Technical topics, such as, building computers, latest technologies, new gadgets, cool movies (special effects), photography, video editing, software, and others.
Don't worry, its a good thing. I have been creating posts to this blog for a month now, and I must say that I really enjoy it. I feel that I am ready to move on to some more serious blogging. Unfortunately, the sevice I am currently with provides a minimal set of tools to create blogs. Therefore I have decided to buy a webspace and start creating with MovableType. Although my blogsite name has changed, to www.tonytalkstech.com, I was able to export all of the content, minus the comments, over the new site. This move is also good for you. There are features available that I will pass on as I learn to implement them. Things like,
BlogSite search capability
RSS Feed
Built-in comment system
Email notification of new posts
Mail this post
and others...
All of these features, along with a higher bandwidth provider, will help the site operate much smoother. I hope you are as excited as I am about this, so when you are ready, click here, and take a look around.
Who could resist? “Show your support for our troops by downloading our free cursors!” says MyFreeCursors.com. One click, and your mouse pointer is an American flag. That click implies that you consent to their terms. The terms are that eUniverse Inc. has the right to watch your every move on the Internet. What’s more, the policy indicates that eUniverse has the right to install other software in the future on the users’ computer — and uninstalling the cursor program won’t remove this additional software from their system. A spokeperson for EUniverse claims that they are not in the spyware business and that customer response to the product has been positive. Excuse me but, I don't know many people that would think this is good business practices. I believe that they did receive some positive feedback from a few people but those people surly didn't know about the covert software keeping tabs on them.
MSNBC.com also reports some shady dealings within EUniverse, ...on April 16, when eUniverse was forced to lower revenue expectations for the current quarter, and its stock price quickly fell by 25 percent. Three weeks later, the firm announced the good news from earlier in the year had been a mistake. On May 6, the company said its two prior quarterly announcements “should not be relied upon” — restated financial results will actually be lower.
Two days later, the company disclosed that the Securities and Exchange Commission had opened an “informal inquiry” into the company’s finances, and Take-Two Interactive CEO Jeffrey Lapin had resigned from the firm’s board of directors. A shareholder lawsuit soon followed.
I came across this little guide and thought that you all might be able to use it. So if you really have to be on the golf course right after lunch try these suggestions.
Faking It
A beginner's guide to making it look like you're working when you're
not.
Technology
The Trick
Slacker
Application
E-Mail Timers
Set e-mail timers so that messages send when you're out of
the office. (In most MS Outlook programs, click "options" in your message
and fill in the "Do not deliver before" window.)
Go to bed early, but make team members think you're
burning the midnight oil by timing messages to send at 3 a.m.
RIM BlackBerry Handheld
Reconfigure the gadget so that e-mails look just like
regular office messages. To remove the "sent from my BlackBerry" message,
click your desktop icon, select Redirector Settings, choose the General
tab, and delete the autosignature.
Leave work early to avoid traffic, but send a few
BlackBerry messages from the road to cover your tracks.
GoToMyPc.Com
Download software to your office PC that allows you to
control your work computer screen over the Internet from anywhere. You can
even operate your mouse remotely. Costs $19.95 a month.
Log on to your work computer during vacations, and open up
today's newspaper on the screen. Colleagues will think you just stepped
away for a moment.
Instant Messaging
Crack the settings in your Instant Messenger program and
disable the "idle" feature, which tells coworkers if you're online. (In AOL
Instant Messager programs, go to "preferences," then "privacy.")
Perfect for three-hour lunches and mid-afternoon
pedicures.
Yahoo By Phone
For $4.95 a month you can call in and have your e-mails
read aloud to you by a computerized voice named Jenni.
Forward your office e-mail to a Yahoo address. When you
travel out of e-mail reach, you can call in to make sure you're not missing
anything urgent.
Call Forwarding
Available for a few dollars a month from most phone and
cellphone companies, this feature allows you to forward your desk phone to
another phone.
You can take the afternoon off for a massage, and still
pick up your work calls in real time.
Ray Ozzie, the famous creator of Lotus Notes, shares his ideas on revamping the internet. Ideas of a next generation Internet like Internet2 or IPv6 have been proposed by others but Ozzie has his own ideas. Ozzie gave examples of what could be part of a rebuilding effort, including XML packets replacing IP packets, encrypted V-cards instead of the usual DNS, a message-switching layer more like the open source Jabber than SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol), or a dynamic DNS that works more like instant messaging for finding people.
