When the Playstation 3 came out with a Blu-ray player, people were impressed and many got the gaming console just for the Blu-ray player. Now the gaming console is turning into an entertainment center. The Xbox 360 is looking to take TV entertainment to a new level.

Just stumbled across this link on the Interwebz today, as I was taking a prolonged study break. Augmented Reality is still relatively new to the world, but there have already been a myriad of applications — tagging restaurants and other services, but now — gaming.

The following video shows two guys playing Rock Em Sock Em Robots on their restaurant table through their mobile devices. While they look kind of goofy, I think that this new method of gaming is going to encourage mainstream gamers to get more social. (While also sparking outrage from hardcore gamers, probably.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXtq1qBMLIw&feature=player_embedded#!

Check it out, tell me what you think! All this Augmented Reality stuff gets quite disturbing though…pretty soon it might seem normal to wear glasses and see the world only through a pair rather than using our natural eyes. (I mean glasses as in AR glasses, not normal people glasses — I sometimes forget that I wear glasses, haha. Proof of technology being ubiquitous?)

So, I was surfing around the Web today when I found a very interesting video on the TED.com homepage. “How to Live to be 100“. Basically, we have a speaker that’s explored several ‘blue zones’, and noticed patterns for longevity in healthy human living.

Dan Buettner (born 1960 in St. Paul, Minnesota) is an American explorer, educator, author, public speaker and co-producer of an Emmy Award-winning documentary who also holds three world records for endurance bicycling.^[1][2][3] He is the founder of the online Quest Network, Inc., which provides opportunities for students to interactively engage with explorers on expedition.^[3] In February 2007, an expedition led by Buettner to Nicoya, Costa Rica uncovered the longest-lived people known in the Western Hemisphere

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Buettner

There are a couple of ideas that jumped out at me:

A vegetable-based diet.

One of my best friends is a vegetarian, so I notice the differences in diet — and I can’t imagine myself going through it! Giving up chicken, and beef (I’ve generally given up pork) seems to be a huge step. With that said, if there were progress made in vegetarian substitutes for traditional food, and if this progress were widely available and convenient, then I might consider trying it. “Easy vegetarianism.” For now, this is my train of thought.

A close group of friends.

The Japanese woman that Buettner mentions has a ring of five women that she’s known for 97 years. That’s a long time — with bonds so tight, it’s like an amplified family — when one gets rich, the bounty is shared, and when one gets poor, the poor is helped out. I really like this idea, but I find it hard to imagine, especially in the modern world. Not to say I don’t have close friends, but to the extent where we share our fortunes and misfortunes? Can this even be applied to the developed world?

A reason to wake up.

The most prominent characteristic of these golden-aged people was the reason to wake up in the mornings. I don’t think I have one yet. But I think that it’s important for me to find one, real soon. This is, in many ways, similar to a ‘purpose of life’, which I believe to be very important to a human being.

Check the video out, if you haven’t already. 20 minutes well spent.

http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_buettner_how_to_live_to_be_100.html

Image: Soylentgreen23

Ever go on YouTube to find a piece of music? You know, that song you want to hear every so-often, but not often enough to download it onto your hard drive. Or maybe just new music. Or stuff you can’t buy on iTunes or obtain by other means.

Face it – YouTube’s really convenient to hear indie, live, or underground music. Now by no means do I consider myself an ‘indie’ or ‘underground’ fan, but I do like many offerings of YouTube; for example, John Frusciante’s cover of the BeeGees’ “How Deep is Your Love” brings much joy to me. Similarly, the Klasix instrumental “I Can’t Help it” really helps me. I don’t carry my laptop everywhere, and it’s impossible to put YouTube on repeat (or is it?) so I decided to download it.

My friend Rohan (at www.yourworldwired.com) introduced me to VidtoMP3.com – and ever since then, I’ve been a fan. Sure, the website looks a tad sketchy, but it saves any video as an MP3 file on your hard drive, all processed online. Granted, it won’t have the best sound quality (actually I don’t mind it, it’s not as bad as I thought it would’ve been – definitely audible), but it’s a great way to get music you wouldn’t have been able to otherwise.

www.vidtomp3.com

Watch your favorite TV shows when you want to – in your living room, or on-the-go.

We’ve all been there – we have to make the difficult decision to choose between a TV show or work. Or a TV show or a function. Or a TV show or a social event. In most cases, the choice is obvious – and TV is put on hold. If you’re regularly choosing TV over these alternatives, I’ll be glad to prepare a lecture on how there’s more to life than just sitting on a couch.

