“EDGECRUSHER’s WAll”

Hundreds of years ago (2001), my boy D Lugz decided to let the world know how he felt about some of the most popular rock bands of that time. It wasn’t until recently that we dug it out of the achives, blew the dust off, and showcased it once more. The original post can be found here, or you can just read below in the interest of convenience:

EDGECRUSHER’s WAll

- Dennis Tavernite

Randy Rhodes ( 1956 – 1982 )
The greatest guitarist ever. If Clapton is God, then Randy must have gave birth to him. Randy never gets the credit for being the very best. He had only appeared on two Quiet Riot albums (being one of the founding members, and both albums not being released in america), and Ozzy’s two best albums(Blizzard of Oz, Diary of a Madman), plus the live Tribute cd. With his short career and life he never got credit for being the very best, to read the full Randy story clicking the picture of him directly below…

DENNIS’ top 10 over-rated bands

as of 4/ 24/ 01

10. (New) Metallica – Now i love Metallica, they are one of the greatest bands of all time.. um as of the mid 90’s though. If you bought Load or Reload, then why are you even alive? Just because a watch says rolex, doesnt mean its not a cheap imatation, meaning the cd says metallica, but thats not my metallica… since when did they give a shit about being radio friendly?? Master of Puppets went like something platinum or whatever and without having a video or a song on the radio. They lost their metal edge for money, f**k them.
9. All Hair bands – Lemmie ask you a question.. in a decade from now, will we find radio stations and music television praising the existance of boy bands? NO!! because people who understand what good music is knows that they suck and are hoping for this thing to end like disco. So then why are we still praising hair bands? I dont dont friggin know, email me if you know why.
8. Rush – …so people have heard this guy’s voice and he hasnt been shot yet? Kudos mr. Rush guy for making horrible music and still being alive.
7. Korn – Back in the day a band called Korn realeased an album, it was hard, and it was good. Then their second album was released and it was still hard, but not as good. Then Korn made radio freindly albums where bad songs were overplayed…
6. Staind – Someone please tell Arron Lewis to shut the hell up!!! I dont give a sh*t if he’s on the outside looking in.. so stop playing that song dammit!!! This is one of those self loathing pr**ks where we have to friggin sympathize with him to listen to his crappy boring ass music. Just go home, beat your wife, and dont make anymore crappy songs.
5. Godsmack – They may not be number one on the list, but they definitly have the most boring ass, repetetive, no creativity songs of all the bands on the list. How many times is this guy gonna tell me to go away? May we should listen to him and not go to his concerts anymore? Im serious if you find godsmck entertaining, then you must be brain dead.
4. Kid Rock – Sample rock songs and rap over them,  then only rap about 5 things…then act like a complete moron. Do these things and put Kid Rock out of a job.
3. Matchbox 20 – …..how did these guys get a record deal??? who sat down with them, listened to their music, and said “now thats good music”?? They are not unique in anyway, rob thomas is a nasty looking whiney bitch. they are definitly overrated when they are considered rock music instead of what they should be, pop (well, they really should be in the CRAP genre).
2. Limp Bizkit – Why are these guys so damn popular? These guys are making repetitive, thoughtless music so they can ride the whole rap-core wave of music thats “in” now-a-days…suck my d**k!!! How many times am i gonna hear fred talk(talk, not sing) about how some chick screwed him over or how hes violent and wants to break things? F**k you , you unimaginative motherf**ker!!! So now all these no talent ass clowns are pop culture icons because they play a couple of easy cords and talk about the same stupid crap all the time.
1. Nirvana – …oh thats right, you heard me right, Nirvana. The band the changed the music scene for the 90’s and paved the way for, blah blah blah….  fine whatever, yeah they changed things, they were kinds like the first fo their kind, as in alternative bands and s**t, but people always just automatically have to like them because of all that s**t. That dosent take away from the fact that their music is horrible. I dont really want to hear the incoheirent ramblings of a heorin addicted moron. His music is sometimes cheesy, sometimes boring, sometimes just not apealing in anyway. Just everyone, open your f**king ears and jsut listen to nirvana, just really listen,  then maybe one day you’ll be able to say “man f**k this, f**k you Kurt Cobain, who the hell are you man? Eat my friggin ass!!!”

iPhone Apps I Miss

uSirius – Streamed Sirius Radio to the phone.
Orb – Client for Orb, included the ability to watch live TV streaming.
Summerboard – Allowed for themes and backgrounds.
Solitaire – Okay, so this one you can find in the app store, but it used to be free.
Sketches – Basically Etch – A – Sketch, complete with shaking to erase.
Rainbow Light – As you moved your finger along the screen, the color would change.
The REAL Twinkle – …because the one in the app store is a garbage sell-out.
Services – A really basic app that allowed you to toggle things like Wifi and Bluetooth without having to dig through menus.

