunday at Target, we figured we should buy a few since it's the only game that increases the value of the DS on Ebay. We waited for 20 minutes there for the electronics guy to come back... he went into the back to check on stock for some teenager.

Lastly, we had a 60 year old lady working the register at our lane. I kid you not, we were waiting in line for 45 minutes. She had to call the manager three seperate times for the two people in front of us. She had no idea how to use the gift cards, and had no idea how to do much else. Standing there, smacking her gum, she was single handedly about to start a riot. A one man riot.

By the time we got up there to the register, I didn't want to even look at her. The manager, who we now know by name, walked by and she asked "When do I get my break, Chris?". If she was looking for somewhere to go, she could've just asked me. I'm sure I could've recommended a few places. We got our stuff checked and paid, and we got out of there in an hour and a half.

I'm not an angry person. Judging by the way the trip to Walmart had affected both of us, we resolved to stay away from Wal-mart until a week or so after Christmas. For their sake and ours.

Excellent idea

http://www.ashersarlin.com/archives/2004/09/a_cleaner_safer.php

Ebay Nintendo DS -- final update

We sold all of our Nintendo DS's this past week, and boy am I glad we decided to wait around for a few days before returning the first two. We ended up selling 3 for $239.00, and the other 4 for a little over $200. After all the Ebay fees and Paypal fees we had made over $300 in profit... for doing close to nothing.

The last DS is sitting here in a box, packed and ready to go. The last person paid by echeck and the check has yet to clear, but I'm hopeful that it will soon.

It was a good learning experience though. If I decide to pursue a little extra money on the side with some Ebay sales, I'll have some new insight.

Paperwork at school... done

Yesterday I went to school to fill out my paperwork to be hired as a "research associate". Sounds prestigious, no?

I went up to the personnel office on the 4th floor of Keeny Hall to see the lady in charge of all things paperwork related. I recieved a stack of tax documents and a few other drug policy sheets and sat down to fill them out.

I had no idea what I was doing, but it typical man fashion, I put my best thinking look on my face and began to try to make sense of the documents. There were all kinds of boxes, checks, questions about things I would be withholding and exemptions I'd be claiming. So, naturally, I excused myself to the bathroom and never went back.

Not really. I actually decided that the best method of filling out these papers is the old method of "write something down... if it's wrong, they'll call me back later". So, I slapped zero's in all the boxes and check all the boxes I could see... except the marital status and sex boxes. I checked single for marital, and wrote 'yes please' beside the check boxes for sex.

After the tax documents, I had to fill out some other sworn statement about upholding the constitution of the US and the constitution of the state of Louisiana. I just sorta stared at it blankly for a little while and finally the lady sitting behind the desk prodded me to write something. This was the first inkling the lady had that I may be slightly retarded.

I moved on to the last page of paperwork and the paperwork lady received a phone call. I was sorta confused about what goes where in this page, but just started filling things out the way I wanted. As I was randomly filling things out, I could hear the paperwork woman asking "Is that Shreveport or Ruston?" She asked again "Shreveport or Ruston?" Finally, she said "Do you live in Shreveport or Ruston?", apparently becoming irritated with the person on the phone. I looked up and realized that she was no longer on the phone, and had been asking me these questions. She thought one of three things, "this kid is hard of hearing", "he's a little simple", or "he's ignoring me". None of them were good for her disposition:).

I went back and checked all the paperwork. In my last act of irritating the paperwork lady, I flipped a set of staple pages over, with the pen still in my right hand. As I turned the page, I managed to smack the pen into her wall, leaving a big blue mark. I didn't stop, or look up, but I wanted to laugh. I didn't look up, but I firmly believe she was staring at me with the most evil glare since the creation of man.

I handed her my documents, she smiled the fakest and shortest smile I'd ever seen. It was more like a facial twitch than a smile. She snatched the documents and said something "b'bye now".

She's gonna be even more irritated when she realizes that all my paperwork is filled out improperly, and half the stuff was scratched through. I would've loved to been there for that.

Pistachio Commission

In researching the secret word, I came across http://www.pistachios.org/. Yes, that's right. There is an organization dedicated to the promotion of pistachios. More specifically, it is the California Pistachio Commission. You may have just read the silliest organizational title in history. Can any of the members even admit their membership in public without a chuckle, or a mere snortle?

Of course, by looking at the website you'd think it was a support site for passing kidney stones, as that's what the two pictured people appear to be doing. Actually, the site seems to target women.