Internet2 is a consortium being led by 202 universities working in partnership with industry and government to develop and deploy advanced network applications and technologies, accelerating the creation of tomorrow's Internet. Internet2 is recreating the partnership among academia, industry and government that fostered today?s Internet in its infancy. The primary goals of Internet2 are to:
Create a leading edge network capability for the national research community
Enable revolutionary Internet applications
Ensure the rapid transfer of new network services and applications to the broader Internet community.
I came across this little thought in my daily readings and wondered if anyone thinks it is true. Needless to say, I am part of an IT department and we rarely have any outages. If anyone out there can relate to what this message is saying, please leave a comment to tell me all about it.
It turns out that Monday morning is the most likely time for a website to crash. It's not because hackers like to get up early and start the workweek off with a few extra machines to take down, but because in-house IT staff come into the office with their groggy brains chock full of ideas they had over the weekend. They have a "weekend inspiration" and come in Monday morning and tinker... and the website goes down. The researchers say the best uptime days are during holidays like Christmas and New Years when the IT staff stays home. But then, "as soon as you see the developers logging on again, the trouble starts." The study suggests that companies put into place better testing procedures and change control.
Monday was the launch of a new Albert Einstein website. This one site brings together more than 900 scientific documents and personal papers detailing the thoughts and emotions of one of the world's most fascinating minds. In addition to the voluminous collection of Einstein's writings, some never before published and none previously available online, the website will house an extensive database of 40,000 documents, images and research on Einstein's life and work, as well as digitized copies of Einstein's professional and personal correspondence and pages from his notebooks and travel diaries. The website is the result of a year-long cooperative effort between the Albert Einstein Archives at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Einstein Papers Project at the California Institute of Technology. Along with all the technical works of Einstein are some personal facts about the life and ways of Einstein, some refuting popular beliefs.
Roxio, who bought Napster, really cheap, after it was sued and forced out of business, has just purchased PressPlay. "With our acquisition of Napster we obtained the most powerful brand in the online music space," said Roxio's chairman and CEO, Chris Gorog. "Now, with our acquisition of pressplay, we have the most complete and scaleable legal technology infrastructure to use as a platform to relaunch Napster." When the reincarnated Napster hits the market it will be going up against Apple's new iTunes Music Store, MusicNet and Listen.com's Rhapsody service. Roxio is hopeful that the Napster name will give them the leverage they need to make it big.
Imagine going to medical school so you can learn how to smell farts. This just may be the case. British scientist have been doing studies on the pungent gas emanating from stool (flatus). "There are very specific (chemical) 'fingerprints' in the gas, so that you can make specific diagnoses very quickly," says lead researcher Dr. Christopher Probert. So the next time you smell some very bad gas and you think to yourself, "Damn, that guy/gal must be sick!" you may be exactly right.
Retailers have now begun to take Pre-Orders for the first release of Lord of the Rings - The Two Towers (the Theatrical Edition). Set for release on Aug 26th the Theatrical Edition (available in both Widescreen and Fullscreen releases with Dolby Digital 5.1 audio) will contain the version of the film seen in theaters and feature: a modest number of 'making of' featurettes, A 10 minute sneak preview of The Return of the King, and a short film by Sean Astin called 'The Long and Short of It' with an accompanying making of.
The The Two Tower's Extended Cut won't be available for pre-order until June 20th. Pre-order Lord of the Rings - The Two Towers Theatrical Edition at Amazon, DVDEmpire or DeepDiscountDVD.
MyHD MDP-100 by MIT is the latest design PCI card based on TeraLogics' Janus decoder chip. The MDP-100 features broadcast tuning and display in 1080i, 720p, or 480p, delivering HDTV to your Windows based PC. Watch HDTV on Windows desktop or in full-screen glory, it's never been more affordable!
The hardware processing of TeraLogic's Janus 8VSB decoder ensures that today's PC's will have plenty of power. The single card design with breakout cable includes video input from S-Video and Composite sources. Both RF inputs can tune ATSC or NTSC. MyHD card features HDTV recording to your hard drive or upcoming support of IEEE 1394 based D-VHS tape (Windows XP only). Record HDTV, image capture of HD images, up-convert NTSC, it's all possible with the MDP-100 HDTV card. Full featured remote control is included for easy navigation of channels and formats.