Either way, it’s a tough decision – so why make it? I learned over this summer how to keep control over TV while still enjoying TV more than I ever did before.

It all started with a show called Entourage (God bless Ari Gold). I’d heard a lot of good things about it, so I decided to give it a try. The only problem? I didn’t know when it aired, and I didn’t want to pay for a season DVD. I could easily have borrowed them from a friend, but I decided to try exploring my options. I opened a world of media that I had never known about before. And the best part – I never had to watch a single frame on a computer screen, but on a nice TV screen (not that big actually, just 32-inches – but bigger than a computer screen nonetheless).

Here, I already assume you’ve got your TV shows on your computer. The method you decide to acquire them with is entirely up to you – buy (or borrow) a season DVD and rip it, illegally download your TV shows season by season (this is extremely popular), or purchase them off iTunes (or other websites). Either way, after we’ve got the TV shows on our computers, the issue is how to bring them to our TV. Who wants to watch it on a small screen anyway?

5 Cheap and Easy Solutions to Keep TV in Control

1. Computer

A lot of people have old rigs lying around – if you do, then congratulations. All you need to do is buy a TV tuner card (typically $50) and install it in your unused computer. Then, simply transfer the files from your computer to your TV – I simply dragged and dropped them to my external hard drive, then plugged it into my PS3 and played it like that. You will also want playback software – nowadays, VLC is light and covers a huge spectrum of file formats. If it’s media center software you want, I hear some good things about MediaPortal (and it’s free!).

More info: http://lifehacker.com/298408/turn-your-windows-pc-into-a-media-center-powerhouse-on-the-cheap

2. With a PS3 or Xbox 360

I’d already mentioned this, and it’s doubly simple with a PS3 or Xbox 360. A lot of people use these simply as gaming consoles and nothing more; little do they know that these little consoles double as excellent media hubs! I am very pleased with the PS3’s playback interface, as I find it very streamlined. Again, simply drag and drop the files from your computer to your external hard drive, then copy them onto the PS3 or Xbox 360 hard drive (PS3 users, the triangle button comes in handy). Easy as pie.

PS3: http://www.us.playstation.com/

Xbox 360: http://www.xbox.com/en-CA/?fbid=u8aEteIsElN

Another method using a PS3 or Xbox 360 would be to stream the media from your computer to your console (this can also work with a Wii and Orb software). I used Vuze to stream my media to my PS3 – but I wasn’t pleased with the result. My home’s Internet has excellent download speed, but mediocre upload speed, which lead to very laggy and unresponsive playback, with load times and all. I was much happier with the cruder method.

3. With a PVR

This is probably the easiest, but the most traditional and restrictive route; nowadays, tons of cable companies offer customers free PVRs and such for service – so take advantage and get one! PVR’s can tape shows off cable (this is a blessing, as you won’t need to acquire any media files – but unfortunately, you can’t put any on either) and save them onto the PVR’s hard drive, then play them back later on. Undoubtedly, you will probably have heard of this method already.

Of all these methods, I prefer the second one most – the $400 PS3 or $300 Xbox 360 are both excellent investments in entertainment, and open up not only a huge world of gaming, but also excellent media opportunities.

On-the-go

4. Slingbox

This solution has boomed in popularity since I first heard about it a couple of years ago. Slingbox basically streams your media files from your computer to another computer or another device that has a connection to the Internet. I believe that a major issue (as with all streaming) would be the limited upload speed of home Internet, but Slingbox has worked for some people (why would it be selling like hotcakes if it didn’t?).

More info: http://www.slingmedia.com/

5. Digital Media Player/iPod

A lot of us commute to work or school, and the time is wasted staring out the window. Why not do some homework, catch up on sleep…or watch a TV show? Simply download Videora iPod Converter (or your respective converter for your digital media player) and convert the files to iPod format, and drag and drop them into your iPod via iTunes. Ta-da, you can now watch your favourite TV shows on the go.

I hope that these instructions serve you well, and if you have any questions or concerns then fire away!

My iPod Video 5.5G, which I got as a gift for Christmas a couple of years ago, has been good to me. It does what it was made to do — play music — very well, and it’s still playing videos and that nice game of Pong. However, there are times when I get bored with the relatively dull iPod UI, when I wish I had more games on it, or when I wish I could use my own equalizer settings to play my music the way I want to play it. The beauty of having a popular device, like the iPod Video 5.5G, is its community of dedicated hackers, working night and day to improve it. There are many alternatives to the original Apple firmware, but amongst the various ones, I believe that Rockbox is the most reputable and trusted, and also the one that appeals to me the most for its simplicity (sorry, iPod Linux).

