/dev/null/kevin

Dilbert.com was relaunched last week and it's terrible.  The pointy-haired boss has won.  They tried for Web 2.0 but ended up with Web 2.Oh No!

Now that I've gotten the one-liners out of the way, here are the specifics.  With a plethora of new features that might have sounded good on paper, the new site looks like a MySpace page with hemorrhoids.  It's loud, obnoxious, filled with Flash 9, and causes an itching sensation.  Tim Bray said it best:

Tim's not the only one who doesn't like the new site.   Venky also doesn't like the new site, but the most negative comments come from Dilbert's own readers: 

Today's Sunday strip was particularly bad as the Flash application didn't even display the entire strip all at once.  I needed to page through the Sunday strip to see it all.  Whatever humor there was in the strip was lost as I had to deal with the navigation.  I'm lucky that the Flash even worked for me since many of the comments show that Flash 9 doesn't work on many platforms, including Solaris and some PDAs.

Perhaps Scott Adams needs to buy his own copy of How To Make Webcomics from the guys at halfpixel.com [1 2 3 4] who really know how to make a web site for comics.

Update [04/25/2008]: Scott Adams has revealed the "secret" back door page with just the comic.

Since I complain about a lot of things I figured I should give credit to some good customer support from the Warner Brothers movie studio. 

I bought Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix on DVD last week.  I noted that it included a free digital download of the movie.  Yes, it requires windows and WMP, but free is free (or at least I already paid for it).  I entered by key and watched the download start, but just a few minutes in the downloading software hung.

Experienced people can see where this story is going.  On my second attempt to download the software I was told that my access key had already been used.  D'oh!  Worst fears realized.

Checking the support site they said I could call them during regular business hours (I was doing this on a Sunday).  There was also an email submission form for problems.  I sent the email, expecting to hear nothing, but only a few minutes later I received what I thought was just an auto-responder message.  Turns out it was a real response and they had reset my key!

Take 3 of the download worked perfectly.  All of this on a Sunday afternoon!  So congratulations, Warner Brothers DVD people on an excellent job!

Since I am the source of all things Led Zeppelin, and because all Zeppelin fans love me, I feel it's my duty to inform you all that Led Zeppelin has finally taken the stage.

[photo from Getty Images]

The took the stage at 9pm London time at the O2 Arena.  Here is the song list as reported by the Billboard blog:

Ironically, this list isn't too different my my joke list.  They were supposed to perform in November but Jimmy Page broke his hip finger.

This review for the movie Bratz may still be on Yahoo, but in case it's been removed, here it is.  It really is the most helpful, and accurate, review.

Here it is, the movie poster for Star Trek XI.  And what an impressive poster it is.  It's got stars on it, and I think they're trekking somewhere.  Wow.  I think this poster cost $5,000,000 to make.  Move over Santa and Jesus!  Next (next!) Christmas I've got a date with a young Vulcan named Spock who cuts open people's brains and steals their hero powers.  Update: Nimoy, too!

I blogged previously about hating spoilers.  Thus, I avoided any and all references to the new Harry Potter book.  Now that I finished the seventh book I went looking to see what could have spoiled it for me.  As expected, there were lots of spoilers out there.

Note: while there are no spoilers in this blog, I do link to several sites that contain spoilers.  Use caution if you're like me and don't want details of HP7 revealed to you.

Professional book reviews, like movie reviews, are supposed to be free of spoilers.  The whole point is to read the review to see if you want to spend the money on the book or movie.  The New York Times got into some trouble for posting an early review of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.  I read the NYT review and it does contain some minor spoilers (like what "Deathly Hallows" means) but nothing too bad.  Nothing like this horrible review from my own San Jose Mercury News.  Do not read that review if you don't want the book spoiled for you!!  The Seattle Times also made a similar blunder and gave away too much because they used "clever" hints that were too transparent.  Sometimes even opinions are spoilers.

Other web sites had actual photographs of the first 500 pages.  I'm not linking to them because they are piracy.  Some sites printed summaries of the book based on those 500 pages.  Still more web sites printed fake spoilers, sometimes mixed in with real spoilers.  It's hard to know if these are pro-Potter or anti-Potter sites.  The could be pro-Potter sites trying to fill the web with lies so even if you read a real spoiler it won't have the same impact.  When you have lots of lies mixed with lots of truths then you really have nothing more than the usual speculation that occurs before the release of a big title.

There was also one lunkhead, a participant in a hot dog eating contest shown on ESPN, who displayed a Harry Potter spoiler on the back of his sign as he was introduced.  I won't say if his spoiler was true or false, but his intent was cruel, so I hope he chokes on a hot dog someday and is then saved by a Harry Potter fan.  Here's the video.  Don't view if you don't want to read the spoiler, and definitely don't read the comments on that page.

