Brain Assassin » internet

Mortal Kombat: Rebirth Isn’t Exactly a Movie Trailer

JC — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 09:29:58 +0000

With the debut of a short Mortal Kombat film titled Rebirth speculation has run rampant on the internet yesterday. The nearly eight-minute clip featured a very interesting and dark and gritty take on the fighting franchise. The short is directed by Kevin Tancharoen and features a cast that includes Ian Anthony Dale (Scorpion), Lateef Crowder (Baraka), Mat Mullins (Johnny Cage), Jeri Ryan (Sonya Blade) and Michael jai White (Jax). According to Jeri Ryan’s twittering Rebirth isn’t a live-action trailer for the next Mortal Kombat game and it’s not a trailer for a new MK movie. Looks like an independent production to sell Warner Brothers Tancharoen’s reimagining of the franchise.

So, there’s no guarantee that there will be a reimagining or if there is that the same actors will play the characters in a feature film version. Despite all that, the ‘teaser’ looks like a huge success online. Lots of talk here and there and I have to admit, I like Tancharoen’s vision more than the first two films and I definitely like it more than that sorry excuse for a series titled Mortal Kombat: Conquest. Anyway, enjoy the trailer:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4WKGweLeeY

What’s the Best URL Shortener out There?

JC — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 09:42:16 +0000

Performance results for the tested URL shorteners

The guys over at WatchMouse did a really interesting comparison: The set a bunch of URL shorteners against each other to see how good they really are. WatchMouse monitored 14 popular URL shorteners for a month and took a long, hard look at availability and speed. Interestingly enough, only goo.gl and twt.tl were always available during the testing period. In terms of speed, Facebook’s fb.me ist by far the slowest of them all and goo.gl reigns supreme.

Also, it seems that only a few of the shortening services optimized their DNS servers for international use. If you’re in the same country as some of the services have their servers stashed, you can look up the IP address half a second faster than an international visitor. In addition to these findings, WatchMouse figured out that bit.ly’s pro service – a paid version offering more options – is slower on average than the free counterpart.

Personally, I don’t use URL shorteners because I like to see where a link gets me. There are a few add-ons and/or userscripts for Firefox to keep you on the safe side though, by expanding shortened URLs. Anyway, if you can’t avoid the use of such a service check out the new website the guys from WatchMouse have set up: the site provides real-time status reports for URL shorteners.

http://blog.watchmouse.com/2010/03/url-shorteners-make-the-web-substantially-slower-facebooks-fb-me-is-slowest/

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Create Mind Maps with Bubbl.us

JC — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 15:15:11 +0000

A few minutes ago I stumbled over an interesting article over at Lifehacker. The new beta at Bubbl.us allows users to do some productive brainstorming by offering a free, web-based and simple to use software. You can start to produce good-looking mind maps without registering. If you want to save your mind map though, you should register. It’s free and they don’t want your e-mail address.

Bubbl.us is very easy to use and you will intuitively grasp its options. Most options are very streamlined and can be accomplished without ever needing your mouse. Best of all, apart from printing your mind map, you can export it to JPG or PNG. If you did register, you are able to share your mind maps with others. It’s very speedy although it took me a while to properly save a mind map I created.

It’s good to know that there is a free, web-based solution out there that’s easy to use. If you are not into web-based products, take a look at FreeMind which is a mind-mapping software written in Java. FreeMind offers some attractive features licensed under GPL. Let’s get to work and sketch out your ideas for world domination!

Mind over matter

Gametrailers Userscript Updated

JC — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 08:57:34 +0000

I don’t really have time to fix my userscript Tweak Gametrailers but I just did anyway. The latest changes over at Gametrailers.com introduced a new flash player and banished QuickTime and Windows Media Player. In addition with few moderate changes in the naming scheme my script didn’t work anymore. Now it’ll work again and it’s even smaller than before.

Ah, just to let you all now: Obviously, the guys over at Gametrailers made some bigger changes. Effective immediately you only need to register to completely bypass the age verification. Of course, my script still will take care of that annoyance. Have fun!

Userscript truly enhances KeePass

JC — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 16:55:13 +0000

So, during the last few weeks I’ve been looking for a password manager. I recently stumbled over RoboForm which is a quite interesting product if you’re looking for a password manager that runs in your browser and acts as a form filler. I tested it for a few days but I didn’t really like it all that much. RoboForm is convenient but it only works within your browser. I’d like to have my password manager available to me all the time, though. Plus, you absolutely have to pay for RoboForm after a trial period of 30 days or it will become seriously crippled in its functionality.

That’s why I once again turned to KeePass which I’ve used for a short while a few years ago. So, I installed KeePass on my systems and dropped the heavily encrypted database in my Dropbox account. After configuration I immediately discovered the awesome potential of a feature called AutoType: Just set the focus on the control accepting your username, press your defined shortcut and the magic happens. KeePass logs you in with the credentials you provided. Nice, you might think. Well, it didn’t work all too well in the browser. I discovered a few scripts on Userscripts.org but not one of them worked as I wanted them too.

No problem, I thought. Just create one yourself … and here it is: KeePass AutoType Enhancer. This script sets the focus on any username field it detects on a web page. You can configure the script to even focus controls that are outside the viewport so that the browser scroll as necessary. If you don’t, it will ignore controls outside the viewport. I’ve implemented the shortcut CTRL+ALT+S to manually focus on the username field. The shortcut will always set the focus on the appropriate field even if it isn’t inside the viewport, thus ignoring the switch provided in the script. Enjoy!