The thing that gave me pause when reading the front page was this quote:

"The U.S. FDA has announced that eating nuts, such as pistachios, may help reduce the risk of heart disease when eaten as part of a diet low in saturated fat and cholesterol"

Eating three helpings of donkey excrement as part of a diet low in saturated fat and cholesterol may help reduce the risk of heart disease. How do people get away with claims like this?

Secret Word

The secret word is "pistachio".

Ebay Profit Guesstimator

After my adventure with selling the Nintendo DS's on Ebay, I decided to make a tool that would allow me to estimate the profit I could make with an item on Ebay. I call this tool the Ebay Profit Guesstimator.

You can find it at http://www.jojometal.com/ebay/ebayprofit.php.

Feel free to comment on it here. I welcome any suggestions or comments.

Marvel sues maker of City Of Heroes game

Marvel should be ashamed of themselves. They have filed a suit against the operators of the popular City of Heroes massive multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG). In the game, you are able to create an identity for a superhero, and assume that character's identity. Marvel's position is that some people in the game are creating characters that resemble closely, if not exactly, marvel super hero characters. This is reasonable because it's probably true.

The real problem comes in when they try to get a share of the money that the City of Heroes operators are getting from subscriptions to play their game online. They claim that NCSoft Corp. and Cryptic Studios (the operators) are guilty of contributory and vicarious copyright and trademark infringement. This basically means that the makers of the game should be held responsible for even allowing their game's players to customize characters in a way that will resemble marvel characters. This, of course, is ridiculous.

People who make products and services shouldn't have (or be able to) to police the users of their products. It all goes back to the basic idea that once a consumer buys a product, he/she should be free to do whatever he wants with it. If a person who plays city of heroes wants to parade around the imaginary world that exists in COH as a replica of captain america, they should be allowed to do so. It's no different, in my opinion, than dressing yourself as spider-man and running around outside scaring the children in the neighborhood. Well... basically the same anyway. If a consumer wants to take on the role of an imaginary figure, whose right is it to say that they can't do so? I think Marvel will be hard pressed to say that these people are wrong for doing so.

So, they're attacking the company that allows people to do so. This is even worse than attacking the consumers, in my opinion, because I don't believe the COH operators have done anything wrong. Marvel is just going after the one body from which they can extract money.

The COH ops shouldn't be responsible for policing and protecting everyone else's intellectual property. It's an extension of the consumer's personality. It's as strange as having a t-shirt printer forbid people from making themselves t-shirts featuring their favorite cartoon character, or screen capture from a movie (I wonder if this is illegal too).

--Thank goodness for people who are better at expressing ideas than I am. Here's an article on the subject. It's as right as right can be.

Damageplan massacre

It was a sad day for the music world yesterday. The band Damageplan was playing a concert last night in Columbus Ohio when a gunman jumped on stage, shooting the guitarist Dimebag Darrell multiple times, killing him. He shot and killed one other member of the band, though his identity has not been released. The gunmen then directed shots into the crowd, and at other members of the band killing 4 people total (2 band members and 2 audience members supposedly) before he was gunned down by police.

Damageplan featured former Pantera artists Dimebag Darrell and Vinnie Paul. Vinnie Paul has not been confirmed as dead or alive, but his brother Dimebag Darrell was pronounced dead at the scene.

On a personal note, I grew up listening to pantera and really enjoyed most of their music. They had some really beautiful songs. My heart goes out to those family members and fans who lost loved ones at the club last night.

Interesting info about UEFA champions league soccer

I read a while back that when fans get unruly, that the powers that be in the UEFA organization sometimes bar all fans from certain games in retaliation. I think this is a great idea.

After what happened with the Pistons-Pacer brawl, where the fans were partly to blame for the incident, something like this should be done. The next game between the Pistons and Pacers should be played with noone there... sorta like a time out for fans. There's really no way to punish them otherwise.

I'm not really sure that it's fair to the owners of the teams who will lose a lot of ticket sales because of the banning of fans for a game or two, but I think it may be good in the end. If owners, faced with the prospect of losing a vast amount of money, are proactive in removing unruly fans, and preventing situations that may increase the likelihood of such events, then events like the brawl are less likely to happen.

I was reminded of all this when I read that a big game between Real Madrid and AS Roma will be playing their upcoming game will be played with no fans in attendance, only media. The fans at the last game threw things at the referees. As crazy as fans overseas are for soccer, this is likely to help them curb their anger.

Bank One Saboteurs

It is my firm belief that bank tellers at Bank One "misplace" deposits that don't include deposit slips.

