Username Identity Theft

Well, once again I find myself getting to a new site/service "late" again.  This time, the site/service in question is Twitch.
My continuing problem is that when I arrive late to the party, some ignorant, uncreative jackass will have already registered with my username, killermist.  http://www.twitch.tv/killermist shouldn't have been allocated, because as of the time I tried to register, I hadn't yet registered an account.  In order to report the user for identity theft, which is what it amounts to, I had to register a new username (realkillermist), which isn't MY username.

The last thing before this that had that problem was Kik.  They seemed to totally not care that some user was engaged in identity theft by stealing my username.  So, I don't have much choice but to not use their "service" and to badmouth them to others because of their utter apathy for protecting my online identity.  Even worse, someone may initiate a chat with the jackass that is using my username and not realize that the user isn't me.  This has put Kik on my disavowed and shunned list.  Their administrators and policy enforcers don't care about identity theft?  OK.  They'll just get plenty of negative word-of-mouth.

Depending on how Twitch chooses to handle this bit of identity theft, they may become a service that I use, or a service that joins Kik on the disavowed and shunned list, forever to get nothing but negative word-of-mouth out of me.

Fortunately, since I'm killermist on Google, that solidifies my online identity on everything that Google provides or that authenticates via Google.  So, the moronic jackasses can't take over those identifications.

Driver Behavior

Today, I was pleasantly surprised that IndyGo driver #3030 bypassed a person that was waving for the bus, but wasn't at a proper bus stop.
I can already hear some complaining, "You're so heartless.  It's cold out there."
That isn't the driver's fault, or mine either.  I make the effort to be on the bus stop where I should be.  He and his groceries can too.
I'm glad that the driver followed the proper protocol and didn't pick him up.  Picking up from any random location encourages that same behavior from others.

Survivor, sigh

After 29x05 and 29x06, my heart is kind of not in Survivor so much.  Missy and Baylor are such toxic people for whatever tribe they're in.  Missy is blissfully unaware of her wastefulness, which is what drew Dale's attention and dislike.  Baylor is suck a wishy-washy little mouse.  But somehow the two of them managed to get Dale's daughter and then Dale voted out.  [sigh]  I don't know how the other people can be so oblivious to not see that they're making a horrible mistake keeping those parasites around.

Now in 29x07, there's the "trail mix fiasco", which translates to "eat the rich" narrative. [sigh]

I think the only three people I really even liked left in the game were Keith, Wes, and Julie.  All the other ones just have this coating of sleaze on them.  I'm kind of disappointed that Julie quit.  But, I can't blame her.  The general sleaziness of most of the rest of the tribe is something I wouldn't want to willingly deal with either.

29x08  [sigh]  "War on women" narrative, anyone?  Give it a friggin' rest.

When Wes and Keith go, I may not have a whole lot more reason to watch because I don't particularly "care about the characters" anymore.

Ruined entertainment

God bless them, but the people trying to manufacture entertainment have a serious up-hill battle to deal with.
Once upon a time, movies like Back to the Future and Terminator 2 seemed like plausible futures even if there were some dystopian elements.
Now, movies like the most recent X-Men movie come along where gigantic liberties are taken with the past, present, and future, and even then, the most horrible possible future portrayed seems like a pretty, glittery impossible jewel of what could-be because what-is can't possibly lead to something so humane.  Mutants dying horrible deaths at the hands of sentinels that are so adaptable that the mutants can't keep up?  That's a lunatic, beautiful future compared to the kind of black hole of stupidity that humanity is working on now.  Idiocracy (the movie) seems far more plausible than anything that exists now.  Even if the "logical conclusions" of the movie are totally non-sensical, the initial premise (that the sane people stop reproducing and the morons reproduce copiously) is completely valid.
As dystopian futures go, many that are portrayed in movies really don't look so bad anymore.

• 1984 - meh.  We're already there.  It can't be so bad.
• Equilibrium - A forced loss of emotion might not be such a bad thing.  Far too many really stupid results have been caused by stupid emotional reactions.
• Dredd - In the middle of a chaotic mess there might be people that actually enforce something resembling order?  Sign me up.

Seriously.  Looking at movies that portray a future, no matter how fscked-up and horrific that future is, I am not able to look at it and not think to myself, "Wow!  That'd be nice."

