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Geez, CJ, put that thing away
before you hurt somebody!

The re-release of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas is due next Tuesday, according to the Web sites of gaming retailers. GameStop lists the title as being available September 13, roughly two months after it stopped selling GTA due to the "Hot Coffee" modification, which allows the game's main character to engage in sex acts.

Every major retailer has pulled the game from their shelves, and Take2 Interactive, the parent company of Rockstar Games, vowed at the time to have a new version of GTA: San Andreas available minus the "Hot Coffee" scenes within "six to eight weeks."

Also released is a PC patch called "No More Hot Coffee", available at both the Take2 Intractive and Rockstar Games websites.

Read the rest at BetaNews.com.

In other related news, hackers have come up with the shocking "Hot Biscuit" Mod that allows the player to control the cute and lovable virtual pets of Nintendo DS's Nintendogs to have hot and steamy, doggy-style, sex!

Note: This Nintendo thing is a hoax. A joke. You know... like Bonzai Kitten. Originally posted at 4 Color Rebellion.

Yes. I am bummed. I've enjoyed Firewire (aka IEEE 1394) for years now and it seems Apple is really pushing consumers toward USB2. To not include a Firwire cable was one thing. Okay, if I can afford an iPod, then I can afford a freekin' cable. But now with the release of the nano, Firewire is not even supported for song syncing. Even though it uses the same dock connector as previous iPods that can use either Firewire OR USB2, the nano can only use a Firewire cable for charging. WTF? While USB2 may hold an ever so slight advantage in transfer speed (480Mbps for USB2 and 400Mbps for Firewire... ooh big deal), Firewire is iosynchronous. In other words, all devices on the Firewire bus have the full bandwidth, while on the USB2 bus, all the devices share the bandwidth. My other problem with this, USB2 implementation on the Mac has always SUCKED when compared to a PeeCee. There's an article on BareFeats.com that supports this. Sure it's an older article, but you get the gist. The other issue is that older Macs (like mine - G4-533 MHz Dual Digital Audio) do not have USB 2.0, only USB 1.0, which yes... is backwards compatible, but only up to 12Mbps. Even my wife's Mac (G4-1.25 GHz Dual MDD) has USB 1.1. I know we can get a USB2 cards for our Macs. That's not really the point. I DON'T FUCKING LIKE USB!!!! Why not go with Firewire 800? USB can't even hold a candle to Firewire 800.

Apple did not explicitly state a reason for excluding FireWire on the Nano. Presumably, the company wanted to save the expense of supporting both USB and FireWire, as well as any power and space cost to including both connections.

Steve Jobs really should have checked with me on this first.

Source: c/net's news.com.

I'm sure most everyone who has visited here Googles. That said, you must have noticed how Google occasionally changes its banner. Ever wonder if you missed any? What they looked like? Well now you can check out the past Google banners at alex tan's wall. I'd wondered if anybody was ever saving them.

iPod shuffle vs nano

Originally uploaded by digitalbear.

I've been waiting for someone to post a pic like this. I was wondering about the size difference between the shuffle and the nano. The shuffle, though not as fancy, still does have one advantage over the nano. The shuffle, in addition to being an iPod, without any other cables or adaptors, makes a very convenient USB Flash Drive. In fact, I probably use it more for that, than music. I also have a first generation 10Gb iPod with the movable scroll wheel that I use for music. Remember those? Geez, what a relic. Yes the battery still works, just fine. That nano though... That's the shit right there. See more comparison photos and even some disassembled nano photos here. See the new nano ad here. I must see that thing in person.

Well, it looks like Kanye pulled the "race card" yet again. No, it's not about Katrina this time. And yes, of course it's satire. But it's funny. iPod Nano [ Tempus Fugit | TxFx.net ]

Oh yeah. I almost forgot to mention...

Kanye Tool was there too.

In an Apple Special Event today in San Francisco, Steve Jobs announced the departure of our beloved iPod mini and the arrival of the all new iPod nano. It's completely flash based, comes in two capacities (2GB & 4GB), has a color screen, comes in either black or white, and starts at $199 for the 2GB model and goes for $249 for the 4GB model.

Also today, Apple announced the world's first mobile phone with iTunes, made by Motorola, called ROKR, and it's available now only from Cingular for $249 with a two year contract.

Also announced at today's Apple Special Event was iTunes 5. Take a look at the new features for iTunes 5!

• New Look
  Streamlined design makes iTunes even easier to use.
• Search Bar
  Find stuff fast and refine your search with the handy new Search Bar.
• Smart Shuffle
  Adjust random playback to hear what you want.
• Sync from Outlook
  iTunes now supports iPod syncing for Outlook and Outlook Express on Windows PCs.
• Playlist Folders
  Organize all your playlists into folders.
• Parental Controls
  Limit kids’ access to the iTunes Music Store and sharing features.
• Album Reviews
  Browse over 1,000 album reviews.
• The Complete Harry Potter
  Download all six audiobooks or the Digital Box Set and add the collector’s iPod with Hogwarts crest.
• iTunes for Your Mobile Phone
  Sync music to the Motorola ROKR E1.

Below are some screenshots of iTunes 4.9 vs iTunes 5. Click the thumbnails to enlarge.

iTunes 4.9	iTunes 5

Looks like Gravatar.com is down and it was causing my comments pages to come up very slowly. I was pretty sure that my gravatar plugin was supposed to be caching the gravatars and pulling them from the cache. Perhaps I've got something misconfigured. In the meantime, I've deactivated the plugin, and the comments page seems to come up normally now (minus the gravatars... of course). You may all now resume calling me racist, whitey, cracker, or whatever.

Developed by: Parallax Software, which split into Volition, Inc and Outrage Entertainment in 1997. Volition, developer of Descent: Freespace, was acquired by THQ in 2000. Outrage, developer of Descent 3, was also acquired by THQ in 2002 and then closed in 2004.
Published by:

• Interplay, on August 24, 1996 (PC/US)
• MacPlay, on March 5, 1997 (Mac/US)

Remember this game? While reading through The Mac Observer, I came across this article. Seems Descent 2, now discontinued and released as an open source game has been brought back from the dead to the Mac (and those other guys), by The D2X project. Life is too short for all work and no play.

Flying Gurnard
Originally uploaded by Walt.

While at the same fish store, this little guy caught my eye. He's a Flying Gurnard. He's such a cool fish. He's got these huge pectoral fins. Sometimes he keeps them tucked in and sometimes he has them spread out like wings. When he's not swimming around, you're likely to see him walking around on the bottom of the tank (or ocean floor if you happen to be in the neighborhood). He just uses his little pelvic fins as if they were legs. Yes he's a very interesting fellow.