I'm not exactly mp3-savvy, but my forays into the music download space have been frustrating; ever since the heyday of Napster's (albeit illegal) peer-to-peer application, in fact, digital music has quite gone to shite. Yahoo's music player = teh suck! MTV's Urge (now Rhapsody) = slow. Napster = slow. iTunes = don't know because I don't have an iPod, nor am I interested in downloading a media player when I already have one on my machine. It's one thing to have users install a plug-in for a media player that they already have on their machine, but to have people install your own player is ballsy...that player better be really freaking amazing (yeah...I'm looking at you Yahoo and MusicMatch). So I'm always on the lookout for better alternatives or open to suggestions.
Amazon is now offering non-DRM MP3 downloads at or below the industry standard .99/9.99 price point. I like this for several reasons. 1) First off, I've always been a fan of their website...fast and easy to use, and I'm already a member with one-click payments on file and everything. I even go to their website and listen to their 30 second song snippets to sample new music, instead of whatever WMP plug-in I happen to be using at the moment; searching for music is generally faster than within WMP. 2) I like the burnable & transferrable non-DRM format that doesn't come with any usage restrictions (e.g. 3 burns or 3 sync devices). But 3) (and this is my favorite) I like that it doesn't come with their own p.o.s. Windows Media plug-in. They do have a download manager applet that sits outside of WMP, but it's a small download and un-intrusive program.
Obviously my ultimate, ideal, perfect-world dream would be if there were an affordable subscription service with non-DRM downloads, but since that is not realistic, I'll take what I can get. I canceled my Urge membership a few weeks ago because I was never actually using it. I don't have the time, patience, or interest to just sit and listen to new music and sync up my mp3 player all day. Once in a blue moon I want to listen to an album before paying for it, so I thought the subscription route would be cool. Instead I just ended up paying $15 a month for music I never listened to.
I just bought a mess of songs by The Decemberists, mostly singles and compilation tracks. Now, I don't normally shop for or buy CD singles, but the ability to d/l a non-DRM mp3 of songs of a band that I already know I like, is pretty damn awesome. From what I've read, Amazon's library is not the most extensive, but they had several tracks that either were not on Urge or were not easily find-able on Urge; either way gives Amazon the edge.
Ultimately I guess what I'm doing is getting away from subscription-based DRM files, to just buying music that I hope I will like in a burnable format that is cheaper than, say, going to Best Buy. If you actually want to possess an actual retail CD, then I still highly recommend LaLa, especially if you were like me and had a library full of embarrassing CDs that I never listened to anymore, that I could then "trade-up" for just $1.79. When I first started using LaLa, I had several hundred CDs, but over 100 of which I never listened to anymore (and I could always rip them to my computer if I wanted to keep them anyway); now I have several hundred CDs that I actually like. Then to help in discovering new music, I have been a subscriber of Yahoo's Launchcast for a couple of years now and I'll keep that going for like $4 a month, I think it is. I was disappointed when Yahoo's music purchase system turned out to suck, because I was already a member and I like their radio station functionality, the way it recommends new music. But they made you download a whole new player, not just some WMP plug-in, and it ended up being quite painful and it had very basic functionality at that. I remember I submitted a bug on it through their website, never got a good response nor did they ever fix it; so I lost interest in it.
I've gone on quite long, but as you can tell, I like me some music. I just don't know how to really manage it all. I'm fixing to go uninstall Urge. The fact that it scans my library constantly to come up with Auto Playlists while hogging my CPU the whole time, with no easy means to disable said functionality, irritates me to no end. Shame on you MTV, didn't you learn that lesson from Sony? I want digital music, not a virus.
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Monday, September 24, 2007
Knock Knock Who's There Trick or Treat...Sex
If you don't know what that refers to...then you must see this:
LOLz. That's just funny, I don't care who you are. I know.