Hopefully, Installer will find its way to iPhone 2.0 software so I can have some of these back.

A Week With the iPhone 3G

The first week of the iPhone 3G as part of my life has already passed. I decided to do some comparing and contrasting with the old phone. I was fortunate enough to be someone with (what was referred to as) a “jailbroken” iPhone. This meant that the phone was able to have applications written to run natively on the phone. Apple now incorporates this via an application store within iTunes, however, does it measure up?

First up, the physical phone. It seems very similar at a glance, however, once you hold one for about 3 seconds, you feel the difference. The old iPhone was slightly heavier and flatter. The back of the old iPhone was metal where as the new one is plastic. I’m so accustomed to the old iPhone, that the new one seems as though it is of cheaper quality. It is also actually a bit wider and thicker. The volume and silence toggle buttons have a cheaper feel to them as well. Of course, the phone is priced much less, so there maybe a reason to that. One thing that shocked me a little was the screw visibility on the bottom. Apple usually avoids unasthetic eye sores like the plague, somehow, these made the cut. I wonder what prevented them from extending the speaker grate over them just to mask them. Big plus, the flush earphone jack. What a weird thing that was last year. Woof.

The screen seems to be the same if not better as far as I can tell. Although people have been complaining about the yellow-tint, I can clear this up. The screen color is more yellow than the old iPhone, but that doesn’t mean it’s wrong. The old iPhone was more blue, too blue as a matter of fact. If anything, the newer screen has a better contrast and the yellow tint makes the screen more accurate. I brought up a picture on both phones and my computer monitor, the iPhone 3G matched the monitor more than the old iPhone.

3G Vs. Edge: 3G is faster, that’s the bottom line about that, however, at what cost? 3G is great and all, if you have the coverage. Some places, switching off 3G will actually give you more bars on the Edge network. I hope it is only a matter of time before they fix this by adding more 3G coverage. Although it’s a nuisance, for now I switch off 3G most of the time. I know it’s strange to buy the iPhone 3G and not use the 3G feature, but the 16 gigs of space vs. the 8 I had before was motivation enough for me. The other problem with 3G is the battery.

The battery: horrible. I don’t know from experience, however, the feedback I have seen is that the iPhone 2.0 software is a battery hog and it drains the orginial iPhone battery pretty fast as well. I can’t imagine that they downgraded the battery or anything like that, it must be a combination of the hardware and software. Switch off 3G does help though, 3G really likes to drain your juice. I still am a little surprised that they battery could be this weak. If you aren’t fortunate enough to be able to charge your battery at least each night, you may be walking around with a dead iPhone, which is no fun at all.

Accessories: Another annoying side note, a lot of accessories stopped working. Even old Apple chargers won’t work with this new iPhone. That’s a really lousy move. I can’t imagine there is a good reason for this. I popped in my car charger on the way back from the Apple store last week to give it more juice on the way home and the phone delivers a message saying: Pe-tuie. For shame.

