Spiderman 3 leaked trailer quality less than satisfactory

The Spiderman 3 trailer has been leaked, so now you don't have to wait and see it before Superman Returns... at least, if you want to see the, like, characters and stuff, you do, but if you want to listen to the music and bootleg background noise and try in vain to read some of the teasers, you're set. Much funnier bashing of the quality + the trailer itself here.

Wi-fi for all who want to pay for it...which isn't many

As someone who hates the idea of paying through the nose to get fast internet service (at least, I did until I no longer had a laptop to take advantage of it), I was really excited by stories about wi-max and citywide wi-fi networks growing in popularity, even with the high likelihood that they would have spotty coverage. As far as I was concerned, it was a step in the right direction. Of course, I think I assumed that they would be paid for via taxes and/or advertising and would at least feel free. It could be that that's the only way they'll have the success everyone's envisioning, too: there was an article in the New York Times this morning about how Taipei has set their citizens up with a citywide wi-fi network accessible to 90% of the population (which is impressive--if/when LA adopts this strategy, that kind of coverage will likely take years)...and only 40,000 people (out of 2.6 million), a paltry 1.5%) have signed up for it. It's not expensive: $12.50 a month is completely affordable, and I'd be more than willing to pay such a fee (particularly compared with the $38 a month I'd been paying to Comcast previously, and that a promotion rate... it was going up to $60 soon). Then again, my options are limited. In Taipei (and in San Francisco, where Google and Earthlink are looking to build the first citywide wi-fi network in the US), there are plenty of free options: cafes, work, your neighbor's unsecured wireless, hotels and airports that want to attract more business travelers.

In fact, cities in the US are looking for a way to provide wi-fi free to their residents, with the company that made the investment recouping it via advertising. A company that had started negotiations to build a network in Sacramento pulled out earlier this month because the city insisted they make back their money with advertising rather than subscription fees. People just don't like paying for stuff that they don't see as essential, which is the case in Taipei. We're willing to put up with everpresent banners and commercials you can't skip if it means we get something free. I'm willing to pay a small fee to get rid of it, but we're talking a pretty small fee: I pay Yahoo about 20 bucks a year to get my email advertisement-free. Of course, along with that perk I also get more storage, I got to switch to Yahoo Mail Beta (which rocks, it's like a portable Outlook) months and months ago, whereas regular users still have to sign up to try it out and hope for the best, and there are some other perks that I really can't remember because the beta mail interface is so friggin' awesome... anyway, I think that $20 is well-spent. But I'm not willing to spend much more. With wireless it'd be about the same, I think: ubiquitous wireless access is a nice-to-have: I can't live without the internet, it's true, but I spend 8-10 hours a day in an office where I have access to it for free. And I would imagine that most of the people who would be interested in wi-fi in the first place are in a fairly similar situation. It'll be interesting to see what happens.

This is a real ad.

Seriously.

Discuss.

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UPDATE: Clicking on it led me to this site. You won't be disappointed.

M:I 3

Saw Mission: Impossible 3 on Saturday. It was like watching the pilot episode of Alias all over again. Which is good, in that that episode was really good, but bad in that, well, if I can draw that comparison, I've already seen it. (C'mon J.J., I'm sure you've got a couple more tricks up your sleeve. If you aren't going to blow them on a big-budget summer movie, then when? I don't see your style meshing with Sundance.) Was the movie worth the price of a $12 movie ticket? I don't know. What I do know is that it was not worth the price of a $12 movie ticket plus gas money for sitting in two separate traffic jams on the freeway on the way back from BFE. On a Saturday. After midnight. Oh no. Nothing is worth that.

Month in review

A quick summary of what the hell I've been doing with myself when not blogging:

1. Watching movies from my Netflix queue. 8 more down, 140 to go.
2. Reading. Seriously. Have finished like 5 books in the past month.
3. Strep throat. Again.
4. Turning 24 and celebrating like I'm still 23. Big mistake. Am now exhausted.
5. Complaining about the weather.
6. Going out and getting sunburned the second we had good weather; don't mind the bad weather so much anymore.
7. Adding new links to my sidebar.
8. Swimming. At least until I got strep throat.
9. Working.
10. Drinking too much.

Y'all aren't missing out on anything.

RIP laptop

I always knew this day would come... I just didn't think it would be this soon.

