I think MODSonair is a great show, but it could possibly be better if we could turn it from radio to television. Sure, we broadcast live with a webcam… but that doesn’t make it interesting to watch. Wouldn’t it be better if you could see the game trailer being talked about, the screenshot of that piece of hardware or something else along those lines?

So, I spent this past weekend looking for new software and testing it out (hopefully it hasn’t filled my computer with crap causing it to crash during the next show). Sadly, none of these programs worked out for me. And here they are (in case you have something better to suggest):

• http://www.stickam.com/
  Like: It works, it’s free and it gets the job done for producing a live show.
  Dislike: You can only broadcast your webcam. The service will occasionally restart and kick everyone out of the show.
• http://www.mogulus.com/studio
  Happy: This is a Stickam-like site that allows you to broadcast your video. You can broadcast other videos as well as your webcam.
  Sad: When the other video plays, it takes the over the audio too so that the show host can’t say anything.
• http://www.ustream.tv/
  XP: Another Stickam-like site with more administration options. You can create user polls, assign co-hosts and more.
  Vista: No other video options other than to broadcast your webcam.
• http://www.webcammax.com/, http://www.superwebcam.com/, http://www.splitcamera.com/
  Battlefield: You can mix up your video with effects and text. You can broadcast your video and even your live desktop.
  Sims 2: It feels like a toy. The effects are amateurish. Switching between video sources is horrible.

If you’ve got any other suggestions for me to try, shout’em out. I’m willing to look into anything (except Mac, you damn hippie).

I love this concept car that BMW has come up with. BMW realized that the outer shell of a car doesn’t have to be made of metal. The frame (or skeleton) of the car needs to protect us while the outer shell just needs to push the wind a bit to make us more aerodynamic.

With that in mind, GINA is skinned with a fabric of sorts that can stretch. The doors open like wings or arms. The headlights blink like eyes. The engine opens like a gaping… well, not a mouth, but something that gapes.

Check it out:

For the past few months I’ve been extremely interested in getting an ultra-portable laptop. If you have heard of them before, you aren’t alone. They pretty must sprung up near the end of last year. They are smaller than a standard laptop but bigger than a PDA. They come with a full keyboard, so they are a laptop. However, they also are really small.

For the most part, the specifications for such a device are:

• 7-10 inch screen
• mobile celeron or the new atom chip coming from intel (soon)
• 1Gb memory
• wireless options

As you can see, it’s a real laptop. It’s just smooshed into a smaller package. Exactly what I want… something really small that does the job of a laptop. Great for browsing, email and other lightweight computer functions. No… It’s not going to do too well playing crysis. lol.

Why haven’t I gotten one? Well, it’s probably a reason you’re familiar with. I want the best one that money can buy, but every week something new is announced. So, it’s the idea that the next best version is just a month away. Therefore, I am hung on which I could purchase.

To make matters worse (or better, depending on how you look at it), there is a computer show going on this week where all new models and options are being announced. This isn’t going to make my decision easier.

I’m just going to have to close my eyes and point to one. lol.

Oh, and for an idea of what I am looking at: (more…)

The topic of this post is a word that was coined by a good friend of mine, Stryder. He knows I have it and has mocked me with it several times. But I don’t mind so much. He’s right, I have it. I have a (more than) slight addiction to leveling up. Although this would normally be related to games, I don’t think it’s restricted to just games.

I found a sudo-game  this weekend that I started playing. I’m not exactly sure it’s really a game… I don’t know what to call it yet. The name of this “game” is The Passively Multiplayer Online Game (link). Yup, that’s the name of this game and not just a description.

Here’s how it works. You install a Firefox extension found at the site linked above. This extension will put a tool bar at the bottom of your browser to track your surfing… or gaming as it were. As you surf, you may stumble upon chests, portal, or mines left by other players. It’s like playing an RPG while surfing the net. As you surf, you earn more points (or gold). As you earn more, you have the ability to level up.

It sounds ridiculous and that’s what made me check it out. Now, I am having fun playing it. I also can’t help but think of the possibilities that this extensions presents. Imagine what could be created with something like this in mind? I picture a community of people sharing things about the internet in real time instead of having to read their blog or their profile somewhere else.

If you noticed my post on MODSonline, I’m working on some updates to the site. Well, I wish it were as easy to do as it is to say. hehe.