I hate spoilers.  I don't like having movies, TV shows (or books, Harry Potter leakers) ruined for me and will do everything possible to avoid anything that could reveal major plot points.  Even in the way back days of USENET, I would avoid discussions of upcoming shows.  I also don't watch movie previews of movies I know I want to see.  The same goes for the "scenes from next week" at the end of some TV shows.  The people who make those teasers and trailers don't care about what they spoil; they're job is just to get you to watch it.  I won't even watch the beginning credits of the new Battlestar Galactica because it contains spoilers.

My problem is that almost anything can be a spoiler.  I have a pretty good memory, and a fairly logical mind, so it doesn't take much for me to connect things together.  Show me someone in a certain situation and I can pretty much guess how they're going to get into it.

With so many "web 2.0" feeds and instant communication, avoiding spoilers is harder than ever.  I am on the west coast, so huge plot details appear in my RSS reader before I even see some shows.  I found out who won the first season of Survivor while I was online years ago.  Recently, I actually deleted quite a few RSS feeds in anticipation for the inevitable Harry Potter leak that was to come (and it happened within hours of me doing so).

I had the season finale of Heroes spoiled for me due to a careless Twitter tweet.  The worst spoilers are the careless ones.  People who don't think before they speak (or tweet).

Sometimes people try to be clever and just give a little "hint" at a spoiler.  Don't.  Telling me that "you'll never see the surprise ending coming" means that I will.  Telling someone there is a surprise ending spoils the surprise.  Saying the ending made you happy or sad ruins the surprise.  Pretty much anything you say will spoil the ending.  So shut up! 

What really confuses me are people seek out spoilers!  People watch Entertainment Tonight, read TV Guide, or visit Ain't It Cool to get every piece of gossip and news about something coming out (TV Guide is really bad because they get advanced viewings of everything and then write articles like the shows have already aired).  Then people spread those spoilers carelessly because they assume everyone already know this stuff (bastards).  And then do you know what these spoiler-mongers do after the movie comes out or the TV show airs?  They will complain about it and say thing like "I could see the ending coming" or "it was too predictable."  Of course, dummy!  You read the script Harry Knowles posted!

So, in conclusion, seek out spoilers if you must, but don't assume that anyone else wants to know what you do.  I don't.

For this post only I am disabling comments just in case some jerk wants to put some spoilers in the comments.

While driving to work I heard back-to-back commercials for an Eddie Money concert and an Andrew "Dice" Clay show.

I'd attend, but I can't find my weight-lifter pants and thin tie with the piano key print.

Tags: 80s | eddie money | andrew dice clay

Yet another really bad example of lazy and inaccurate reporting.   Other examples: 1 2

Headline: Brosnan, wife helps Honolulu school kids

First Line: Pierce Brosnan and his wife Keely have donated $100,000 to help replace an unsafe playground at an elementary school on Kauai

Now, I don't expect everyone to be an expert on Hawaiian geography, but I would hope that someone who calls themselves a reporter would know that Honolulu, the capital of Hawaii, is on the island of Oahu, not Kauai.  This is like saying he helped kids in Sacramento when he lives in Los Angeles.

Since today is the 30th anniversary of Star Wars I am required, by law, to tell my Star Wars story.  That's me on the left there, cut and pasted into the Special Edition of Star Wars that came out in 1997.  I wrote a web page about it in 1998 and it's still there, looking like I wrote it in 1998.  Can you say "looks best when viewed with Mosaic?"

Something that I didn't mention is that I didn't know if I would make the final cut of the movie until I actually saw it in the theater.  We had filmed quite a few sequences so I didn't know what to look for, or even where to look, other than somewhere in Mos Eisley.  I ended up being quite easy to spot and everyone who came with me saw me right away.  I was lucky that you can see my face as most people's faces were covered.  The guy on my right was wearing glasses when we filmed that scene and was told to remove them, because glasses don't belong in the Star Wars universe.  I guess they worked around his glasses by covering his face with a building.  Tough luck, dude.

This was the first scene we filmed and I remember trying to stand as close to the camera as they would let me.  We were told to have a conversation so what I'm actually saying to the two other guys was, "If this shot gets into the movie, we'll be right up front!"  And I was right! 

Tags: star wars

I seem to be turning into a Friday-only blogger.  Times, they are a-busy.

Perhaps you read, in many places, the story about Japanese people getting scammed by people sending them sheep when they ordered poodles?  Well, it's fake.  Some news sites have pulled the story, but their links remain.

This is what happens when one lazy reporter posts an urban legend as news and all of the other news agencies pick it up.  No one does any verification.

Oh, and 3rd Happy Birthday, Blogs.Sun.Com.  You don't look a day over two.

Tags: news | reporting | errors | sheep | poodles

Here are my predictions for who will win (not who should win) the Oscar.  Predictions are in bold type.

 Update: Winners are in green, my incorrect predictions are in red.

