My tastes in blogs are rather particular and the number of blogs I am visiting is not large. I write mostly about computing and personal taste and a lot of the things that really bug me! Well, I did use to be a debugger, after all.

Returning to Roblogfest. This was some sort of top blog thing + a party where bloggers got together and talked about ... wait a minute! What would bloggers talk about? And even more than this, would they repeat the most interesting stuff in the blogs the next day? I imagined blog entries like "Yesterday I talked to [some guy - with a link to the guy's blog] at Roblogfest and it was really interesting what he said about [this - a link to the entry of the guy's blog]". That's the Internet for you, hyperlinking to the extreme, I thought, feeling slightly smug and imaginative.

Returning to Roblogfest. I kept bumping into it, while reading some blog or the other, waiting for some smart thing to enlighten me. Instead: the RoBlogFest competition, with voting and everything. I imagined stuff like "The least interesting blog category: Xulescu's, winner with 5534 votes" or "Most read blog: Roblogfest". Well, it wasn't interesting enough to care, so I ignored it. I kept reading BBC news and Google news, looking for stuff. Who cares about who's blog is better or not? Isn't the blog a symbol of personal expression, uncorrupted by external demand?

Returning to Roblogfest. The competition is over, the party is over. The blogs are full of Roblogfest again. This time people either enjoy having won something (more people on their blogs?) or thinking the whole competition was stupid (they didn't get more people on their blogs). Also, a lot of pictures, little youtube videos and stories about how bloggers got together and talked and whatever. Lots of links, too. "I talked to [this guy] yesterday. The rest I didn't know. I wanted to know them, but some I didn't". Most of the bloggers were kids. Some cute, some not, mostly the kind of social pariah which would write their feelings in a blog rather than sharing them during a party. They enjoyed the party, though.

This reminds me of that joke, with two people meeting in a park and admitting to each other that they really enjoy walking alone in the park, then decide to take the walk together. Yeah, I am sure now I feel smug. I am definitely superior. I would have liked to be that young again... or to go to parties and meet cute blogger girls, but I am well beyond that. I am definitely superior. And my blog is better.

theSTART are a Rock / New Wave / Electronica band from Sudden Valley, California, as it writes on their mySpace web site. They also have an official website. I've discovered them quite a long while ago, but back then I didn't use to put images and video to the blog. Anyway, without further ado here is the videoclip to the song Gorgeous, by theSTARt. I hope you enjoy it.


Yesterday, the video worked, today it's stuck on "Loading". Just in case you experience the same problem, here are the available videos with theStart.

Have you ever wondered how these beautiful girls and boys appear suddenly on your TV, singing a completely meaningless song while looking like they're having the time of their life? And how they seem to overwhelm the TV, then the radio, then appear in tabloids, then completely disappear? Where is a small tutorial on how to make your own!


The clip is from a movie called Before the Music Dies (or B4MD, how they chose to shortcut it) that exposes the bad things in the music industry today. Here is the link to the IMDb entry for the movie. I will see it as soon as I can and review it, then update this post.

Yes, at last another one of the World Sucks series. Here I am tackling globalisation, yet not the concept, but the buzz. People that somehow are against globalisation are the ones that have actually already accepted defeat. They see the franchise epidemic and high level political and economic games as the cause, not the symptom. They are nothing but fork and torch villagers trying to kill the beast without really understanding the cause of everything. They are especially wrong since they try to kill a beast much stronger than they will ever be.

And the cause is... not dr. Frankenstein, but statistical discrimination. It is the thing that makes shops disappear if they don't give to most of the people most of what they want, that puts people that don't behave like the majority into ignorable categories, the thing that doesn't come from high up to affect us, little people, but comes from very little people to affect the higher ups.

I am talking about statistics. Once you have enough objective data you can draw conclusions based on hard mathematics, conclusions that you know are not biased and that have true meaning. It tells shop chains which are the most financially effective customers and what exactly choose to buy, it tells media conglomerates which are the people which will be most inclined to see their shows, exactly what they would want to watch and how much they are going to be influenced by commercials in order to buy products, it tells politicians which is the biggest part of the electorate and what they could be told in order to elect them.

The effect of this is statistical discrimination, or the oppression of the minority groups that don't "fit" into the whole data schema. That's why you will not get the products you really want, you will not see the shows you want to see or the movies you crave or the books you need. That's why you will see young people asking you about every day things like some vegetables you used to find when you were a child and now nobody knows what they are. They do know about some exotic fruit you've never heard about, too, and they are willing to pay ten times the price of normal fruit for the privilege to eat it.

It starts with small business, it extends to media, then to art, then to politics. Before you know it, you can either do what everyone else does or be ignored. Does it sound like 1984? That was a naive view of the world, where the actual oppressors were a very small minority, where democracy was a dream. No, the actual oppression comes from the majority of people, the idiots watching today's TV shows, eating popcorn at European Gigolo and Scooby Doo the Movie. And it all starts from you, the little people.