Gametrailers.com Userscript Updated

JC — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 11:30:43 +0000

This morning there wasn’t much to do at work so I tried to make my only Userscript – Tweak Gametrailers – even better. This script tries to make browsing Gametrailers.com a little more pleasant. It removes the age verification and prevents Flash based videos from playing automatically. I implemented the latter feature today and I hope that I can make it even better. Right now, it looks a little like Flashblock. A user suggested to start playing videos in full screen mode. I’ve looked into it today and it sure looks like I’m going to implement this with the next release.

Funny. I started out with a little script to make browsing Gametrailers.com more pleasant and now I’m thinking about features I don’t really need. Well, that’s the way it is

Is FarScape Really Coming Back?

JC — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 14:44:10 +0000

Unbelievable! I almost missed this one, can you imagine? Anyway, first things first. I already wrote about FarScape a while back. The execs from SciFi canned the show and left the fans hanging in the air with a major cliffhanger. Even though it had good ratings. And now they’re gonna bring it back? At least sort of, we’re talking webisodes here. Well, that’s a mystery to me but who am I to judge. Any FarScape is way better than no FarScape. And that’s it, as far as I’m concerned.

Still, let’s take a closer look. Over at Gateworld.net I found the first piece of information which sent me into the depths of the internet, looking for more information I could get my hands on. So, SciFi announced that there will be 10 webisodes of FarScape, set to be released on SCIFI.com. At Comic Con 07 Brian Henson himself told the audience that there will be “at least 10 webisodes of Next Generation Farscape”. In addition, they were talking spin-offs or movies but there has only been some development as far as the webisodes are concerned. Finally, SciFi has whipped up a site where you can “be first to get news about the web series”.

Sounds good? Well, take it with a grain of salt: Each episode is anticipated to run for 3 to 6 minutes. “The characters, creatures, passions, conflicts and barely contained lunacy of the ‘Farscape’ universe have never stopped. We just haven’t had a window into that universe lately to see what’s currently happening there. Well now we do. And it ain’t calm, and it ain’t pretty, and it ain’t like anything anyone is going to expect. But it is totally ‘Farscape,’” promised O’Bannon, executive producer. According to his words, the webisodes should stay true to the original and be different on the same time!

I don’t know what to think. The people in the SciFi forums are quite excited about all this. Even though I feel quite enthusiastic about the “comeback” it sounds a little shallow to me. And who knows what they mean when they talk about it not being “like anything anyone is going to expect”? To my mind, SciFi is trying to see where the new trend of webisodes is going. Change isn’t going to slow down and you has to explore the possibilities of digital distribution, digital content, and, of course, new marketing vehicles. Let’s hope they don’t screw it up.

Fancy formatting and fancy words are not good

JC — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 17:02:47 +0000

Jakob Nielsen provides yet another valuable insight for your homepage design. He writes that the usability of a homepage was compromised because of fancy formatting and fancy words. Users ignored a key area because it resembled a promotion. They looked at the right parts of the page but they didn’t see the essential information.

It’s interesting how people ignore things they don’t want to see. I too mostly ignore advertisements, mainly because I’m not interested in it. Since most sites try too hard selling you something it’s not wonder, I guess. Obviously, less definitely is more. In order to get the most out of your online presence you should check out Nielsen’s Top Ten Guidelines for Homepage Design. Even though these guidelines are clearly aimed at companies they are quite useful for the average Joe.

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MySpace vs. Facebook

JC — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 11:43:00 +0000

What do we have here? A war of some sort? Not quite likely but according to Danah Boyd there is a rift. American teenagers are flocking to MySpace and Facebook and according to her essay, which go where have something to do with socio-economic class. Danah has been trying to figure out how to put this division into some kinda formula. Since she hasn’t succeeded yet we can enjoy her observations over at her blog. I have to admit, there’s a certain truth to be found in this paper.

In short, Miss Boyd has observed that hegemonic American teens are all on or switching to Facebook. Non-hegemonic teens are drawn to MySpace. She thinks that a class division has emerged which is underlined by advertising or policy decisions, for example. Well, considering the origin of each site, I find myself agreeing to her line of thought. But I have to ask myself why anybody should even bother? It’s all just a matter of presentation and news. Both social networking sites embrace different policies, encourage different actions. Is it really safe to assume that MS and FB are the prime indicators of class division?

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Honesty on the Internet

JC — Tue, 27 Feb 2007 13:13:00 +0000

Do you need a hot looking “friend” to enhance your page with photographs and comments? There’s a site called FakeYourSpace that allows you to hire attractive models for 99 cents a month. For that fee you can pick your friends and even specify exactly what comments they should post. You’ll get two posts a week and each additional purchase of the same model simply doubles the amount of comments you’ll get in a week.

I should’ve come up with this idea. Turning cyber-losers into social networking magnets, that’d be something to brag about. Well, I for one don’t like this kind of social network reputation hack. It’s bad enough that people start to think of the cyberspace as some kind of real-world replacement. You never know for sure if somebody tells you fictitious stories or plain truth. That reminds me of this famous cartoon which is still something to laugh about. Well, nowadays even more so.

Personally, I think that’s disgusting. What’s the use in pretending to be someone you really aren’t? Sooner or later you’ll be exposed and everything you lied so hard for is gone. What’s next? Starting a new secret identity, booking other models to bring some content to your blog/page? If that’s the case it’s a sad world we live in.

MySpace vs. Facebook