In other comedy news, we saw the movie Superbad on Sunday. Pretty damn funny. It's along the same vein as American Pie, filled with the raunchy antics of sex-crazed drunken teens, but in my humble opinion I think it does in a way that is more respectable. I can't think of a better word, but that is close. The movie isn't about sex and getting drunk. I mean yes, the funny bits of the movie are about sex and drinking, but the movie does have a deeper meaning, and it doesn't make fun of it like others in the genre. It's hard to explain. I just walked away thinking I liked it more and brought across to teens a better message than the American Pies. I recommend it.
In gaming news, Halo 3 came out last night. I went to the midnight launch at the local game store, and after waiting for an hour and putting up with high school kids yelling and throwing things, it was totally worth it when I got to take the game home. Played it all night, and went to bed about 5:30am this morning. Woke up at 10am and finished the campaign, what a riot. I don't know if Halo 3 will quite have the life-changing effect that Halo 2 had, which basically put online console gaming on the map. Halo 3 fixed a lot of the online bugs and such of Halo 2, but since it's still such a similar game I don't know as it'll have the "wow" effect for as long as Halo 2 dominated the Xbox Live charts. Nonetheless, I'll be playing it every night until I get sick of it; hopefully, they'll release maps, playlists, and tweaks enough to keep it fresh for years.
LOLz. That's just funny, I don't care who you are. I know.
In other comedy news, we saw the movie Superbad on Sunday. Pretty damn funny. It's along the same vein as American Pie, filled with the raunchy antics of sex-crazed drunken teens, but in my humble opinion I think it does in a way that is more respectable. I can't think of a better word, but that is close. The movie isn't about sex and getting drunk. I mean yes, the funny bits of the movie are about sex and drinking, but the movie does have a deeper meaning, and it doesn't make fun of it like others in the genre. It's hard to explain. I just walked away thinking I liked it more and brought across to teens a better message than the American Pies. I recommend it.
In gaming news, Halo 3 came out last night. I went to the midnight launch at the local game store, and after waiting for an hour and putting up with high school kids yelling and throwing things, it was totally worth it when I got to take the game home. Played it all night, and went to bed about 5:30am this morning. Woke up at 10am and finished the campaign, what a riot. I don't know if Halo 3 will quite have the life-changing effect that Halo 2 had, which basically put online console gaming on the map. Halo 3 fixed a lot of the online bugs and such of Halo 2, but since it's still such a similar game I don't know as it'll have the "wow" effect for as long as Halo 2 dominated the Xbox Live charts. Nonetheless, I'll be playing it every night until I get sick of it; hopefully, they'll release maps, playlists, and tweaks enough to keep it fresh for years.
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Offer...Accepted
Huge news in the PalmerRaineyan house. I got an offer Friday on my way to Charlotte for my 2nd interview with Hewitt. Yesterday I got the offer from them, and I immediately accepted. Not much to debate about or re-negotiate. Hmmm....great pay, bonus, benefits, work anywhere I want or they will pay to move me to Charlotte. Gee...let me think. OK. So yesterday within a span of an hour, I got an offer, accepted it, quit my job, and turned down the other offer. So it was a day full of rejoicing and rejection all around. A little bit bitter, a lot sweet. I will start my new job 10/15, more than likely working from the farm for a couple months until we find someplace permanent.
I celebrated by taking the wife out for calzones. Because that's how we do it. Ash and I have this running argument about the merits of pizza. She seems to think that you can have (brace yourself) too much pizza. WTH is that? And also I have never been able to take her to an actual pizza place for dinner, probably because she just doesn't loooove pizza like she, clearly, should. I had been wanting to go to Mellow Mushroom for years when we were in Athens and then Columbus, and I could never get her excited about it, so last night was a bit of a small victory. Baby steps.
I celebrated by taking the wife out for calzones. Because that's how we do it. Ash and I have this running argument about the merits of pizza. She seems to think that you can have (brace yourself) too much pizza. WTH is that? And also I have never been able to take her to an actual pizza place for dinner, probably because she just doesn't loooove pizza like she, clearly, should. I had been wanting to go to Mellow Mushroom for years when we were in Athens and then Columbus, and I could never get her excited about it, so last night was a bit of a small victory. Baby steps.