Every form of discrimination in this world, either good or bad (yes, there is good discrimination), is statistical in nature, but most bad ones are determined by bad entry data, like all Gypsies are dirty or all black people are thieves. This time there is a growing mother-of-all discrimination, one that starts with perfect data, ends up with the perfect solution and leaves just about everyone that matters out of it.

The only option IS globalisation, the only possible solution for the people that want to do something different is to get together, through the Internet, through the disappearance of borders, nationalities and local law, through the dismissal of all things that separate people of the same type, because the oldest and most effective method of ruling other people is divide-and-conquer. Because no one is special for being American or Romanian, these are just stupid inventions, based on geography or past connections. Each person is special for their own reasons.

Globalisation is not the cause, it is the symptom. It is the opposite of localisation, or keeping something for yourself in a single place. Globalisation is the crucible of sense: you now get to decide what is important and what not in the whole world! And the problem is not high up, it's down with you, it's your decision.

Fight stupidity; elect common sense; choose diversity; create AND consume what others create just don't limit yourself to consumption alone; say the things you mean, not the things others want to hear; fight for your right to party, but think of the people who want to sleep; do what you like, but consider the others.

Yes, Manga again. I feel the whole manga/anime intensity fading away again, since I've read the Berserk and InuYasha manga and watched the Samurai Deeper Kyo anime series. Oh... that and my wife hates me for ignoring her :)
But before this manga fading to black, I will blog one more manga series. I think that it is nicely drawn, but hard to actually follow. I am talking about hardcore sci-fi manga Blame! by Nihei Tsutomu. Placed in a distant future, humans and silicon creatures (and some crossbreeds) inhabit a huge structure and fight each other for obscure reasons. The manga is a cross between Giger and Aeon Flux and, if you remember the MTV show, just as hard to follow due to very little explaining and scarce dialogue. It is basically a world description, even if it has a central character and a plot line.
The same artist created two other manga series in the same universe: Biomega and Net Sphere Engineer. You can download most of the Nihei Tsutomu works at the Controlling Authority site.

This has to be the coolest site ever! It is specially created for the cut hair of Britney Spears. You can now buy it for a measley 1,000,000.00$ (that's a million). I hope some charitable person buys the hair, divides it into one million tiny pieces and donates each one to a voodoo priest.

Update: their official site is not valid anymore and there hasn't been activity on their myspace page hasn't been changed from mid 2006.

A while ago I got this song from a friend of mine, it was called gruv.mp3. No id tag, nothing about the origin of the song. I thought it was nice, but it bothered me that I didn't know who the hell sang it and, of course, where I should get more. Finally, after searching for the lyrics on Google every one month or so, I finally found out who the band was.

They are called duteVino and they are from Romania, mind you. They are singing in English, though, and there is almost no accent whatsoever. The genre of their songs is something like Alternative/Funk/Jazz. Visit their myspace site to get a feel for their music.

How about some pop-rock music for a change? Of course I am depressed all the time if I only listen to sad music. Here is a nice, pop, rock, sexy, jiggly song from a Finnish band called LAB (their official site at labplanet.net is down, the band is disbanded): Beat the Boys



If you liked this, you might want to check two other LAB videos: Machine Girl and When Heaven Gets Dirty
Update:
I've gotten all their songs and they rock! This band is like a better Garbage! Original and strong. I just love their songs.

Update:
It's so difficult to find the band members without knowing more than Ana's first name and Pekka "Splendid" Laine having quite a common name. It doesn't help that they are Finnish, either. The story, as far as I can ascertain is that the members split up and went their separate way. Ana and Splendid worked on an album together that was supposedly finished in 2009, but was never released. Their new band is not called LAB anymore, but "Rain Hill", another commonly found name on the Internet, although not as bad as Lab, I guess. Their band page shows activity in early 2013 and even two songs that I cannot find anywhere for free, but their previews are pretty cool. It smells like another failed project. That is so bad.

Anyway, the links to the new band's Facebook page is this and the link to their official (and horrible) web site is this, where you can also listen to two 30 second previews.

Ok, a few days ago I wrote this post that basically said Inuyasha was a great anime and that the manga goes on further and the story is still going. Here I am telling the same thing about Berserk. The story is a cross between Flesh+Blood and Hellraiser. The anime ends suddenly at chapter 11, but the manga has reached chapter 32 and goes on. You can find the manga online here and here and here.

If you can read Japanese, here is the official site for Berserk.

Anyone who knows me knows what my stance is on this. School is something, religion is something else. There are a bunch of (traditional) ways to teach religiousness to a child, in the home as well as in church, special camps :), etc. I see no need for a religious education forcefully imposed on children inside the school, especially in a country that is not that religious. Where is the separation between state an church here?!