Challenge-response technology, is the concept behind the idea of being greeted with a response saying something like "click on this link to deliver this message" or "type in the word you see in the box above" when you receive an e-mail from a new sender. Spam-Arrest and EarthLink are both big providers of this technology to their customers. MailBlocks, of Los Altos, Calif., claims to own all rights to the concept and hopes to prevent anyone else from selling such a system without paying hefty licensing fees. So, MailBlocks has asked for a preliminary injunction in both suits.
The Long Beach, Calif.-based electronics maker will announce Monday that its sixth-generation drive, the DVR-A06, will arrive in the United States in June. The drive will retail for $329 and support DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+RW, CD-R and CD-RW. The DVD+RW format includes support for DVD+R media. The DVR-A06 will be for use inside PCs; an external version, which can be connected to a PC via a cable, will likely follow in three months to four months, said Andy Parsons, senior vice president of sales and marketing at Pioneer Electronics.
Free software called PeerGuardian creates a personal firewall that blocks the IP addresses of snoops. They can see the names of files being traded, but they can't download the file to tell whether it's a copyrighted file.
I found this fact quite amazing. I had no idea that Jupiter had so many moons. Since they began their systematic search in late 2000, the team -- David Jewitt, a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Hawaii and graduate student Scott Sheppard -- has found 43 of the planet's 60 moons. (Four were discovered by Galileo, four were discovered during a fly-by of the Voyager spacecraft and nine were discovered during the 20th century by other astronomers who painstakingly analyzed photographic plates.) Jupiter is predicted to have at least 100 moons that are at least 1 mile in diameter.
"At this stage, the board has not come across any show stoppers that in our mind would prevent the shuttle from returning to flight," Gehman said as he and five other board members examined the Columbia wreckage that has been gathered at the Kennedy Space Center. Read Full Story
Samsung’s SPH-N270 is going to be famous for just one reason… It’s the Matrix phone. The phone went onsale in timing with the movie (May 15th 2003). There were only 10,000 initial units and so far there is no word that there will be a second run.
Don’t let the apparent bulkiness fool you—this phone is stocked with enough features to make even Neo smile. The screen is a 65,000 TFT LCD that boasts a very decent size (128×160 pixels). A feature not commonly seen on phones, but a must for the Matrix is included—GPS location.
The real design eye-candy is the ‘pop-up’ design… The ear piece moves up an inch to reveal the LCD.When you pop it up, the 65K color screen can be showing off the Matrix screen saver (yes, you too can have that green vertical text streaming across your screen).
Specs:
Size: 4.53” x 2.28” x 0.79” Screen: LCD (65K colors), 128×160 Mode: CDMA Price: $499.99 Availibility: Sprint PCS Reviews: N/A Purchase:Samsung, Your local BestBuy
AMD released the Athlon XP 3200+ for desktops, the last scheduled member of a chip family that helped turn the company's fortunes around.The 3200+ features a 400MHz bus and runs at a slightly faster clock speed than other high-end Athlon chips. Graphics chip maker Nvidia, among others, is adjusting its chipsets to complement the faster bus found on the processor. Overall, the chip will be neck and neck in terms of performance with Intel's fastest products. The chip holds about a 15 percent performance advantage over Intel's 3GHz Pentium 4 processor when the Pentium 4 is connected to a 533MHz bus, according to AMD benchmarks. Intel, though, recently came out with a new chipset that runs at 800MHz and plans on coming out with another 800MHz chipset and a 3.2GHz Pentium 4 soon, according to sources close to the company.
Yesterday, I took a half day off from work in order to catch a showing of the Matrix. To my surprise, it wasn't hard to get a ticket for the early afternoon show. I expected the theatres to be swamped with people trying to get in. This wasn't the case. The theatre was about 3/4 full for the 1:30pm showing. The movie was action-packed from the very beginning. The special effects; exceptional, although there is an instance in the "Burly Man" fight scene in which I was able to tell that the people where clearly computer animated. Continuation of the story; very interesting for the majority of the movie, a bit corny in one instance and a bit metaphysical in another. Overall, I would give the movie a 9.9 out of 10. I thouroughly enjoyed it, especially the "Burly Man" fight scene and the nearly 15 minute long car chase. The new characters added to the story but their parts were too small. Jada Pinkett and Monica Bellucci both looked great and made me wish that they were featured a little bit more. Well, that's my $0.02!