The App Store: Native support is supposed to be a step up, but the apps themselves are hit and miss. Some of the apps are dreadful, or just plain useless. The worst is when an app costs money and doesn’t work. There was a flickr app which uploaded pictures upside-down. Costumers loved that one. The Facebook app is lousy as well, using Safari on the Facebook page formatted for iPhone is a way better experience. The Myspace app is surprisingly written well, completely beats having to browse to the site…which is how it should be. Back in the Installer.app days (which was where we downloaded unofficial apps on the hacked/jailbroken iPhone) there were some apps which made it to the app store, so those were a nice touch of familiarity. You should know by now about my Twinkle saga. Sadly, Twinkle finally came out in the app store and as of the time of this writing, its performance is lacking severely. I long for the jailbreak again. Apps also don’t run in the background any longer, so apps like AIM are somewhat of a pain. Services like Shazam and midomi are awesome (song detection). Whrrl and Loopt are like mini social networks which let you and your friends know where you are and what you think about establishments in your neck of the woods. Pandora is finally on the iPhone, which should require no explanation. It’s a toss up since the apps are made by literally hundreds of different developers. The story is the same with the old hacked iPhone software, however. Some of these apps seem to crash the phone unfortunately. Sometimes, all of the apps will crash and I will need to uninstall them and reinstall them before they work again. What makes this even worse is that it loses your saved preferences, which means re-entering your login/pass and whatever else it needs.

So it’s not there yet, but it will be. The battery may or may not be an issue that is worked out, but I’ll cope with it. I feel like once the phone is jailbroken, I’ll be even happier. On a jailbroken iPhone there were some apps that I would just love to see, may even pay for, in the app store. There was an Orb app which allowed you to, among other things, watch live TV on the phone! This is perfect for 3G! There was also a Sirius streaming app! Having the app store and intsaller.app side by side would be almost like, having the WWF and WCW combine.

Funny!

Found on: http://eleventyone.done.hu/

Eye Crystals, WTF?

Could this really be real? It’s a video of crystals which apparently originate from this little girl’s eye. Read more to see the video.

Read the rest of this entry »

Wario by Justine

Justine made this, I just colored it. I colored it lazily in Photoshop to, so it’s quite a deviation from the original.

A True Pump It Up Master

He clearly has played this game a lot.

Hats off to Twinkle

Although I sound like a snoot, I need to blow off some steam. The new iPhone (and new firmware) was released on July 11th, and with it some changes to the iPhone realm. If you were one of the people who couldn’t resist messing with the iPhone and “jailbreaking” it in order to install applications other than what came with it, well then you may have an idea of what I’m talking about. Apple now has an official “App Store” with software made using Apple’s on SDK (software developer’s kit) in order to release endorsed applications. One of the applications which I grew extremely fond of, was a Twitter application, called “Twinkle.” At this time, the software running on the iPhone for the “unofficial” applications can not coexist with the software enabling official applications. Sadly, Twinkle is nowhere to be found in this new territory. Instead we are forced to try our luck with faceless immitators, such as Twitterrific (which I’ll accept as a name if you are going with the less popular definition of terrific: “causing terror; terrifying”), Twittelator (which is what, a Twitter-Terminator?), and Twittervision (more like “Lack-of-Vision). I won’t waste my time with why I hate all of these. In a nutshell, the three above-mentioned applications are garbage, they feel clunky and are somewhat counter-intuitive.

Thanks to the ability to capture screen shots on the old iPhone (something that requires an app which isn’t official either) I can show you a glimpse of Twinkle.

As you can see, with the old applications, one could also change the appearance of the interface, but that’s another rant.

This is the Twinkle Home screen. It shows myself and all the people I’m following. I would like to point out that in the second tweet, I am agreeing with Stressmint that one of the official Twitter applications is sub-standard.

A fun feature, is the “Near Me.” You can easily set the range of how near or far you want to be able to see. Again, in my Tweet on this particular screen, I am complaining about how much I miss Twinkle.

I selected a Tweet just to show what they look like. The options are simple and to the point.

If you notice above, “marry” has taken a photo for her Tweet. Here is what you see as a result of clicking the convenient thumbnail. I would also like to note that hyperlinks will open up in the Safari browser with ease. When browsed to these Tweets on the web, the link to the uploaded pic is automatically placed within the Tweet.

I’m not a huge fan of this feature, but the “Public” tab which browses (what seems to be) the entire world is fun if you’re bored and just want to gander. I won’t bother showing Settings, basically you provide your login/pass and toggle location.

…finally, the Tweet screen. When you are ready, you click the pencil up in the top-right and type away.

There you have it, simple picture button, it located me, and of course you can toggle that check-mark depending on if you want that information public.

Twinkle is supposed to have been released in the iTunes App store the day it opened. I hope we see it soon! I’ve been Tweeting less with the lousy apps that they have to offer.