Twilight Zone (1985 series) 01x29

I of Newton:
Not often you see a major chunk of a TV show with just two characters.  But, it plays very well.  
Ron Glass (Shepherd Book from Firefly and Serenity) as some lesser servant of the devil with Sherman Hemsley (George Jefferson from The Jeffersons and All in the Family) have a verbal joust.
Fun quotes from the servant's t-shirts:
HELL IS A SUMMER FESTIVAL
HELL IS A CITY MUCH LIKE NEWARK
OVER 2,000,000,000 SERVED
GEHENNA MORE THAN A PLACE A WAY OF LIFE
LET'S DO DAMNATION


The whole thing is expert in so many ways.  Wow.

Prisoner exchanges

I hate prisoner exchanges in general.

However, there's some wisdom to be seen in the value of the exchange.

If one imprisoned Israeli soldier is worth 20, 30, 50 imprisoned Palestinians [or whatever, who cares?], what value does that contribute or deteriorate from the value of those other prisoners.  Imagine: "You're only worth 1/20 of that soldier that was traded.  But, that's the best deal we could swing."   Real wake-up, ain't it?

If Palestinians can not comprehend the valuelessness of their terror/horror-based campaigns against Israel, then there's nothing to be done for remedying that complete and utter lack of awareness.  Nothing.

Shelved cat

Little Techno thinks she's a book and shelved herself.

First Intentionally Listened-to Tracks of 2014

This was a bit intentional.  I knew that too much modern crap would be pimped, so I stuck a headphone in my right ear and thought to myself, "What do I, myself really want to hear first for this year?"  So, I abused my tablet and my network to pull together what I knew I personally wanted to hear first.
I figure only the first 10 tracks count, so that's what I'll limit myself to historically.
(Track names are in bold, to be easier to read)


1.)  Slash - Obsession (from the 1996 weirdo movie "Curdled") (Just the instrumental)
2.)  The Birthday Massacre - Pins and Needles
3.)  The Hush Sound - Wine Red  (the tablet had a lack of content, duh, so I needed time to go searching for other good things.  In spite of this, the track was on the tablet for good reason.)
3.)  Rank 1 - Airwave (Sunset Remix)   (Airwave is such an awesome track, regardless of form.)
4.)  Slash - Obsession (may only be Slash doing some impressive things on a Spanish guitar, but it beats the pants off of Jason Drulo (sp?) and the #RockinEve playlist)
[please don't make me drag out the average replayers to counter the televised crap]  [I have an mp3 player with better content]
Fine, I'll drag out the mp3 player.  Dammit.
5.)  Saliva - Ladies and Gentlemen
6.)  Geto Boys - Damn It Feels Good To Be a Gangster  (came up randomly, but it still beat the media-chosen crap)
7.) "Weird Al" Yankovic - Albuquerque (11 minutes, 23 seconds, worth every second) (intentional, not randomly hit)
8.)  Overclocked Remix - Final Fantasy 6 (3 US)  - Dirt Devil  (look it up.  It is spiffy)
9.)  Shark Island - Father Time (from Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure.  Hasn't lost much value since then.)
10.)  [gotta make this good...]  Def Leppard (Hysteria) - Pour Some Sugar On Me (THE first track I ever heard via CD playback)

It may be a bit random (intentionally).  But, when compared against the mass-media produced end-of-the-year, "this is the first thing you're going to hear this year" crap, I'd say my list slamdances on the grave of their playlist.  Mass media needs to quit trying to tailor itself.  When it does, it just looks that much more foolish.

Fergie, Fallout Boy, That chick that used to be Hanna Montana, Jenna [something] (that may have been a porn star at some point), of these I care not at all out of some specific (and probably small) context.  Don't force me to hear that crap just after the new year changeover.  You pull that crap and I'll both tune you out and hate you for it.