About a month ago, my laptop bit the dust. I don't know if I got one too many blue screens of death--I've gotten a lot of those, actually--or if it simply got bored with doing nothing but surfing the internet (I do actual work only when I'm at work, usually, and the few things I did bring home were even duller than whatever it was I was reading online. Trust me.), but at long last my laptop decided to stage a protest and simply stopped turning on. As it happens, this is remarkably effective at getting my attention, though not so effective that I was motivated to do anything about it until last week. (Because, after all, all I really do with it is surf the internet, and since I can do that at work, the only real effect of losing internet access at home has been falling a little behind on current events and requiring driving directions from my friends, because I can't map anything online anymore. I will also blame it for the dearth of posts here over the preceding month, but we all know that's a lie.) And per the feedback of an engineer at work, it doesn't look like it's worth investing in fixing the problem, which uncertain success, when I could be investing in a shiny new laptop that will turn on. (Hopefully.)

So now, birthday money in hand (I had to turn 24 to get it...it wasn't pretty), I am in the market for said shiny new laptop. And am suddenly stunned by how little I know about laptops. What's the hot new Intel processor? Should I care if it's Windows Vista-compatible? What's the new standard for hard drive space? RAM? Battery life? Weight? Screen size? Built-in wireless? Do any of these questions really matter given that all I really do with my laptop is surf the internet? Are there other things I could potentially use it for if I got a heavily feature-laden laptop? Is there one that makes chai tea lattes from Coffee Bean appear? Will it fold my laundry? I demand the best there is (particularly if it makes chai tea lattes from Coffee Bean appear or folds my laundry), despite the fact that my use of those additional features will likely be limited. I no longer need the complete MS Office Suite, as there's little need for me to do PowerPoint presentations anymore. (Thank God.) I don't really need much memory or RAM, as I'm not a gamer and don't even own a digital camera which pictures I'd want to store and organize. I suppose I'd like to watch DVDs on it when I travel, but from what I understand, no laptops yet really have the battery power to undertake that for the duration of a cross-country flight. And I hate travelling with laptops anyway: everyone glares at the guy who takes extra long going through security because they require you to take your laptop out of its case and run it through separately. (By the way, can someone suggest to airports that they make those conveyor belts longer so you don't have 5 people struggling with 10 bags in the space of a 6 foot-long table, everyone behind them wondering why on earth they didn't prepare for the conveyor belt sooner. Until they actually get there and realize that there's nowhere to put your effing stuff! Argh.)

My point is, while I realize it's silly of me to spend money on features that I'll probably use for about 5 minutes during the duration of my ownership of the laptop (those 5 minutes being the entirety of my attention span the moment I discover said feature and think it's cool...and 5 minutes might be overstating it), I'll do it anyway because I think that I may potentially find them to be of use in the future. It's the same reason I won't give away clothes that no longer fit, or simply can't be seen wearing in public: I refuse to believe that there will not be a day when I can wear them again, and on that day, if I've already given them away, my reaction will look something like "You stupid bitch! What's wrong with you, you totally knew you'd be able to wear that again and look totally cute and now look what you've done! Well, I guess this means you have to go shopping. Again. Don't drink beforehand this time."

See, I just know that if I don't get the Core Duo processor (whatever the hell that does...it sounds fancy), then there will be a day a year from now when I need to do something that can only be done with a Core Duo processor, or I could do something slightly faster if I had the Core Duo processor, or my laptop would still be working despite the beer I spilled on it if only I'd gotten the Core Duo processor. See, I'm thinking ahead to the angst that I will avoid by knowing that I did everything in my power to get a top-of-the-line laptop, because if you get a top-of-the-line laptop, and something goes wrong, then clearly God has it in for you and there was never anything that could be done except resign yourself to your fate. I'm buying a coping strategy, people.

So, uh, any suggestions?

Week 1

A few things I've learned in my first week at my new job:

1. Wearing flip flops a slightly less attractive idea when one has to walk half a mile to work from the parking lot. Uphill. Both ways.

2. Bribery with M&Ms not effective in securing a closer parking spot. Same for offer to be their best friend.

3. In Los Angeles, distance is a poor indicator of travel time. I now drive half the distance every morning in the exact same amount of time.

4. Sitting within 20 feet of someone else who has the same name as you and a bunch of vocal friends who like to say it a lot really blows.

5. You haven't felt cool until you've gotten a computer with two monitors. I can only look at one at a time, but my God, just think of how much time I've saved by only having to minimize and maximize different windows about half the time.

6. Packing all my decorations and stuff into a box on the last day of my old job really expedited process of decorating barren cubicle at new job.

7. If a group of people are standing around the open door to what appears to be a supply closet, do not duck in and stare vacantly at shelves that contain no office supplies and then ask where the supplies are. Much simpler to simply ask before making a fool of oneself.

8. Tearing open first paycheck and cackling with glee frowned upon.