“Ode to the Nice Guys” (About Time)

I found this on the website linked to below. it’s a good read, especially for you girls, although the guys who can relate will nod in agreement.

This is a tribute to the nice guys. The nice guys that finish last, that never become more than friends, that endure hours of whining and bitching about what assholes guys are, while disproving the very point. This is dedicated to those guys who always provide a shoulder to lean on but restrain themselves to tentative hugs, those guys who hold open doors and give reassuring pats on the back and sit patiently outside the changing room at department stores. This is in honor of the guys that obligingly reiterate how cute/beautiful/smart/funny/sexy their female friends are at the appropriate moment, because they know most girls need that litany of support. This is in honor of the guys with open minds, with laid-back attitudes, with honest concern. This is in honor of the guys who respect a girl’s every facet, from her privacy to her theology to her clothing style.

This is for the guys who escort their drunk, bewildered female friends back from parties and never take advantage once they’re at her door, for the guys who accompany girls to bars as buffers against the rest of the creepy male population, for the guys who know a girl is fishing for compliments but give them out anyway, for the guys who always play by the rules in a game where the rules favor cheaters, for the guys who are accredited as boyfriend material but somehow don’t end up being boyfriends, for all the nice guys who are overlooked, underestimated, and unappreciated, for all the nice guys who are manipulated, misled, and unjustly abandoned, this is for you.

This is for that time she left 40 urgent messages on your cell phone, and when you called her back, she spent three hours painstakingly dissecting two sentences her boyfriend said to her over dinner. And even though you thought her boyfriend was a chump and a jerk, you assured her that it was all ok and she shouldn’t worry about it. This is for that time she interrupted the best killing spree you’d ever orchestrated in GTA3 to rant about a rumor that romantically linked her and the guy she thinks is the most repulsive person in the world. And even though you thought it was immature and you had nothing against the guy, you paused the game for two hours and helped her concoct a counter-rumor to spread around the floor. This is also for that time she didn’t have a date, so after numerous vows that there was nothing “serious” between the two of you, she dragged you to a party where you knew nobody, the beer was awful, and she flirted shamelessly with you, justifying each fit of reckless teasing by announcing to everyone: “oh, but we’re just friends!” And even though you were invited purely as a symbolic warm body for her ego, you went anyways. Because you’re nice like that.

The nice guys don’t often get credit where credit is due. And perhaps more disturbing, the nice guys don’t seem to get laid as often as they should. And I wish I could logically explain this trend, but I can’t. From what I have observed on campus and what I have learned from talking to friends at other schools and in the workplace, the only conclusion I can form is that many girls are just illogical, manipulative bitches. Many of them claim they just want to date a nice guy, but when presented with such a specimen, they say irrational, confusing things such as “oh, he’s too nice to date” or “he would be a good boyfriend but he’s not for me” or “he already puts up with so much from me, I couldn’t possibly ask him out!” or the most frustrating of all: “no, it would ruin our friendship.” Yet, they continue to lament the lack of datable men in the world, and they expect their too-nice-to-date male friends to sympathize and apologize for the men that are jerks. Sorry, guys, girls like that are beyond my ability to fathom. I can’t figure out why the connection breaks down between what they say (I want a nice guy!) and what they do (I’m going to sleep with this complete ass now!). But one thing I can do, is say that the nice-guy-finishes-last phenomenon doesn’t last forever. There are definitely many girls who grow out of that train of thought and realize they should be dating the nice guys, not taking them for granted. The tricky part is finding those girls, and even trickier, finding the ones that are single.

So, until those girls are found, I propose a toast to all the nice guys. You know who you are, and I know you’re sick of hearing yourself described as ubiquitously nice. But the truth of the matter is, the world needs your patience in the department store, your holding open of doors, your party escorting services, your propensity to be a sucker for a pretty smile. For all the crazy, inane, absurd things you tolerate, for all the situations where you are the faceless, nameless hero, my accolades, my acknowledgement, and my gratitude go out to you. You do have credibility in this society, and your well deserved vindication is coming.

Fu-zu Jen, SEAS/WH, 2003

http://www.stwing.upenn.edu/~jenf/writing/rant04.html

Funniest Bad Translation, Ever