Capabilities

Rockbox can do a boatload of things with the iPod that the original Apple firmware couldn’t — like using Windows Explorer to import music to your iPod (meaning you don’t have to go through iTunes to upload or download your music), more flexible customizability (you can tweak even the fonts you want to see), and a support for a huge variety of file formats (http://download.rockbox.org/manual/rockbox-h10_5gb/rockbox-buildap1.html). But amongst all these, I found the following to be the deciding factors for me:

1. Themes

There are 14 themes for the iPod Video in the Rockbox Themes Directory. Granted, a good portion of them don’t look too hot, but I think there at least one or two that are pretty eye-catching. It’s just a guess — since there used to be a lot more themes that looked a ton better — but I’m assuming that Rockbox developers removed them due to the lack of Album Art capabilities. Works fine for me. If themes are your major concern, then I’d consider using iPod Wizard to tweak the current iPod theme, and just leave Rockbox alone — but if you’re looking for more than just a theme change, read on.

2. Built-in Gameboy

What? You can play Gameboy on your iPod? Yes. For free. Rockbox can play Gameboy and Gameboy Color files by default (granted, Gameboy Color files might be a bit laggier if I’m not mistaken). All you have to do is a quick Google search for ‘Gameboy Color ROMs’ and a ton of results will pop up. I have two things to warn you about: these sites will be shady, and this is not legal if you didn’t already buy a version of the game. I’ve got a legitimate version of Pokemon Red, so I can play it on my iPod. By the way, always go with Charmander — I know it’s a pain in the ass to play against Brock and Misty, but it’ll pay off.

3. Equalizer

I think the factor that sealed the deal would be the built-in equalizer that Rockbox offers. Unlike the iPod default firmware, which only offers presets (such as ‘Bass Booster’), the Rockbox firmware offers pretty full equalizer that allows you to put more emphasis on different frequencies (I think that’s the word for it). A must-have feature for audiophiles or people that get really into their music (but if you were an audiophile, you’d already be ranting about the shortcomings of the iPod, so I can’t see why you’d have one — haha).

Installation

In the olden days, we had to drag and drop files that we downloaded and unzipped from our desktop to the iPod’s drive directory. Not anymore! With the release of Rockbox Utility, Rockbox is a lot simpler to install (not that it wasn’t simple before), so there’s really no need to write a tutorial (plus I don’t really enjoy writing tutorials that much — sorry folks, there are just too many pictures I have to create, then crop, then upload, and then link to — it’s a heck of a process just for a couple of graphics).

Take the Leap!

If you’re afraid because you haven’t done anything like this before, remember that you can always return to your old firmware via iTunes (the iPod System Restore comes in handy). It can be undone! Just remember — follow instructions to the word, don’t do anything stupid like pull out the iPod USB cord while transferring, and relax. But I’d like to say here that if you do manage to brick your iPod, I hold no responsibility for it.

Good luck.

If you’re a PC user and have ever had the misfortune of running into trouble on your PC (no doubt you have), you’ll probably have seen articles involving or surrounding Windows registry.  If you’ve never investigated,  Leo Notenboom’s got a great article on what Windows registry is, and why it’s there.  And to sum things up, according to Notenboom, the Windows Registry is a central database of organized program and system settings and information.

photo credit: Signarama – Crystal, MN

For each setting you tweak, change, or delete, Windows registry creates an entry to log it.  Over time, these entries become obsolete — unnecessary.  Is it safe to remove them?  You bet — in fact, by purging these entries, you make clear space in the registry, and make it easier to call up programs and settings.  But, if you’ve got a new computer that’s slow, I’d recommend formatting (since registry probably doesn’t have that many entries anyway).

How can you clear it?  Don’t do it manually — instead, rely on the many programs provided out there.  I personally prefer CCleaner — it does the job well, and it’s free.  If you want to find out more information about Windows registry, or if you want to keep up with the times, I suggest visiting Registry Cleanerz — for information, and a set of forums to help with those questions of yours.  Have fun cleaning!

Maybe it’s just me, but I find it nearly impossible to decide on a profile picture.  Nowadays, it’s important to convey just enough to give other people a sense of who you are, without overdoing it on those special effects.  I’m a big fan of Photoshop, but even I think that’s overkill — especially just for a profile picture.  So how do we make it interesting, yet personal, enough to capture other users — or at least make them double-take?

An important piece of the puzzle is personality.  These tools I offer are all free, and offer either a way to create your own character (I suggest creating them in your likeness), or tweak your photos to make them more interesting.