Yes, I know that the statistics say 85% of the population of Romania is orthodox, but that's only in name. True, active, church going religious people belong to distinct demographics like old people, some women, or people in the country side. This new surge of religion in Romania is nothing but a scam! Yes, nothing more than a marketing move.

And yet, here it is, a law that (again) makes religion one of the compulsory classes in Romanian schools. If you don't want religion, the parent must write a letter to the school requesting for it to be replaced with "moral-religious education", whatever that is.

So, what if I don't want any religion for my kid? I consider religion, especially organised religion, nothing more than a ploy to prey on human stupidity and fear. I want to raise my child away from superstitious crap. Let him watch Jesus on TV, the same as Ghost Busters!

Let me analyze what I should do in order to insure that my hypothetical offspring is not getting in school an education that contradicts that at home. First step: write the letter that places him in a special class of "moral-religious education". What that essentially does is place the child in a different group, a ready prey for ridicule or any kind of discrimination. Then he sees that in his group there are only the people that consider religion ridiculous, while in the other (larger group) there are the religious kids along with the ones that don't care about it one way or the other. So he will immediately feel the pressure of being in an apparent minority. This is a clear case of discrimination any way you put it, yet they intend to make this a law. What kind of crappy legislators do we have?! AND, after all this, I only managed to get my kid into a less religious class, probably with a priest or highly religious man as a teacher.

What would these religious people think if we were to add a compulsory "God does not exist and religion is stupid" class? They would shout much and high about discrimination and the right to choose and the local decision of allowing religious symbols or education in schools. Yet they have no problem with refusing the right to choose of atheists. Religious hypocrites? what a shock!

Here is a link to a discussion from 2004 about the legality and ethics of compulsory religious classes and their content.

Update 11 Oct 2009: A new anime started, continuing the InuYasha story, although some people seem to not agree with the interpretation of the manga. It is called Inuyasha Kanketsu-hen (or Inuyasha Final Act) and it starts where the first anime ended. Having just seen the first episode, I must say that I can barely understand what is going on anymore. There are so many characters and I don't really remember how they cam to be as they are now. So my recommendation is to read the chapters of the manga from about chapter 360. Here is another link where you can read InuYasha chapters online: Inuyasha on OneManga.

A while ago I've seen the Inuyasha anime series and fell in love with it. But at that time I didn't have a blog and I also thought that most Japanese anime is that good. As written in my review back then, I was soon crying for more episodes when it ended. I got a bit upset, too, because the series didn't end anywhere. It just stopped!
But, even if it is something obvious, I never thought about searching for the Inuyasha manga! Yes, the anime is based on a manga series that is, as I write this blog, ongoing and (almost) close to its finish. And you can read it! Free! online! :)

Ok, here is the link: Read on!

Heh, I knew this link for a while now, but I accidentally stumbled upon it. It is a male (and lesbian? :) ) only, female breasts oriented site . I've warned you!

Have fun!

The basic animation is taken from the jumping breasts JJ1 site - it seems the site is down.

Also, here are some happy breasts from some other site: Cheer up page

Today Orange Romania had organised a concert in their brand new "Concept Store". A Concept Store is exactly what it says it is, a place where they sell you an idea, the idea of buying and using Orange phones and subscriptions. Therefore everything that takes place in that store is directly linked to image and marketing.
Well. today they blew it, royal style. 15 minutes before the start of the concert (Coma was going to perform, they are this extremely cool Deftones meets Linkin Park via Tool band) they announced that the concert was not going to take place due to complaints from the neighbours. What actually happened is that some greedy idiots thought they could get some money from Orange because they lived right above the Orange Concept Store. Well it didn't work, but the funny thing is they announced the cancellation of the concert after keeping tens of fans out in the cold while watching them through the glass doors of the place. And these were only the ones that got there earlier. I got there about 30 minutes before the announced hour for the concert so I was amazed to see a couple of suits staring at us from the other side of the glass and doing absolutely nothing about it. Then the cancellation news came.
The band members were devastated, the fans disappointed, Orange made complete fools of themselves. But will this ever reach the news? NO! There is no rape or murder involved, no political scandal. Just a few ordinary teens were completely stepped upon in the name of Orange Corporation Choppers!

Caught in a desire to be more scientist-like I've borrowed the book "I Am a Mathematician" by Norbert Wiener from a friend of mine. While being a rather old book (written in 1956), it was exactly what I was looking for: a book that described in layman's terms what the life of a true scientist is like and how he thinks.

I think the book itself was rather boring, but the world described and the way this guy was thinking really opened my eyes to things I wish I understood in my early teens. He sees, for example, the way sciences come together in one big thing called science. Even if he was a mathematician, he worked in physics, psychology and electronics, because he saw the way they worked together, not as separate unconnected subjects. He was thorough, focused and science minded. He went to the beach and thought about equations to define the movements of waves as they break against the shore.

My conclusion is that it is a wonderful insight in the mind of a scientist. It is not a popular science book, it is an autobiography, so it might get a little boring, but it also puts everything into context.

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