I was going to update the tutorials with some custom code to allow user input and updating. The community needs more access to the tutorials and I have a plan to make it happen. But before I start with these updates, it made sense to update the entire back-end. Of course, that’s another involved task. It’s not just upload and update… it’s upload, confirm, test, fix, test, restore, copy, active, done. That’s just a quick list.

When I get that done, I can move onto the Tutorials updates that I originally planned. At least I hope that is all I have to do. ugh.

This year, I’ve seen a number of friends lose their hosting for various reasons. Either the host shuts down, the server crashes, or something along those lines causes them to be left without service unexpectedly.

I’ve discussed it with my web business partner. We’ve decided that we can help out gamers in need with some pretty nice hosting packages:

That’s not bad, right? If you’re interested, let me know.

For a long time now, I couldn’t get email notices from this blog site (yes, the one you are reading right now). It took me a while to figure out the reasons for this problem, but it’s finally solved. I actually filter my email for spam 3 times. Spam is awful… well, I don’t need to tell you how bad it is. When I get email, it first gets filtered via my server and Spam Assassin, a commonly used server-side spam filter. From there, the email goes to two places, it goes to my Spamcop email filtering service and it goes to my gmail account. Spamcop filters the mail and sends it back to a secret account from which I retrieve the email via Thunderbird, which filters the email a third time. On the Gmail side, it just gets filtered the one time and stays there in case I need to check my email from online.

Anyway, wordpress blogs send email notifications from wordpress@yourdomain.com (yourdomain being… well, your domain). But that’s a great way to get even more spam, so I don’t have it setup to receive email. Although Spamcop claims not to check for the sending email address validity, it would reject those emails and I wouldn’t see them (unless they caught my eye on gmail).

Well, needless to say, I had to setup wordpress@yourdomain.com (actually at mydomain, but you get the idea). Now I am getting those email from here. At least I now should know when I am getting comments here. lol.

Am I overly redundant in trying to stop spam? I don’t think so. I don’t get too much spam considering all the domain names (currently 36) and email addresses (only about 20) I have to keep my eye on. And it’s great(!!!) not to have to download that spam just to filter it locally.

However, the biggest problem now is caused by spoofing. That’s when someone sends email from your email address… not literally from your server, but pretending to be you. Then you get thousands of bounce backs from those email addresses that don’t exist. I’d love to hear about a solution for that!

Yesterday, Supersword posted in the MODSonline.com forums asking for comments from the community about how much they can’t live without like the website and what they would like to change. I had no idea he was going to post this… and I think it’s a good post (so, I won’t send the hitman this time).

One of the popular ideas that has come up is regarding the tutorials. Members would like more control over the updating and improving of existing tutorials. Funny thing here… I have that very idea written in my notes from a few months back (before dreaded tax season). So, I think it’s a great idea.

While a wiki-styled system would work, I think it’s sloppy. I’ve been through the code of wiki sites and there is nothing there that is truly secure or manageable without headaches and stubbed toes (from kicking the wall in frustration of course). What needs to be created is something more innovative and flexible. Something that can be tied into the existing architecture of the site. Something that won’t have my wife wondering who I am after I emerge from the dark office after days of programming.

hmmm.. ideas?

I found a pretty cool search engine today… and no, I didn’t make it (askfoyle.com). lol. I mentioned to my buddy this morning that I did some preliminary coding of a search engine to see what I could do (perhaps more on that in the future), and he showed me this: Searchme

What’s cool about this search system is that rather than returning many text links like I’m used to seeing in Google, MSN, or whatever it is I (you) normally use to search, I see a screenshots of the website. This is no tiny little image leaving me to guess at what the site really could look like. It’s a fairly large representation of the site that I can somewhat read. Wait a few seconds longer after my search and my keywords will be circled within those images. Scroll through the resulting images like a jukebox to find what I’m looking for.

And… the whole thing appears to be presented using Flash. Yeah, a flash coded search engine. That’s not normal.

It’s currently in beta, but it still returns the results I was looking for. Oh, and it’s not kicking MODSonline out of the search like Google started doing to me this past weekend (unless you search for modsonline.com).

Follow-up: Go figure, Google has taken me back. What did I do to fix it? Nothing. lol.

I noticed today that the subscriptions on MODSonline.com are on the decline. They held steady for a year but not any longer. It concerns me that we have to rely more on advertising to pay the bills as I always thing that the advertising could just pull out one day and leave us hanging there.

So, what do we do to increase the membership on the site? Do we run a special contest for subscribing members only? Do I program new features for the site that only the members can access? hmmm… I need suggestions.