1. Simpsonize Me!

Originally designed as a promotional tool for The Simpsons Movie, Burger King launched Simpsonize Me as a tool to “Simpsonize” photos of yourself.  The process, theoretically, should be simple — just upload and modify, right?

…mostly.  I only got to finish the upload on my fourth try — on my first three attempts, I actually gave up (put the computer to Sleep) or had the connection time out on me.  So, I offer an alternative to Simpsonize me, which is called “The Simpsomaker“.  Not as simple as just uploading, but I would argue a whole bunch more fun.

2. South Park Studio

Out of all five of these tools, I would say that South Park Studio’s definitely been the most famous amongst my friends.  I don’t usually endorse South Park, but I felt obligated to mention South Park Studio for their own sakes.  Maybe I’m just too darn conservative for this world.

3. Face Your Manga

Face Your Manga was a shocker — because it wasn’t as fully based on manga as one would expect.  I actually enjoyed using Face Your Manga — of course, I am an avid fan of Naruto and Bleach — but I usually don’t tend to enjoy those “manga”-y drawings.  A pleasant surprise, Face Your Manga is definitely one to consider.  Er, might want to take a half-hour out of your day before you get started on this one.

…oh, and don’t get too hopeful about the apparel.  In fact, none of these really offer much apparel customization, sadly.

4. Joystiq Mii

Mii’s have been arguably one of the most interesting and amusing features of the Wii (I feel guilty making funny-looking Mii’s — I’m not superficial, really!).  I figured it was just a matter of time before either Nintendo or another company pushed its Mii capabilities online in an avatar form.  It’s pretty precise, too — the flash app actually mimics the Wii’s own customization of the Mii very realistically.  And it turns your cursor into a Wii hand.

…er, I’m not exactly sure how to download the file though.  Print Screen comes in handy, I suppose.

5. Photofunia

I’ve saved the best for last — Photofunia, as I discovered through Lifehacker, allows you to upload your photos and then substitute it into various hilarious or famous pictures, some even using face detection technology (Mona Lisa, anyone?).  A perfect blend of amusement, customization, while not taking up too much time, I would suggest using Photofunia for those looking for a quick upgrade from a bland picture into an eye-busting double-taker.

Be Creative!

That’s probably not all the customizers out there, but they’re the ones that require least baggage (no sign-ups, no fees, no downloads!).  I think that these will be timeless classics for any user out there that wants a unique, yet interesting profile picture — hopefully, you have as much fun with them as I did.

I’ve always had trouble picking media player software.  The issue with iPod support always made things much more difficult — I’m more fond of Windows Media Player 11, but iTunes had the iPod support, and thus I usually opened iTunes anyway.  Problem with iTunes is that there was no free alternative — sure, I could’ve had access to my iPod in Windows Media Player 11 — if I paid $30 for an extra plug-in.  I had looked at View.tv recently, but that had no album art.  And what is life without album art?

Buzz around the latest Songbird 0.7 beta release grew, and I was interested.  I did my research — and it had iPod support!  I checked out some screenshots, and it looked comparable to iTunes.  Little did I know that when I installed Songbird, I’d never turn back.  I’m not writing a full review, but if you’re interested in some, here are a couple (surprisingly few):

• http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080822-hands-on-singing-along-with-songbird-0-7.html
• http://cybernetnews.com/2008/08/04/songbird-07-ditches-the-black-theme/

What I loved most about Songbird, similar to Firefox, was its add-ons.  It does look great by default, as did View.tv.  They both have iPod support.  Neither had album art.  Alas, that’s where the similarities end — with View.tv, you’re screwed.  With Songbird, you’ve got the Album Art Manager, MediaFlow, and a truckload of other options that make up for its default setbacks.  This, my co-op supervisor taught me, was the beauty of open-source: basically, as long as its got a fanbase and support, the sky’s the limit.

Reminds me of a certain media player, but I just can’t put my finger on it.

The main screen: an almost refreshingly basic view.  To be honest, I’d prefer iTunes’ view by album, but I’m hoping for an extension that will solve that.  Haha.  Er, as for 50 Cent, all I can say is that was from a long time ago.  I’m really not used to Songbird’s location of the Play button, but I guess it’ll grow on me naturally as iTunes did. 

A built-in browser just for extensions.  Beautiful, ain’t it?

Songbird’s got a built-in browser that is used for easy-installation of extensions.  Seriously, they’re just as easy to install as Firefox extensions are.  I’ve got to give kudos — after all, it’s still in beta. 

And after downloading and installing our add-on, and restarting Songbird…

Mediaflow: Watch out, Coverflow!