You see, it's highly annoying to bank tellers when customers don't fill out deposit slips for ATM deposits. I know this because Katie, who works at another bank here in town, hates it when people are too lazy to fill out deposit slips. I am one of those people, ladies and gentlemen.

I look at the situation a bit differently though. I see a deposit slip on the outside of the envelope. So, why should I take the time to fill out the exact same thing twice? I will be writing what checks are in there, in each amount, and will be spelling everything out as simply as possible for the tellers who deal with my money.

Anywho, my conclusion is that they misplace deposits that don't include deposit slips more frequently than those that do. Additionally, I wouldn't be surprised if it was intentional. This has happened to me twice in the last 6 months. You may think 6 months is a long time, but for a poor college student like me that rarely has money to deposit, that's almost a 100% misplacement rate.

The moral of the story: Keep your ATM deposit receipts if you don't wanna fill out those pesky deposit slips. They're gonna lose your stuff on purpose.

ABC is really stretching desperate housewives out...

Katie and I both really enjoy the new ABC show Desperate Housewives. I am obviously, as a male, obligated to like it because it has Teri Hatcher in a lead role. It's in the male handbook, look it up.

There've been several occasions in the last few weeks where Katie and I have sat down Sunday night to watch Desperate Housewives (and Boston Legal) to find that the show has been bumped back a week for some awards show, or tv movie. ABC is really stretching this show as far as long as it can. They've already got viewers expecting to see it. So, they sit down, having already set aside time to watch it, and see that something else is on. Oh well, they figure, I'm already here and this doesn't look half bad. I say it's dirty.

They should at least advertise somewhere that Desperate Housewives will not be seen this weekend. To be fair, Katie did watch the TV movie that was on this past Sunday night, "The Five People You Meet in Heaven", and she enjoyed it. I however, didn't care to watch Jon Voight in heaven in place of my night with Teri Hatcher. It's cruel, ABC. Stop it.

This week in news...

I wrote a few entries earlier this week about the Nintendo DS situation. We bought two of them to sell on Ebay because there was gonna be a shortage in stores. At first, I thought I'd end up returning them because their prices weren't high enough to make enough money to pay ebay fees and such, but they started to rise pretty quickly, so we're still gonna sell them.

Not only are we gonna sell those two, but we went to wal-mart and bought 5 more. We felt so strongly (or I felt strongly, and convinced Katie of the same:)) that we could make money on these that we had to try to get some more here in town. I also decided to sell them all seperately, even after I scheduled an auction selling the first two together. I looked again at the numbers, and it just made more sense to sell them all seperately. So, 5/7 auctions will end today, and I hope they all go well.

In other news, Ocean's Twelve comes out this weekend. Despite the fact that I instictively distrust movies with this many stars, I enjoyed the first one, so I'll be going to see the sequel this weekend.

Lastly, I'm looking forward to a new episode of mythbusters coming out next week. Here's a description of this new episode:

Episode 24: Ming Dynasty Astronaut
Deep in the Mojave Desert Buster takes the hot seat in the MythBusters' quest to test the myth of the Ming Dynasty Astronaut. Will he defy the laws of gravity and survive an explosive launch into space? Or ... not? Then "mad scientists" Adam and Jamie search for a source of free energy, as Adam's stunt double faces nearly losing his head at the hands of the MythBuilders' killer fan. It takes two heads, three fans and five MythBusters to test this head-turning, stomach-churning story.
premiere: Dec. 15, 2004

For those who don't know what the show is about, it's a show about disproving common myths. For instance, the myth that using a cell phone at a gas station can spark and cause a fire, or the myth that dropping a penny from a skyscraper will kill a person. The two hosts recreate the myth using their own unique methods, and decide whether the myth could actually be true or not.

It's really a great show, and I'm looking forward to all the new episodes. I just wish the premiere episodes weren't space almost a month apart.

Posting and you...

I found this over at plasticbugs.com. Anyone who has ever spent time in a forum will appreciate this flash guide to posting in a forum.

http://www.trials-shack.co.uk/posting.html

Luke McCown got his first NFL start today

Former Louisiana Tech quarterback Luke McCown got his first NFL start today. Unfortunately, he got the start against the defending superbowl champs, who are 10-1 this year. He performed well, considering this is his rookie season, and his first start against the New England Patriots. Here are his numbers:

	CP/AT	YDS	AVG	TD	INT
Luke McCown	20/34	277	8.1	2	2

This isn't the best part of the situation though. I think the best part was the publicity that Louisiana Tech got as a result of McCown taking the start. They mentioned Louisiana Tech multiple times, and any publicity is good publicity.

