To get things started on our glorious trip to Seattle/Kirkland for PAX, we flew in two days early to get a feel for the area (and because tickets were $100 cheaper š .) When SickNdehed told me that we had a layover in LA, I wasnāt too thrilled.
Well, something interesting came out of our stop in LAX. While we were traveling down that conveyor belt for people with heavy bags we saw a couple familiar faces walking the other direction in the center aisle. Sick and I glanced at each other and I asked, āIs thatā¦?ā She cut me off by nodding her head and said āYes, that was the RvB guys!ā Soā¦ they actually ended up being on our flight to Seattle and we got a chance to ask them for a picture with us.
Our next point of interest on this day was a nice visit to the wonderful Bungie Studios. We happen to come say āHiā not too long after the building was swarmed by āKirklandās finest.ā It seems they spooked a local when carrying their well known (to the Halo fans anyway) Sniper Rifle from one building to the other. You can check their past Weekly Update for more details.
After sticking our noses through the door SickNdehed and I were surprised to meet Stephen Totilo of Kotaku (who actually flew down to cover our wedding.) After seeing him finish up, we got to poke around the studio lobby for a few. We snapped some pretty pics with some trophies, memorabilia, and even got a few friendlies to come out of their cave to meet us.
Click image for more pics!
Iād say we started our trip off with a -BLAM!- This day is well set in our memories.
Well this wraps up our first story surrounding our PAX visit. Be sure to keep an eye out, thereās much more to come.
Remember Mike and Cheese, the guy that brought us the āIām a General In Halo 3ā music video? Well heās back with another great song and vid. Check it out!
Weāve got a few PAX posts coming up for you later this week, including a blog giveaway. But first it seemed most important to address the fact that many PAX attendees have been coming down with the flu and other illnesses.
If you or someone you know who attended PAX is feeling two or more of the following flu symptoms (fever, cough, sore throat, body aches, headache, chills and fatigue.), please see a doctor to get tested for the H1N1 Flu Virus. Penny Arcade has already confirmed over 100 swine flu cases. It also a good idea to read some information on the H1N1 virus itself.
SickNdehed has actually been suffering from all the symptoms but tested negative today for the flu. She seems to be getting a little better although my cough seems to be getting worse. Needless to say weāll be staying indoors and getting plenty of rest for the next few days. All of you feeling sick should do the same.
Hello again, everyone. Honestly was surprised when I looked at my clock and it said it was Tuesday today. Nearly spent the morning playing Section 8 instead of typing this up, my bad. š
A quick little thing to toss out to iPhone users, the official Flickr app has finally made it through the gauntlet that is the Apple App Store approval process seemingly unscathed. Techcrunch has already tossed out a review so I wonāt go into the heavy details. I skimmed over the article and initial thoughts on the app seem to be that it looks and feels like Flickr far better than any third party download, seeing the āwallā of photos is a nice addition, and upload is painless along with nearly all the options as if you were accessing the web version of Flickr. This app is available as a free download from the App Store.
The line of Android based smart-phones is getting another contender developed by HTC. The Tattoo comes out next month for everyone to poke and prod at till they get tired of it and regret ever laying down the money for itā¦oh wait, thatās a real tattoo and not a phone. Cheesy puns aside, this phone looks like it has the intention of contending with Appleās iPhone3GS in terms of hardware. Hit the link for the full write up on the specs. One of the major selling points for this phone that HTC has been pitching left and right is the apparent ability for the consumer to customize āall aspects of the phone.ā Right, weāll see how much freedom we are given once this thing hits store shelves and the early adopters pick them up.
Quick little update, Opera launched their browser update to the world a little while back. A little time has passed and I did a bit of digging around to check out some reviews. It seems the general consensus on the net is that the new update for Opera has definitely placed the browser as a contender against the other browsers in terms of speed. Hearing this makes me want to see about getting it installed on my Linux laptop just because I like to have options when I choose a program to use. Lifehacker included the new Opera 10 browser and Chrome 4.0 in their latest speed test, so check it out if what you are looking for is a very unscientific test of software capabilities.