Thursday, September 13, 2007
A Page from Dung
I'm going to take a page from my pal Jeff's blog, which probably has the best...title...ever. Dung!
What I'm listening to: I have a 64-cd case in my car but usually only about 3 or 4 of those ever make it to the show. New stuff by The Starting Line (emo), Silverstein (screamo), and my new favorite band Placebo (sort of rhymes with emo), are all in the rotation. I generally alternate music with audiobooks, currently I'm on book 6 of the Wheel of Time, Lord of Chaos by Robert Jordan. I haven't done much LaLa lately since all my CDs are in storage, but before I moved up to the farm, the last two LaLa CDs I got were by Led Zepellin. I can't really explain it, it was just something I wanted to hear. I canceled my Urge membership because I wasn't using it, and I have been passing over Launchcast at work in favor of podcasts.
What I'm reading: The second Halo novel (The Flood) which is the companion to the original xbox game. Oh, after Harry Potter #7 of course. That book, once it got going, was impossible to put down. I think I read the last 200 pages in one day, which is pretty much unheard of for me. I'm going to keep it rolling with the Halo novels, since there are four of them with a fifth to release in October, basically because I'm so jacked for Halo 3 to come out Sep. 25th.
What I'm watching: the last two weeks, it's been mostly US Open. Ash and I haven't seen any movies lately except Harry Potter #5 at the theater, but I want to see Superbad and Brothers Solomon. I keep trying to watch Shaun of the Dead; I've started it once, got about 45 minutes in and was laughing my ass off so I stopped because I wanted Ash to see it. We tried watching it one night, but it really is a movie you have to watch and catch all the funniest bits and she just couldn't make that kind of commitment at the time. Oh we did watch Fantastic Four the other day (well it actually two several attempts to finish it). The 2007 WSOP main event is also running right now, which is still addicting to watch as it ever was, and I even know who won. Well, not personally, just his name. I learned a lesson about Tivo last night - if you move and switch cable companies, check your season passes.
What I'm playing: Mostly Two Worlds with a hint of Call of Duty 4 beta. Two Worlds is a good game after the first few hours of slogging through it and getting used to the menus and shtuff. Halo 3: 12 days and counting. Still really looking forward to Rock Band. They keep announcing new tracks for it and Guitar Hero III both, looks to be a good winter for gaming. Not to mention the Wii we just bought.
I have a 2nd interview tomorrow for a job I really want to get. The interview is in Charlotte, NC, so I'll be on the road pretty much all day tomorrow. Hoping to get one offer in today or tomorrow, and hope to hear something from this job maybe early next week. That would be sweet and I can have both in-hand at the same time.
What I'm listening to: I have a 64-cd case in my car but usually only about 3 or 4 of those ever make it to the show. New stuff by The Starting Line (emo), Silverstein (screamo), and my new favorite band Placebo (sort of rhymes with emo), are all in the rotation. I generally alternate music with audiobooks, currently I'm on book 6 of the Wheel of Time, Lord of Chaos by Robert Jordan. I haven't done much LaLa lately since all my CDs are in storage, but before I moved up to the farm, the last two LaLa CDs I got were by Led Zepellin. I can't really explain it, it was just something I wanted to hear. I canceled my Urge membership because I wasn't using it, and I have been passing over Launchcast at work in favor of podcasts.
What I'm reading: The second Halo novel (The Flood) which is the companion to the original xbox game. Oh, after Harry Potter #7 of course. That book, once it got going, was impossible to put down. I think I read the last 200 pages in one day, which is pretty much unheard of for me. I'm going to keep it rolling with the Halo novels, since there are four of them with a fifth to release in October, basically because I'm so jacked for Halo 3 to come out Sep. 25th.