Blog relocation

I relocated my blog to the main directory of my site. I didn't really have any plans to design another site around the blog, so I decided to just go ahead and move it.

I didn't think about google and the people who are directed here through links. Unfortunately, I assumed that google would eventually drop the dead links from the database, and pick up the new directory. I don't know why I didn't think to alter my .htaccess file to redirect people automatically. After all, all I did was change from http://www.jojometal.com/blog to http://www.jojometal.com. The files are all the same, so it wouldn't have been a big deal to add a redirect. I just wasn't thinking, I guess.

So, if you're in a similar situation and you want to change your site structure and help ease the transition for users and search engine spiders, here's what I did to my .htaccess file to redirect any user looking for an old file to the new one (This assumes, of course, you have a text document called .htaccess in your root directory).

I added:

RedirectPermanent /blog http://www.jojometal.com

This line just means that whenever someone requests http://www.jojometal.com/blog/anyfile.htm they will be redirected to http://www.jojometal.com/anyfile.htm. The "redirect permanent" instead of redirect lets clients know that it's a permanent move. This method will redirect for any type of file in that directory, not just .htm files.

I'm still trying to find out why google's spider won't start crawling my content at jojometal.com. I know it's in the index, but it hasn't updated it in quite a while. It updated the blog directory really frequently. Hmmm...

Maybe I spoke too soon about the nintendo DS's

As far as I can tell, most stores online are sold out of the nintendo DS's. This is a good thing. Wal-mart here in Ruston has plenty of the DS's, but curiously they're sold out of the mario 64 DS games.

Prices are starting to pick up on Ebay, with the DS systems alone going for about 180+ on average. We've got two systems, two starter kits, and two games (bought later), so maybe we'll be able to make a little money after all.

For right now, I'm gonna wait until I can see whether prices really start to rise on them. I guess the only limiting factor for when to sell them will be the date by which I need to ship them in order for them to arrive by Christmas.

Anyway, I'm glad to see that sales are picking up online. I hope we can wait out other seller's impatience on Ebay, selling ours after most people have already sold their supplies.

Nintendo got the best of me.

Last month, after hearing that there would be a shortage of Nintendo DS's, I went and placed an order for two of them, along with two starter kits. Of course, the only reason I bought them was to make a quick profit on Ebay, which I've done successfully with a few other items. However, the only way I'd get a profit on these is if the supply ran out at retailers. Well, to date that hasn't happened.

I just got the two systems in the mail today, and as of last night our Wal-mart still had a shelf full of them. So, it looks like I'll be returning the items to wal-mart... eating the 12 dollars in shipping.

If it was Nintendo's plan from the get-go to release news of a shortage to increase purchases during the preorder period, they succeeded. Many stores online sold their initial preorder stock two weeks before the release of the system. I have to admit that I fell right into nintendo's plan. However, I have to think that the real winner here will be UPS and the other parcel services.

As more and more people realize that they're not able to sell these for anything but a loss on Ebay, they'll want to return them. If they bought them online, they can return them to a local store, and UPS gets one way shipping. If they bought them from an online-only retailer, or the store they bought it from has no local presence, the customer's parcel service of choice will see some added business again.

I'd like to see some numbers on that.

Muay Thai Kick Boxing - Kit Cope

I can't believe it happened, but I actually enjoyed a show that MTV aired. My ReplayTV was set to record pimp my ride, which is usually worth a look, and they were showing a "true life" documentary episode called "I'm a Muay Thai Boxer".

It was interesting stuff. There's a type of kick boxing that originated in Thailand called Muay Thai kickboxing. It seemed to be just like all other types of kickboxing I've ever seen, but then again I know nothing about kickboxing. However, I did enjoy seeing the training they have to go through to prepare. MTV did a decent job picking subjects for the documentary, and putting the film together.

They followed two american kickboxers who were invited to compete in a bare knuckle competition in Thailand. Kit Cope was the first. A former cheerleader at UNLV, he became interested in martial arts and became dominant in the Muay Thai Kick boxing world here in the US, and fought in a few fights outside of the US as well. The other fighter, Ben Garcia had also been a top Muay Thai fighter, but had not fought in about two years after an elbow injury.

Anyways, it was an interesting show. So, if you see it on the guide channel, give it a chance.