Random Rotation Honorable Mentions:  (timestamps = when noticed and/or typed)  ((Some skipping may be occurring))
01:37  Republica  - Ready To Go
01:39  Amy Grant - It Takes a Little Time
01:45  Vengaboys vs ATB - Shalala Lala Ibiza Trance (Alice DeeJay Remix)  [Good luck finding that track, not sure where/when I found it]
01:48  Crash Test Dummies - How Does a Duck Know? [Awesome track]   [also oddly seems to be the one time-unmodified one in the bunch, since I've got a +/- 5% speed and +/- 10% speed version both in the directory]
01:53  AC/DC  - Thunderstruck
01:57 t.A.T.u vs. Rammstein - Ondo I To Zhe (Long Repeat Remix)  [Very good happenstance to get this track and its siblings]
02:08  Chumbawamba - Mary, Mary
02:11  Sophie B. Hawkins - As I Lay Me Down
02:13  Johnny Cash - The Man Comes Around  (The man (Cash) wasn't wrong...)
02:17  Pidgeonhed - Battle Flag (Lofidelity Allstars Remix)

Sleep:
I'm on record for what I permitted/required myself to listen to.  If you're not on the list, you don't necessarily suck.  You're just in a really fierce competition.  If you were tapped by the mass-media to play something or sing something for the waving in of 2014, there's some high probability that some people missed your "contribution" entirely.

[edit] Came back and undid the coloring, which really didn't work for this blog's background, and instituted some far more simple formatting.

Uninstall Thursday Week 2

Well, let's get at it.

Monopoly Slots -- It just got boring.  Spend all your money, wait for more free money, spend that, wait for more free money, hope you level up, blah, blah, blah.  Nah.  I have more important things to do, like maybe nurture my Sims and go ghost hunting some more.

Castle Clash -- Just like so many similar games.  Fun for a day or two, then gets boring and neglected.

Game Dev Story -- Many rave about it.  But, I've seen this type of game before.  I lose interest after about an hour.

ttorrent -- What was I thinking?  "I'm going to run torrents from my tablet, over wifi, using up my limited storage and running out my battery faster.  Not to mention that I'm also going to be fighting my NAS for upload bandwidth when I'm at home."  No.  I'm really not.
µTorrent -- Same problem.

MonsterCrafter -- An interesting concept, but I don't quite "get it".  And it isn't as fun as GunCrafter which uses some of the nifty features of a tablet/phone for aiming and stuff.

Zombie Highway -- Another app that's good for about 15 minutes the first play, maybe another 10 minutes of replay a couple of times, and then there's not much reason to come back.  I guess if you're competitive with yourself, then you'll keep striving for that longer distance, more kills, more goals accomplished, better car, blah, blah, blah.  I just don't feel that particular need, I guess.  It does make good use of the gyroscope for steering-wheel-like control.

Riptide GP  Shiny, polished, gyroscopic controls, competitive computer opponents.  It's just not my thing.  Sometimes I like the concept of boat racing games, but my reflexes really aren't what they once were, so I leave the more twitchy stuff for the kids.

Next week, I really need to make an effort to go through some of these free-apps-of-the-day I installed and never opened and see what they're all about.  I've probably got a good bit more dead wood laying about that I can get rid of.

Uninstall Thursday

Most of these were probably picked up from Amazon's appstore as "free app of the day"

Monsters Ate My Condo.  It was fairly well crafted, but too twitchy for me.

Hambo.  Kind of interesting as a puzzle/kill-the-enemy type game, but eventually got too hard, and I lost interest.

Float'n'split tablet keyboard.  The resizability to be able to get more visible screen is nice, but means the keys get smaller (harder to tap).  It just doesn't seem as useful as the Hacker's Keyboard (which is free).

Tiny Death Star.  After a couple weeks, it got REALLY boring, and I only wanted to bother looking at it once or twice a day.  The amount time it took to stock many things in the difference facilities never lined up and many times was just too short.  I don't want a game where I have to babysit it for an hour 2 or 3 times a day to play it.  When one thing takes one minute to stock, but the next store has something that takes 3 minutes to stock, and another has something that takes 5 minutes to stock, do you flip out of the game after each event, or set all 3 to stock, then flip out of the game, wait 5 minutes and come back to stock or do you just stare at the screen mindlessly for all 5 minutes, using the elevator to move VIPs that apparently don't know how to use the elevator themself while waiting for the different things to get stock?

Simpsons Tapped Out.  Similar but different from Sims FreePlay. It suffered some of the same timing issues as Tiny Death Star but on a different scale.  And too much of it just seemed geared towards "Hey, buy donuts so you can do things faster!"