As you all can tell, I have been doing some homework this week on The Matrix Reloaded. Everything I have read, predicts this as a movie of epic proportions. If all goes well I will be one of the lucky ones to see it opening day. I found one tip that we all should keep in mind. After The Matrix Reloaded is over, stick around to see the trailer for the next Matrix film, The Matrix Revolutions.
MatrixFans have posted a translated article from French magazine Studio in which Monica Bellucci spoke about her upcoming role as Persephone in The Matrix Reloaded. Beware of some minor spoilers.
“The only thing I can tell is the three main characters are still the ones played by Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, and Laurence Fishburne ; that I’m among the new characters who appear in the second movie and that I have a very small role in the third one. I got no action scene, well only one in fact, but one very special. Then I didn’t have to jump on walls, nor practice martial arts like Carrie-Anne Moss who executes some unbelievable technical valors! [...]
“Actually the first thing I do when I arrive on the set is the rehearsals. I understand pretty quickly the Wachowski have a very definite idea of what they want! I meet Lambert Wilson who is absolutely lovely. I meet Keanu again. I’ve known him on Dracula (Coppola) when I started my carreer. I had only a small role in a sublime erotic scene ; I had to jump on a bed with some other girls and to kiss this handsome lad! And almost ten years later I have to make something very big with him – which I can’t spoil, but it’s not bad either! [...]
“Then comes my first day of shooting. This won’t belong to the movie but to the video game which is meant to be released with the movie! The Wachowski are directing me... which is fun. Anyway, we shoot it like a movie. It’s cool because it allows me to enter this universe in a soft way. The next step is the real shooting. The place where it’s done is extremly well protected and... HUGE! A city! Some days I’m sure more than 2000 persons are working on these sequels. Amazing!
Some had asked me, "What about Monica Bellucci?" She is a newcomer to the Matrix story. If you look closely, you can see her in the "Final Trailer". She is the very cute woman standing there training her gun on something. Look closely, you'll see her. Well, I found a little something on her on the AskMen.com site. This should hold you for a while....
We'd like to say that Monica Bellucci is just a woman, but we would be lying. She is not a mortal woman; she is a cruel joke from Mother Nature with the sole purpose of driving men of all ages to the point of insanity. How can anyone be so beautiful? Why are examples of the perfect woman like Monica rarer than a Chicago Cubs World Series title?
Minute-by-Minute Guide to the May 15-16 Total Lunar Eclipse
For those of you that are intersted in the Total Lunar Eclipse, Space.com has a guide to help you through the event. No enthusiastic skywatcher ever misses a total eclipse of the Moon. Yet during the time that the Moon is entering into and later emerging from out of the Earth's shadow, secondary phenomena may be overlooked by any observer who isn't prepared.
They also happen to be the elusive co-writers and co-directors of The Matrix and its sequels, the most significant and popular sci-fi film franchise since Star Wars. The first Matrix, released in March 1999, made $460 million (U.S.) worldwide and the long-awaited follow-ups The Matrix Reloaded (out next Thursday) and The Matrix Revolutions (Nov. 7) are likely to each top that figure.
Keanu Reeves has always had the reputation of revealing nothing to the press. Even those who work with him find him a tough nut to crack. His co-star in the Matrix films, Laurence Fishburne, laughingly admitted that he "can’t tell you a fucking thing about Keanu. I’ve been working with him for five years. I don’t know a fucking thing about him. All I can tell you about Keanu is that after I’ve spent that much time with him, I love the motherfucker, but I can’t tell you a fucking thing about him."
A startup company called Niveus Media introduced its ONEbox Media Center This PC is built around a VIA Mini-ITX M10000 Motherboard with a 1 GHz processor. Priced at $999 it includes a standard settop box case, 80GB hard drive, a DVD-ROM drive, an ATI All-In-Wonder VE TV card, 10/100 ethernet, firewire, USB serial and parallel ports. Operating system is the home edition of Windows XP. Niveus Media has developed its own software -- called ONEbox Media Center -- to control playback of DVD, video, music, photos and TV.Titan's electronic programming guide (EPG) is also included in the package for TiVo-like PVR functionality. The OneBOX will work with Comcast's digital cable, but other digital cable services are also not currently supported. The system has left room for user enhancements like swapping in a DVD burner or adding wireless networking. Niveus Media is currently testing an HDTV version with PVR capabilities.