Here are a couple of links to some important sites in Muay Thai Boxing.
http://www.mastertoddy.com (The trainer of the documentary subjects)
http://www.wmtc.nu/ (World Muay Thai Council)

Custom Key Blanks

I took a trip to Wal-Mart Monday to do my grocery shopping for the week. Katie and I also decided to get a copy of each other's keys in case we run into another situation like last week, where I volunteer to pick up some stuff from her house while she's at work, but lock the door behind myself just after leaving her house.

We went back through the bowels of Wal-mart to the automotive section where they have the key copying machine. They had a few key blanks (the metal from which the copied keys are formed) on the rack that had designs on them, which I had never seen before. I figured that since I always have trouble finding which keys are which, especially in cold or rainy weather situations, that I would get one of the keys with a logo. They had an american flag, the saints logo, LSU, flames, and some black key that I couldn't really see. I chose LSU since it was the one I could actually use without fear of snickers (laughs, not the candy bars).

I had to wonder why there were no Louisiana Tech key blanks in the middle of Ruston. Surely there has to be a market for them. We have 10,000 college students, with many more fanatic alumni here in town. I'm sure that most of them would be happy to get copies of their own keys made with the tech logo and colors on them. Tech could even make all their keys to the dorms in this fashion. They'd get money for the use of their logo, and the students would have keys that stand out from their other keys.

Tech, you need to stay on top of these developments. Also, you should start marketing some USB thumb drives with your logo. You've got a brand name, as you well know judging by all the crap you sell in the bookstore, but you're not targeting the right items. You could have so many more useful items. Louisiana Tech Key Blanks and Louisiana USB thumb drives would be great.

Real Gilligan's Island

As a regular watcher of TBS afternoon shows (Home Improvement, Seinfeld, Everybody Loves Raymond), I've been watching a lot of the real gilligan's island commercials lately. I found out from watching the commercials that the two blonde ladies who were cast as "Ginger" are both real, fairly well known actresses.

So, I ventured online to find out who they were. I found that one was Rachel Hunter... I thought I'd seen her before. Who is this other girl though? Nicole Eggert? Why does that name sound familiar...? Let's see, she played in Baywatch, ok. She also played in Charles in Charge.

I realized that it was the cute little blonde headed girl, Jamie, from Charles in Charge that I used to drool over. I couldn't believe it was her. I didn't even recognize her. I just realized that this is sort of a useless post, all to say wow, she's gotten some work done, or her looks have just changed drastically with age.

Annualcreditreport.com

If you've wanted to check out what's on your credit report, but didn't want to pay $10 or more, then your lucky day has come.

A new site has appeared that will let you check your credit report from the three big credit agencies for free. Annualcreditreport.com. This isn't a scam. The site has been put up as part of the updated Fair Credit Reporting Act passed in January that guarantees U.S. citizens an opportunity to look at their credit report.

Unfortunately, certain areas of the US aren't able to check their credit reports yet. The US is divided into four areas. Each area will be able to check their credit reports for free once a year beginning on different dates specified in the picture below. How'd they determine who would go first, I wonder...

--Update: For some strange reason, when anyone clicks on a link to their site they recieve this message.

For security purposes, www.AnnualCreditReport.com can be accessed by typing the web address "www.annualcreditreport.com", or from links from the Federal Trade Commission (www.ftc.gov), Equifax (www.equifax.com), Experian (www.experian.com) and TransUnion (www.transunion.com) websites.

AnnualCreditReport.com is the only web source authorized by all three nationwide consumer credit reporting companies from which free annual credit file disclosures can be requested.

I guess I can understand that ... well, actually I can't (just like current fashion trends), but thems the rules. So, right click the annualcreditreport.com link above and select "copy link location" (for firefox users) or "copy shortcut" in IE and right click your browser's address bar and choose paste. Or, just type the address manually if you like doing things the old fashioned way.

I guess I just started work

I guess today marked my first official day of work. I haven't signed any paperwork unfortunately, and until that's done I won't know for sure that I'm actually employed. But, today I did go to my first team meeting of the quarter.

I'll start actual development on Friday. I think I'll be working on a multi-threaded web crawler with another student in the group. After we start work on that, I'll be interfacing between CenturyTel and the university to start work on a joint project. I don't think it would be good to talk about that here, so I'll just leave the details of the project out.

Graduate school plans are on hold for now, as my financial situation isn't good enough to bear what they're gonna charge. So, I'm stable for the next three months at least. After my three month job position is up, I'll evaluate my options at that time. For now, I'm glad to be up and running with the new job, and anxious to start working with Centurytel.