I have absolutely no idea how much scientific validity this picture has, but it gave me a good laugh and I would like to share it with you. I like to call it: Proof The Matrix Is Inefficient.
While I would love nothing more than to sit down and go into details about the benchmarking that was recently done to Intelās new Core i5, I think I will save everyone from my techno-babble on that one. Instead, I jump to my usual explanation of my choice of titles. No odd commercials this time around, but I do have a demo video of a new Formula 3 race car. Now why would I show you this and what does it have to do with a grocery store? The thing is made out of various produce, yet it still can take a corner at roughly 125mph. I am not a gear head by any means and I still find that impressive. This race car has been named the WorldFirst and was created by researchers at the University of Warwick. The WorldFirst makes its first race against twenty-two other Formula 3ās on October 17th. Enjoy the demo video, and Iāll see you next week.
Morning everyone, another week gone by so quickly and another ahead. Today I couldnāt decide if I wanted to go a bit older for the weekly unusual commercial or not, so Iām throwing two up at the end of the post. One possibly will scare parents everywhere, and the other really has very little to do with the product until they slap the logo on at the end. Letās get started, shall we?
Do you like to watch TV but find yourself often questioning yourself why remotes donāt want to work after taking a little swim? Well, it seems Sony has decided to take it upon themselves to waterproof a line of new universal remotes. Not a bad idea right? Waterproofing electronics to insure they donāt fry when you show off just how much grace (read: lack of) you possess. I personally had a bout of clumsiness involving a glass of water and my laptop keyboard so this little article by Engadget caught my eye. Take a look for yourself: Sony Waterproof Universal Remotes
Now, how many of you have ever had to take a breathalyzer test? Interesting little things, and for awhile now there has been a version of this gadget that could be hooked into your carās ignition system by court order. Toyota is testing such a device from today till November 30th. Fortunately the thing has two settings, alarm and disengage ignition. Even has a digital camera to snap a mug shot of you when you use it. Now what is stopping some drunk guy from bribing a random passerby into breathing into the device? Really I am not sure, but I would like to assume some sort of facial recognition which would explain the digital camera. Unless of course the camera is just there so you can upload photos of you smashed to Flickr/Myspace/Facebook/Photobucket. I highly recommend reading through the comments and look out for some of the creative ways Engadget readers are coming up with to bypass the locking mechanism. Leave it to human ingenuity right?
Two rumors stuck out in my scouring for interesting news. The first is the fact that eBay has announced it is making a deal to sell Skype. I remember hearing a few months back that the founders of Skype wished to buy back their company and about that same time were threatening to pull the plug on one of the core P2P technologies that makes Skype work. Only news leaking out of this story at the moment is that apparently Skype is being sold to a private investor group. The other rumor that caught my eye is that Apple could be opening the iPhone up to other carriers in the U.S. very soon, effectively ending its exclusive deal with AT&T. If this follows the same pattern as what has happened in other countries, the iPhone is likely to see a huge jump in its market share. I know I would be tempted to set aside my Blackberry as a backup if the iPhone happened to hop onto the Sprint network.
And now the two videos I have to share with you. First off, letās get the one to scare parents everywhere out of the way. Thanks go to Duracell for their hypothetical situation announcer guy and this horribly frightening scenario they dreamed up. Seriously, this was a commercial. I remember seeing it on TV.
See what I mean? Talk about the media using scare tactics to get you to believe things. Anyway, lets move (quickly) on to the next video which is a bit older as well, but this one is from earlier this year. It is a cell phone service provider commercial believe it or not. During the entire un-edited commercial there is absolutely no mention of said provider, until the end where they slap the T-Mobile logo on. I think that is one of two things that make me love this commercial. The other being it involves a flash mob style dance party.