I remember seeing a WPF Application for a Coverflow compatible with Windows Media Player 11 — although that was experimental and way long ago.  I’ve since given up the dream.  Alas, hope is not lost, and we’ve got the Mediaflow extension for Songbird.  Isn’t she so perdy?  If only the Album Art Manager could find all my album art…actually, it’s not fault of Album Art Manager, as its built-in feature that allows it to automatically download album art off Amazon is absolutely ingenius.  My kudos to you, creator of Album Art Manager.  You too, creator of Mediaflow.  I can’t tell you how pleased I am, with iTunes: I almost forgot, but I had to manually grab the album art myself (until I became an iTunes customer).

I really hope Songbird becomes popular with the masses — for the sake of progression, and the benefit of all mankind.  I really can’t see a reason for it to fail.  I’ve only taken a look at its extensions: I haven’t even mentioned its compatibility with Last.fm, its lyrics feature, and the other themes out there.  Not to mention it’s still in beta.  I’m truly excited for Songbird 1.0 to come out — but with Songbird 0.7 already providing such stiff competition, we can only look forward to more innovative and powerful products from Microsoft and Apple to compete.  Beautiful.

• Download Link: http://www.getsongbird.com/
• Songbird Blog: http://blog.songbirdnest.com/

Very recently, I was informed of a new service called Quamut.  Launched by Barnes and Noble, Quamut is a service that offers many guides to life – their slogan is “The go to how to”.  I was immediately interested, and even had the opportunity to receive a couple of guides to read from Barnes and Noble.  Quamut refers to one of their guides as a Quamut, but in our report, I’ll be calling it a guide to dissolve most of the confusion.  …yeah, it sounds a bit weird, but I think you’ll eventually get what I was trying to say.  If not, just ignore the statement and continue.

You might think that I exaggerate when I say that a Quamut serves as the guides of life – I do not.  Quamut has guides on pretty much everything, from songwriting to fly fishing.  I received guides on Home Plumbing, Basic Cooking, as well as Buying a Hybrid Car.  While I’m not an expert on either of these subjects, and thus, can not evaluate them from that perspective, I can tell you that I did learn a lot from all of these guides to-go.  These guides to-go cost USD$2.95, but Quamut offers guides for free over the Internet.  Furthermore, a different .pdf of a guide to-go is available for a free download daily, which serves as extra incentive to check out their site regularly.  In that sense, I think they did a top-notch job in making the site very attractive.

Very Easy on the Eyes

As I scanned my Quamut guide, I noticed that the important information popped out at me – which is because Quamut took care to highlight the most important vocabulary with bolded text or in a red colour.  Furthermore, the diagrams included were  very useful in helping me build an idea of what kind of information they were trying to convey.  Although I found the text to be a bit small for my taste, I guess that’s justifiable to save on the amount of material used – plus, I know that I would much rather carry around a zippy, thin folder of information as opposed to a lugging around a huge binder.

Strictly for Newbies Only

While I did find the guides to be good reading, I also took them to an expert – Jonathan, of APH Networks, for appraisal.  To be specific, he was interested in the guide on Buying a Hybrid Car.  He did report that while the guide was generally pretty accurate, the information seemed to be tilted towards persuading the reader to purchase a hybrid car, and on occasion didn’t show both sides of the story.  For example: many negative aspects of hybrids are not mentioned – such as the effects the nickel batteries have on the environment, or how the hybrid standards have been revised since the article was written, and in fact, the article overall looks more like a promotional article for hybrid vehicles.

From the perspective of a newbie, however, I found the Quamut guide to be very informative and comprehensive.  Because the errors were relatively minor, most of the information actually made perfect sense to me, although it did take me a while to absorb the whole thing – it’s actually quite a good amount of reading, in case you were wondering.

I guess the conclusion that we arrived at was that while Quamut guides are great for newbies, they should only be read by newbies and not by any experts – however, it’s not likely that experts will flock to read Quamut guides – if they’re so knowledgeable about a subject already, why would they read a guide for newbies (unless they wanted to teach, or were very modest)?

Final Conclusion

Quamut guides: if you want to learn something, they’re probably the best place to turn to.  Quamut’s guides are generally very accurate, although experts on certain subjects will be able to find a few errors scattered here and there.  The guides are available free, so I can’t see a reason not to – and if you end up loving them as much as I did, you’d probably be compelled to purchase .pdf’s of them for $2.95 or even the quality-printed guides that can be found at Barnes and Noble.

Thanks to Madison Dunn for informing me about Quamut, and taking the time and care to mail those Quamut guides!