"Mr Anderson". Ah, Who else could pull of that sly speak but the ever-so-versatile Hugo Weaving?, back reprising his role as Agent Smith in "The Matrix Reloaded". But believe it or not, there was a time when it didn't look like Weaving was going to accept the offer of doing a little film called "The Matrix", as he explains to PAUL FISCHER.
"The Matrix Reloaded" is about to make anyone associated with it a big star. For Jada Pinkett-Smith this has been a long time coming. Better known as the other half of actor Will Smith, Pinkett has appeared in a slew of movies - including "Woo", "Scream 2" and "Jason's Lyric" - but none are about to raise her public-profile as much as her starring in two of the years biggest movies - "The Matrix Reloaded" and "The Matrix Revolutions".
Believe it or not, Val Kilmer was the one man who might have prevented Laurence Fishburne from nabbing the role of Morpheus in "The Matrix" movies. Thankfully, Mr Kilmer turned his nose at the role, and Fishburne claimed it as his own. And can you imagine anyone else in the role besides Larry? Now, he's back starring in the first of two super-sequels "The Matrix Reloaded".
Carrie-Anne Moss kicked a lot of ass in the original "Matrix", so it would be expected to see her in action again in The Matrix Reloaded. The increased sophistication of the fight scenes was indeed more difficult for the actress, but at least she had some idea what to expect this time around.
"The first time around, I had no idea," Moss said. "Ignorance is bliss. I just wanted to be in this movie and do what I could. The second one was much harder. It was a lot longer. And I broke my leg right away during training. It was tough. I broke my leg in the beginning of training, so that was six months before we started shooting. So I had eight. weeks where I was really forced to sit out and watch. It was brutal."
It wasn't just fighting this time. Moss has an extended motorcycle chase during the film's highly touted freeway chase, and she spent several months learning to ride before shooting the chase. "On the day that I did it, I didn't allow myself to doubt myself for one minute. Whereas like, on the wire and doing other stuff, I have kind of a process that I found that I would do in action sequences, which is where I come in kinda serious, I'd give it and give and then I'd have a bit of a breakdown somewhere. Sometimes I'd need to have that breakdown in order to overcome it. It's like I'd have to go, 'Oh, I can't do this' to 'Okay, f*ck, I can do this!' Whereas on the bike, I was like, 'Today, Carrie-Anne, you don't get to indulge in any part of our neuroses about who you are as a person and la la la. You are going to be hardcore serious. This is about having a goal.'"
The Wachowski Brothers definitely put the pressure on Moss to complete her riding stunts. "They wanted me to do it. They let me know, pretty early on, that they expected it of me. And it sells the whole thing that I did what I did, and I understand why I needed to do what I did because without it, it wouldn't have worked. You needed to see me on that bike, you needed to have those shots."
Indeed, the brothers were under pressure themselves. "After 270 days of shooting, they were pretty thin. They're definitely evolving as human beings, growing and changing just like all of us have changed so much. They're even more committed and even more dedicated. And they also had so much more on their plate. They were setting the tone for the whole thing, so they're responsible for inspiring a big group of people. I don't know if you remember at the end of the movie, [reading the credits and] all the people that it took to make it? And every person, from the set decorators to the set painters to the construction, people were so inspired to work on this film and really cared and really wanted to do it. And why? Because of them."
Sometimes, Moss could look to her costar, Keanu Reeves, for inspiration in his dedication to the fight scenes. "Keanu's fights are just incredible to me. I wish you could all see the extent of his commitment, because you would respect him even more. He is unlike any actor I have ever met, any person I've met, actually. Physically, he just takes himself to the edge. He is willing to do whatever it takes to learn. He is so hardcore with himself and so hard on himself. It took that kind of commitment. He's the One. I don't think there's any other actor that could have played that character. I know it. And without any kind of movie star bullsh*t. He's not in it to be hot and strong and aren't-I-cool. There's just none of that. He's there because he loves this character and he loves the brothers and he loves the movie and he really wants to be."
