My philosophy: If you're going to swear, then fucking swear, goddammit!
None of that half-assed BS like...ummm..."B.S." Either swear or don't. But no half-way pretending-to-swear "wussing" out, chicken-shit fuckface!
Try it, it's fun!
General
The Best Imitation in the Universe
Published 2012-06-02 00:54 by Abscissa in General
Many people[1] have asked me, in response to my previous post, "I'm a drooling moron and I still don't understand how your 'Makes Sense / Doesn't Fucking Make Sense' game is played." Of course, that's not even a question, dipshit, which gives you an idea of just how stupid hypothetical people are.
Lack of actual question aside, here's how the game is played:
Right before I win, I say awesome techno-like stuff that shows the honeys[2] just how gigantic my technology-dick is. They writhe in ecstasy imagining it, and then BAM! It gets smacked in their face. The immense force of my crotch log moving at mach 4 cracks their skull, and then they orgasm just because that's so damn manly. Then I win because, as I said, this all happens right before I win.
This, of course, is nothing but a cheap and inferior Maddox rip-off. Fortunately, pointing that out myself makes it not cheap, but totally ok. Awesome!
0 people say a shameless Maddox ripoff is incomplete without a counter that makes a witty (and awesome) remark about the visitors
[1] Nobody.
[2] To be clear, "honeys" is a euphemism for "those little plastic bears at the grocery store with delicious honey inside, yum". Not "women". Yes, it makes more sense this way. Because I said so.
Great Show, Make It So!
Published 2012-05-31 21:01 by Abscissa in General
(click to enlarge)
I want to see a Klingon cooking show.
I really do. That would be hilarious.
Paramount: Make it so!
Porn/Prostitution Laws Are Weird
Published 2012-04-16 15:19 by Abscissa in General
Here's what I don't get:
The exchange of money for sex is typically illegal...unless you sell a videotape of it. Then it's ok.
Aspect Ratios Are Easy, Yet They're Botched More Than Ever
Published 2012-04-06 02:18 by Abscissa in General
Ever since widescreens appeared, botched up aspect ratios have only gotten more and more common. Go into any restaurant, for example, and if they have TVs up (an annoying practice anyway), chances are 50/50 it'll be displaying an image bizarrely distorted by stretching/squishing, or an image with big black borders on all four sides (which I'm going to call "double-letterboxed", because that's what's happening).
This is two-thousand-goddamn-twelve. In this age of palm-sized supercomputers and HD, that's just inexcusable. Especially considering how simple it would have been to avoid.
Since industry can't seem to get it right, I'll spoon-feed them the solution they should have been able to standardize on from day one of the first widescreen TV:
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Your video feeds support metadata. Even over-the-air broadcasts. If you know how to stick copyright flags and program information into a video stream (and for the record, you do), then you already know how to embed an aspect ratio. Do it, if you're not already. And standardize the damn thing, if it isn't already.
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When the video feed changes to a different aspect ratio, change the damn aspect ratio information.
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From the original video author's desktop to the user's home system, do NOT fuck with the aspect ratio. Do NOT change the aspect ratio flag. Do NOT letterbox the feed. Do NOT crop the feed. And for the love of god, do NOT stretch/squish the feed non-uniformly.
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A TV should already know its own dimensions. It's not as if they're ever going to change. So when it receives video, have it UNIFORMLY scale the video so that one dimension matches the screen, and the other dimension is smaller than the screen and centered.
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If you must, let the user optionally choose "crop" (the same as above, but using the other dimension to match to the screen) or "stretch" (ie, non-uniform scale-to-fit). But don't make that stupid shit the default. It should never be the default. Never, never, never.
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What you say? Non-digital, non-smart TVs? Simple: Any device that outputs to a TV - a cable box, digital tuner, DVD player, game console, whatever - is told by the user what aspect ratio their screen is. Show them a square and a circle to make sure their choice is correct. Better yet, show them various squares/circles/rectangles/ellipses, and when they choose which pair looks like a square and circle: Guess what? You know their aspect ratio!
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To minimize user setup and screwup, set-top boxes (whatever set-top box it may be) should attempt to auto-detect whether the screen handles aspect ratios on its own and, if not, what aspect ratio the screen is. Do NOT make assumptions. Whenever there's any doubt, don't pull a "salesman" and grab an answer out of your ass: Have the user choose their own "square and circle".
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What? Auto-detect? Yes. Even VGA had ways to send monitor information to the source device. Surely HDMI and DVI should be capable of the same. And if RCA cables are being used, that just means you're back in user-selection land.
So there. You've now been told how to not fuck up aspect ratios, so after years of shitty distorted and double-letterboxed video feeds, let's start getting it right.
Restaurant TVs Are Annoying
Published 2012-04-06 01:06 by Abscissa in General
Movement, such as that on TVs, automatically draws the eye. So if a nearby TV is on, it's difficult not to watch it.
But what's the point of eating out if your attention's just gonna get drawn to a screen? You have screens at home. May as well have gotten takeout - it ends up amounting to the same thing. Defeats the point of eating out, if you ask me.
Sports bars are a different matter, of course. But then, I like neither bars nor sports. Nor drunks. Nor 30/40-somethings pathetically clinging to their frat days. I do, however, like bar food and good booze. Who doesn't? So...umm, what was I saying? Something about wristwatches, I think?