What I'm watching: the last two weeks, it's been mostly US Open. Ash and I haven't seen any movies lately except Harry Potter #5 at the theater, but I want to see Superbad and Brothers Solomon. I keep trying to watch Shaun of the Dead; I've started it once, got about 45 minutes in and was laughing my ass off so I stopped because I wanted Ash to see it. We tried watching it one night, but it really is a movie you have to watch and catch all the funniest bits and she just couldn't make that kind of commitment at the time. Oh we did watch Fantastic Four the other day (well it actually two several attempts to finish it). The 2007 WSOP main event is also running right now, which is still addicting to watch as it ever was, and I even know who won. Well, not personally, just his name. I learned a lesson about Tivo last night - if you move and switch cable companies, check your season passes.
What I'm playing: Mostly Two Worlds with a hint of Call of Duty 4 beta. Two Worlds is a good game after the first few hours of slogging through it and getting used to the menus and shtuff. Halo 3: 12 days and counting. Still really looking forward to Rock Band. They keep announcing new tracks for it and Guitar Hero III both, looks to be a good winter for gaming. Not to mention the Wii we just bought.
I have a 2nd interview tomorrow for a job I really want to get. The interview is in Charlotte, NC, so I'll be on the road pretty much all day tomorrow. Hoping to get one offer in today or tomorrow, and hope to hear something from this job maybe early next week. That would be sweet and I can have both in-hand at the same time.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Our Baby has a Wii-Wii
Camera One (6/29):
Camera Two (9/6):
Camera one, camera two... Here are a few more pics. It's been a few days, and Ash is still recovering and coping with the fact that it is now a he, but at least there's still only one in there, right?. Still nothing better than a baby's heartbeat during an ultrasound. Well that and the fact that there will be a higher likelihood of having someone to play co-op with and to increase my gamerscore for me while I'm at work. I can now unabashedly rent and/or buy kids games (for the achievements, of course, but he won't know that). I don't know what I'd do if my child didn't play some sort of games, I'll take jigsaw puzzles, but give me something to work with. I'm in deep sh'pocky if he wants to play baseball or basketball or something. Ash is going to do her best to get him into horses, but if he's anything like me as a child, he'll be interested for about a month and then move on to the next thing.
Speaking of video games, Ash and I went over to a friend-slash-co-worker-slash-my-idol Oosik's house last weekend, where for the first time we got to play a Nintendo Wii. Ash totally got hooked and after a couple of hours later as I was dragging her away, she was just raving about how much fun it was. So, to make up for the fact that our baby has a peepee instead of a feefee, I looked all over the interwebs until I found one. It'll be shipped this week. Isn't it great when I can buy my wife a new game console to make amends? That's...
wait for it...
awesome.
Camera Two (9/6):
Camera one, camera two... Here are a few more pics. It's been a few days, and Ash is still recovering and coping with the fact that it is now a he, but at least there's still only one in there, right?. Still nothing better than a baby's heartbeat during an ultrasound. Well that and the fact that there will be a higher likelihood of having someone to play co-op with and to increase my gamerscore for me while I'm at work. I can now unabashedly rent and/or buy kids games (for the achievements, of course, but he won't know that). I don't know what I'd do if my child didn't play some sort of games, I'll take jigsaw puzzles, but give me something to work with. I'm in deep sh'pocky if he wants to play baseball or basketball or something. Ash is going to do her best to get him into horses, but if he's anything like me as a child, he'll be interested for about a month and then move on to the next thing.
Speaking of video games, Ash and I went over to a friend-slash-co-worker-slash-my-idol Oosik's house last weekend, where for the first time we got to play a Nintendo Wii. Ash totally got hooked and after a couple of hours later as I was dragging her away, she was just raving about how much fun it was. So, to make up for the fact that our baby has a peepee instead of a feefee, I looked all over the interwebs until I found one. It'll be shipped this week. Isn't it great when I can buy my wife a new game console to make amends? That's...
wait for it...
awesome.
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