The sequel develops all of the characters, and some developments call into question characterizations from the first film. Most notably, we learn that Morpheus has some defiant tendencies. As that relates to Moss's character, Trinity never loses complete faith in her leader. "I always had an idea about Trinity, about her backstory. One thing that I always thought about her was that she was taken out of the Matrix very young, like 11 or 12. And I always thought that her conviction was just very strong. What I love about Morpheus in the second one is that you almost start going, 'Is he crazy?' Whereas in the first one, it's just like there's Morpheus and you believe in him. But all of a sudden you go, 'How does he know what he knows?' And so many people are doubting him and other characters are going, 'The guy's wacky,' and you suddenly have this whole different perspective. Whereas for Trinity, I've always believed that she so full-heartedly believes in what she believes in."
I don't know about the rest of you guys out there, but for me, I hate it when Explorer opens into the "My Documents" folder. I personally don't like putting stuff where windows thinks it should go. So I really have no reason to go to this directory. Here is a way to get around the problem.
1. Click Start, point to Programs, then Accessories, then right-click Windows Explorer, and click Properties.
2.Under Target field, which reads %SystemRoot%\explorer.exe, add to make the line read %SystemRoot%\explorer.exe /n, /e, /select, C:\
3.Click OK.
In the command "%SystemRoot%\explorer.exe /n, /e, /select, C:\", Explorer will open a two pane window(/e) allowing you to select a drive to start in(/select), with the c:\ drive highlighted(C:\). I like to set this up so that I don't have to select a drive, so by removing the "/select" command , the Explorer will open a two pane window with the c:\ drive expanded. Now I find this a lot more useful than the "My Documents" folder.
Lucasfilm Ltd. and Paramount Home Video have officially announced the DVD release for the highly anticipated Indiana Jones Trilogy! The Adventures of Indiana Jones - The Complete Movie DVD Collection is set for release on November 4th as a 4 DVD box set and will include: 'Raiders of the Lost Ark,' 'Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom' and 'Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade,' available in separate THX certified widescreen or full frame versions with Dolby Digital 5.1 audio. The set will also include a special fourth disc with newly produced documentaries that explore the making of the Indy films, including brand-new interviews with the cast and crew – including Spielberg, Ford and Lucas – plus scores of other surprises from all three films. The three Indiana Jones films will be available only as a collection and will not be sold individually. We'll let you know as soon as the The Adventures of Indiana Jones - The Complete Movie DVD Collection is up for pre-order! posted by Tony | 11:21 PM |
Omega Laser has plans to be the most powerful laser in existence.
University of Rochester’s Omega laser heats up its target to 100 million degrees Celsius in a quest to duplicate the power of the sun. UR is planning on extending the back of it's laser lab some 82,000 square feet, in which they will be adding a pair of petawatt lasers. The Petawatt is currently the world's most powerful laser, located at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. It can produce pulses of 1.3 quadrillion (peta) watts for half a trillionth of a second, more than 1300 times the entire electrical generating capacity of the U.S. This power is several hundred times more powerful than the Omega, and would let the lab make significant advances in its fusion research. The $70 million addition will help keep UR technologically current, a must to stay off the "ripe for closing" list. With the petawatt, UR would leap into the emerging and promising field of “fast ignition” fusion. Hypothetically, a burst from the petawatt would serve as the metaphorical spark plug, igniting a fuel source and setting off a fusion reaction. Researchers also foresee using the petawatt bursts to “see” into the plasma generated when the Omega laser array is fired at a target.More.... posted by Tony | 11:13 PM |
Morpheus Rises In Reloaded
Interview with Laurence Fishburne, borrowed from SciFi.com
Laurence Fishburne, who reprises the role of Morpheus in the upcoming Matrix Reloaded, told SCI FI Wire that his character is revealed as a military leader in the Real World.
In one scene, Morpheus delivers a rousing speech to about 1,500 extras crowded into an underground cavern set, representing the last human settlement of Zion.
"I can tell you that the speech in Zion was like being on stage," Fishburne said. "I was playing to 1,500 people. ... It was wonderful. Oh, it was fun."
Fishburne added that he got to interact with several new characters. "It was great to have some new energy," he said. "It was great to have all those new people. Anthony Wong and Jada Pinkett Smith and ... the Rayment twins, Harry Lennix, Lambert Wilson, Monica Bellucci, everybody. It was nice to have more people." The Matrix Reloaded opens May 15.
Wired Magazine Reports: A mysterious weblog purporting to be the journal of an anonymous heiress on the run from her wealthy family appears to be a hoax. But the site and offline elements supporting it are so elaborate and so well executed that many bloggers suspect the whole thing just might be true.