• Best Picture:
• "Babel"
• "The Departed"
• "Letters From Iwo Jima"
• "Little Miss Sunshine"
• "The Queen"

• Actor:
• Leonardo DiCaprio, "Blood Diamond"
• Ryan Gosling, "Half Nelson"
• Peter O'Toole, "Venus"
• Will Smith, "The Pursuit of Happyness"
• Forest Whitaker, "The Last King of Scotland"

• Actress:
• Penelope Cruz, "Volver"
• Judi Dench, "Notes on a Scandal"
• Helen Mirren, "The Queen"
• Meryl Streep, "The Devil Wears Prada"
• Kate Winslet, "Little Children"

• Supporting Actor:
• Alan Arkin, "Little Miss Sunshine"
• Jackie Earle Haley, "Little Children"
• Djimon Hounsou, "Blood Diamond"
• Eddie Murphy, "Dreamgirls"
• Mark Wahlberg, "The Departed"

• Supporting Actress:
• Adriana Barraza, "Babel"
• Cate Blanchett, "Notes on a Scandal"
• Abigail Breslin, "Little Miss Sunshine"
• Jennifer Hudson, "Dreamgirls"
• Rinko Kikuchi, "Babel"

• Directing:
• Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, "Babel"
• Martin Scorsese, "The Departed"
• Clint Eastwood, "Letters From Iwo Jima"
• Stephen Frears, "The Queen"
• Paul Greengrass, "United 93"

• Foreign Language Film:
• "After the Wedding" Denmark
• "Days of Glory (Indigenes)" Algeria
• "The Lives of Others" Germany
• "Pan's Labyrinth" Mexico
• "Water" Canada

• Adapted Screenplay:
• Sacha Baron Cohen and Anthony Hines and Peter Baynham and Dan Mazer and Todd Phillips, "Borat Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan"
• Alfonso Cuaron and Timothy J. Sexton and David Arata and Mark Fergus and Hawk Ostby, "Children of Men"
• William Monahan, "The Departed"
• Todd Field and Tom Perrotta, "Little Children"
• Patrick Marber, "Notes on a Scandal"

• Original Screenplay:
• Guillermo Arriaga, "Babel"
• Iris Yamashita and Paul Haggis, "Letters From Iwo Jima"
• Michael Arndt, "Little Miss Sunshine"
• Guillermo del Toro, "Pan's Labyrinth"
• Peter Morgan, "The Queen"

• Animated Feature Film:
• "Cars"
• "Happy Feet"
• "Monster House"

• Art Direction:
• "Dreamgirls"
• "The Good Shepherd"
• "Pan's Labyrinth"
• "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest"
• "The Prestige"

• Cinematography:
• "The Black Dahlia"
• "Children of Men"
• "The Illusionist"
• "Pan's Labyrinth"
• "The Prestige"

• Sound Mixing:
• "Apocalypto"
• "Blood Diamond"
• "Dreamgirls"
• "Flags of Our Fathers"
• "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest"

• Sound Editing:
• "Apocalypto"
• "Blood Diamond"
• "Flags of Our Fathers"
• "Letters From Iwo Jima"
• "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest"

• Original Score:
• "Babel" Gustavo Santaolalla
• "The Good German" Thomas Newman
• "Notes on a Scandal" Philip Glass
• "Pan's Labyrinth" Javier Navarrete
• "The Queen" Alexandre Desplat

• Original Song:
• "I Need to Wake Up" from "An Inconvenient Truth" Melissa Etheridge
• "Listen" from "Dreamgirls" Henry Krieger, Scott Cutler and Anne Preven
• "Love You I Do" from "Dreamgirls" Henry Krieger and Siedah Garrett
• "Our Town" from "Cars" Randy Newman
• "Patience" from "Dreamgirls" Henry Krieger and Willie Reale

• Costume:
• "Curse of the Golden Flower"
• "The Devil Wears Prada"
• "Dreamgirls"
• "Marie Antoinette"
• "The Queen"

• Documentary Feature:
• "Deliver Us From Evil"
• "An Inconvenient Truth"
• "Iraq in Fragments"
• "Jesus Camp"
• "My Country, My Country"

• Documentary (short subject):
• "The Blood of Yingzhou District"
• "Recycled Life"
• "Rehearsing a Dream"
• "Two Hands"

• Film Editing:
• "Babel"
• "Blood Diamond"
• "Children of Men"
• "The Departed"
• "United 93"

• Makeup:
• "Apocalypto"
• "Click"
• "Pan's Labyrinth"

• Animated Short Film:
• "The Danish Poet"
• "Lifted"
• "The Little Matchgirl"
• "Maestro"
• "No Time for Nuts"

• Live Action Short Film:
• "Binta and the Great Idea (Binta Y La Gran Idea)"
• "Eramos Pocos (One Too Many)"
  
• "Helmer & Son"
• "The Saviour"
• "West Bank Story"

• Visual Effects:
• "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest"
• "Poseidon"
• "Superman Returns"

Tags: academy awards | oscars | predictions

IMDb's new look is nice, I guess, but the muscle-memory in my mouse hand doesn't know where to click anymore.

Help!

Tags: imdb
 

Here are some cool pictures of an artist who cleaned the soot from the inside of a tunnel to create art.

 Tags: skulls | soot | art