The story for this one, pretty much a collection of my images made in 327. For the final the task was a Flash slideshow, so here is the slideshow to display them.

LINK

The topic of my RSS feed is based solely around the Sirius & XM merger. It will be very interesting to see what happens here. Check out the links, but I would not recommend buying stock for either of the two…

CLICKY CLICK

I don’t think many people are away of the DS market. There are a ton of games available, wireless multi-player, and even online gaming. Although I am not a big Pokemon fan, the first games that will be able to use the headset for the DS will be Pokemon Diamond and Pearl. The new Pokemon games, and the headset have a release date for April 23, 2007. With the headset, think of all the possibilities. Maybe if you’re sitting in a camp chair in Wal-Mart’s garden center waiting for the PS3 (waste of time) with some other fanatics. Yea! you get the idea, DS headset=smack talking.

From Slashdot

Snowgen writes: “Viacom has filed a $1,000,000,000.00 lawsuitfor ‘massive intentional copyright infringement’ against Google over YouTube video clips. ‘”YouTube’s strategy has been to avoid taking proactive steps to curtail the infringement on its site,” Viacom said in a statement. “Their business model, which is based on building traffic and selling advertising off of unlicensed content, is clearly illegal and is in obvious conflict with copyright laws.’”

It will be interesting to see how this case gets handled. I am not going to overload this post with links to various articles, because they’re all over the place. I feel that the structure of YouTube is set up for user (Web 2.0) posting. With this in mind, how can YouTube create a program that actually watches the content, decides if it is copyrighted or not, then allow or deny the posting of that content. To my knowledge this can’t be done. On the other hand, YouTube could have a group of employees who sit in front of a monitor viewing content all day long, where the visual aspect is taken into account. With humans scanning content, it would be much easier to recognize copyrighted material. Is this efficient? Probably not, but it may be the only way to filter “user posted” material.

In the same aspect, I could post some offensive material on my website, and it may be noticed or may not be noticed. The fact is that until someone see’s it, and takes action it would be available. At the end of the day does Viacom really have a case here? I have no idea, but I do know that Viacom is everywhere…yes everywhere, and it sucks! GO YouTube/Google!!

It has been awhile since a good FPS for the PC has been introduced. I have been playing Battlefield 2 for awhile now, Counter-Strike: Source, and good old F.E.A.R. Each game has its unique features, but yet after a while you just get bored. I remember looking at the preview for this game awhile ago, but recently one of my buddies reminded me it was launching in time for spring break! The game itself looks pretty amazing. The storyline is set around the time of the Chernobyl disaster in Russia. The S.T.A.L.K.E.R. team heads back into the 30km zone around the nuclear plant, which from what I understand is where the game starts. It sounds like there are some killer (no pun intended) multi-player modes. For $40 this should definitely be an option you look into! For those console gamers, now is the time to switch to PC.

IGN GALLERY

I honestly think the entire situation is out of control. Some people say they know he did it, media giants said he confessed, who really knows for sure? OJ lost in civil court, and owes over 30 million to the families of Brown and Goldman. Okay, so hes got some debt to repay, that’s a fact. He has been on TV, made a movie, and has a book started. Hes got resources coming in and obviously not in dire straits. Why is he not paying off his debts?…maybe he is who knows!

Anyhoo, a judge ordered the rights of his book to be sold at auction. Anything made off of the book would go to repay the 33.5 million he owes the families (Brown and Goldman). It may be possible that we will get to read his story. Keep an open eye, and just wait for the reviews of how sick and morbid he actually may be…biased? nah, everyone knows he did it

Simple, and to the point! Web Worker Daily and the “5 New Jobs of the Web 2.0 Generation”. Take a look!

Talking about data syndication, networks, and I guess technology in general I came across a few questions. One of the biggest questions I want to address is who is making money from sites like Facebook, and Myspace. I use those two examples because, well I use both of them. Before these vast networks of young people and the online industry, what was there? I remember, it was like MSN and Yahoo, there you could manage your profile and it was very limited. Now look at it you can easily throw up a CSS mask over your Myspace, and customize it anyway you want (with some restrictions, nudity, racism, don’t cover the default ad’s, etc.). As Myspace continues to evolve, I find myself being presented with new films that are coming out. I guess I a going off on a distraction, but all of this is interesting to me.

For example think about the photo industry, companies like Kodak, Fujifilm, Sony, and all of those other companies. I guarantee you that sites like Myspace have affected these industries, and they know it! With the release of 300 The Movie Myspace user’s can now add the profile for that movie, and then they will be able to upload 300 images. 300 images per account is huge. With all these Myspace nussies out there adding pictures all the time, its amazing. Then think about the possibilities, it is either a self-developed professional print (still requires materials), digital, or from a photo center at the local supermarket. Next time you go to Wal-Mart, Target, or whatever store you shop at, take a walk and check out the lines in the photo department! What I am getting at is that Myspace has definitely provided a boost to the photo market, digital, or old school, all the same in this case. I am only mentioning one of the effects of these online networks. Think about some other ways Myspace, Facebook, WAYN, High5, or whoever effect the consumer marketplace.

Cody, from “Cody’s world changing ideas”  came up with a very good point.  Everyone in the MM352 class should post a link to their web projects.  You can find a link to his blog to the right.  For my project I stuck with the idea of technology and the adaptations surrounding technology.  To view my project just follow the link below.

Theory of Evolution 

Thanks, and have a nice end of the world!

Just over a year ago, Sirius signed a deal with Howard Stern for a total of about $250 million (stock and salary). There was alot of questions surrounding this deal. Sirius gave Howard two channels, where he could do his thing. As a Stern fan, I grabbed a Sirius radio and tuned in. The music channels that came with Howard where just a plus! Many people thought that Sirius made a bad decision, and it would hurt the company. In contrary, the other side figured that XM would be toppled. Along with Howard, Sirius signed the NFL, Tony Stewart, Eminem (Shade 45), Playboy, Martha Stewart, those are just to name a few. XM has its big names as well, Snoop Dogg, Ellen Degeneres, Oprah, sure there are some others…but I’m a Sirius subscriber.

The two companies would combine to share and enterprise valued at around $13 Billion, and that is including the debt of approximately $1.6 Billion. XM stockholders would receive 4.6 Sirius common stocks to every 1 XM common stock held. Pretty good deal for XM stockholders. With this announcement it would pretty much give them [XM/Sirius] control of the “free” radio airwaves. As of today, the satellite radio industry can pretty much say anything they want. As a consumer this is interesting to me, because there are some stations on XM that I would probably listen to. The only thing that I don’t like, is a subscription increase. It is already $12.95 per month, and I think XM is a bit cheaper. If anything it may be lowered, which would be good. What about the stations, equipment, etc.? I would love to get 200+ stations of radio to listen too! Anyhoo, it would be interesting to hear other peoples opinion about this.