The Flight Risk weblog tells the incredible story of Isabella V., a wealthy young woman who claims she went into hiding in early March to avoid an arranged marriage.
More....
Sometimes the Star Wars followers take things a bit to far. This is a case of just that, but I must admit it is pretty cool and very creative. In yesterday's blog, I talked about the MiniITX form factor motherboard. This case mod takes advantage of its small dimensions. This article takes you through the step by step process used to create the ultimate mod. posted by Tony | 5:39 AM |
DVD Video Recorder with 80GB Hard Drive
The RD-X2 is a collaborative product by Toshiba and Tivo. One of the main reasons why I never bought a Tivo was for the fact that you couldn't easily save your recorded programs off the machine. Including a DVD recorder is the next logical step in the evolution of Tivo. Toshiba improved upon Tivo's unit by incorporating a DVD-RAM/DVD-R burner. DVD-RAM offers all the benefits of DVD including high-capacity, (double-sided: 9.4 GB total storage), high speed (x2/x4/x8 dubbing from HDD to DVD-RAM) and backwards, maintaining the integrity of the MPEG2 digital signal. DVD-RAM is re-writeable, offers quick access with high-quality images and sound. Overall, the RD-X2 is a step in the right direction but until the price settles a bit (original : $1499, now can be found for $820) I won't be making that move. To read more about it, checkout the key features and the technology and benefits. posted by Tony | 5:13 AM |
Retailers have now begun to take Pre-Orders for the first release of Lord of the Rings - The Two Towers (the Theatrical Edition). Set for release on Aug 26th the Theatrical Edition (available in both Widescreen and Fullscreen releases with Dolby Digital 5.1 audio) will contain the version of the film seen in theaters and feature: a modest number of 'making of' featurettes, A 10 minute sneak preview of The Return of the King, and a short film by Sean Astin called 'The Long and Short of It' with an accompanying making of.
The The Two Tower's Extended Cut won't be available for pre-order until June 20th. Pre-order Lord of the Rings - The Two Towers Theatrical Edition at Amazon, DVDEmpire or DeepDiscountDVD. 
MyHD MDP-100 by MIT is the latest design PCI card based on TeraLogics' Janus decoder chip. The MDP-100 features broadcast tuning and display in 1080i, 720p, or 480p, delivering HDTV to your Windows based PC. Watch HDTV on Windows desktop or in full-screen glory, it's never been more affordable!
Samsung’s SPH-N270 is going to be famous for just one reason… It’s the Matrix phone. The phone went onsale in timing with the movie (May 15th 2003). There were only 10,000 initial units and so far there is no word that there will be a second run.
Yesterday, I took a half day off from work in order to catch a showing of the Matrix. To my surprise, it wasn't hard to get a ticket for the early afternoon show. I expected the theatres to be swamped with people trying to get in. This wasn't the case. The theatre was about 3/4 full for the 1:30pm showing. The movie was action-packed from the very beginning. The special effects; exceptional, although there is an instance in the "Burly Man" fight scene in which I was able to tell that the people where clearly computer animated. Continuation of the story; very interesting for the majority of the movie, a bit corny in one instance and a bit metaphysical in another. Overall, I would give the movie a 9.9 out of 10. I thouroughly enjoyed it, especially the "Burly Man" fight scene and the nearly 15 minute long car chase. The new characters added to the story but their parts were too small. Jada Pinkett and Monica Bellucci both looked great and made me wish that they were featured a little bit more. Well, that's my $0.02!
Some had asked me, "What about Monica Bellucci?" She is a newcomer to the Matrix story. If you look closely, you can see her in the "Final Trailer". She is the very cute woman standing there training her gun on something. Look closely, you'll see her. Well, I found a little something on her on the 
For those of you that are intersted in the Total Lunar Eclipse, 
Keanu Reeves has always had the reputation of revealing nothing to the press. Even those who work with him find him a tough nut to crack. His co-star in the Matrix films, Laurence Fishburne, laughingly admitted that he "can’t tell you a fucking thing about Keanu. I’ve been working with him for five years. I don’t know a fucking thing about him. All I can tell you about Keanu is that after I’ve spent that much time with him, I love the motherfucker, but I can’t tell you a fucking thing about him."
Carrie-Anne Moss kicked a lot of ass in the original "Matrix", so it would be expected to see her in action again in 
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