Jacksboro Pike

Test Post To Tumblr

John — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 21:09:48 +0000

Testing my post to tumblr

Phone Rumors and Excitement – Motorola Sholes/Toa (Pictures and info)

John — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 14:33:00 +0000

Verizon, Google, Motorola all in one place.

Anyone that know me knows I love to have new phone I love cool phone and I love Multi-featured phone. For the past 2 and a half years THE phone to get has been the iPhone. I don’t have an AT&T account and I don’t want one. I’ve been waiting for the iPhone to come to Verizon but it looks like my wait is over, because THE new phone to have is on its way. The Motorola Sholes (or Toa) runs on the Google Android platform and will be released later this year.

First, here are the *specs…
* OMAP3430 – 600 MHz ARM Cortex A8 + PowerVR SGX 530 GPU + 430MHz C64x+ DSP + ISP (Image Signal Processor)
* Dimensions 60.00 x 115.80 x 13.70 mm
* Weight 169 g
* Battery Li-ion 1400 mAh.
* Standby 450 hours, talk time 420 minutes
* 3.7-inch touch-sensitive display with a resolution of 854×480 pixels, 16 million color depth. Physical screen size is 45.72 mm by 81.34 mm.
* 512MB/256MB ROM/RAM
* microSD / microSDHC expansion slot
* Camera: 5.0 megapixel with autofocus and video recorder
* Connectivity: USB2.0, 3.5mm audio jack, Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR, Wi-Fi
* Supported audio formats: AMR-NB/WB, MP3, PCM / WAV, AAC, AAC +, eAAC +, WMA
* Supported video formats: MPEG-4, H.263, H.264, WMV
* GPS navigation
* Package Contents: Phone Motorola Sholes, battery, charger, USB cable, 8GB MicroSD memory card and other literature.

You’re asking yourself, “John your contract for verizon is up, why not jsut buy an iPhone?” There are a couple reasons for this.

1. I used to be a Cingular customer from 2002 to ’05. 3 Years of annoying amounts of dropped calls, dead zones, and poor call quality. I’m not a doctor or anyone important so a dropped call can be fixed by a quick call back. But, I pay good money for phone service and I that service delivered to me perfectly and uninterupted.
2. The iPhone was the hottest thing on the block for the past couple years. I love having devices when they are fresh and new releases. Having one now would be nice but I want a device that fixes all of the iphones problems.
3. Native Google voice support. I’m new to Google Voice and I don’t use it much but that’s because I have a phone that doesn’t support any google App! And once I heard AT&T/Apple denied the Google Voice App, It began to quickly sway my opinion of Apple/ the iPhone.

So how about some Pictures?

These Pictures were released on 9-30-2009 on Howard Forums.
And they make me pretty excited. Since the phone has not been officially announced and now we see that it is up and running. Running apps and looking a the App Store.

What excites me most about this phone? It runs android as it’s native OS. This is fantasitc. Developers developers developers! Finally i will have a phone that can be developed for openly. Finally I will have a phone that isn’t locked down by Verizon’s HORRIBLE operating system.

Android and me posted a letter they received stating the “Motorola xxx will be released exclusively to Verizon on 12/1/2009″ They also say “xxx shatters the standard mobile web experience” and “Equipped with a powerful processor, Flash and full HTML browser, xxx delivers webpages, 3d graphics, videos and more…”

I am very excited for this phone if you can’t tell. And, if everything works out the way it should, I will have it in my hand on launch day. See you at the verizon store, Dec. 1 @ 8 or 9Am.

*As of 10-1-2009 nothing has been officially confirmed by Verizon.

Show Review – Film Riot, a new type of show.

John — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 16:14:00 +0000

I work in the TV business and few months ago I had a mini internal freakout.

“The business is changing, TV is changing, entertainment is changing avertising is changing. I need to find another field of work.”

I’m right television and entertainment are changing. But, we still need to be entertained. So someone still needs to make content for whatever medium we’ll be enjoying content from.

Youtube propelled web video into a realm it was never really thought of before. Before 2006 in order to watch something on the web we had to stream/buffer a Quicktime or Windows media file. Youtube introduced Flashvideo which paved the way for HULU (the big TV networks’ lead competitor to Youtube)

Where am I going with this … Ahh yes, TV is changing, No we have creative people and groups making content for the web. We see companies like The Twit Network and Revision3.

One of my favorite shows to watch right now is Film Riot

Film Riot is informative and funny. It’s basically some dudes from Triune Films answering e-mails about how to do certain video/film techniques on the cheap. Usually accompanied by witty banter and hilarity.
Check out an episode, this is one of my favorites. How-to simulate a car crash, teleport … and nudity.

Funny right? What?! you didn’t watch it yet? Go ahead, I’ll wait…..

….
….
…
Done now? I don’t believe you, but we’ll move on.
What’s my point about this entire post? nothing!!!!
Just kidding, my point is that entertainment is changing but, as I said, people still need to create that content. And now the big networks aren’t the gatekeepers. Anyone can create and show it to the world. From the crap to the gold. So turn on your webcam, your Sony Handycam or come find me and let’s start creating!

Thank you for reading, see you next week!

New shows

John — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 02:25:00 +0000

I’ve heard that some people become sad during the winter months, some sort of seasonal depression due to a lack of sunlight or birds chirping or something. One of the cures is to wear a hat around that has a light bulb in the rim, I think that’s a funny cure. I don’t understand this affliction though, how can anyone be sad when there is new TV on the air? Someone is spending a lot of money with sole intention of getting my attention, which is hard to get and harder when speaking on retention and not to mention they want me to watch it live without the use of the Tivo under my television. (I’m so sorry for that, I should write this when I’m not tired)

I feel good about this years premiers, it seems like there are less stupid reality shows and more well scripted TV hitting me. (TV only hits me because it loves me) This year Glee has stood out as the show that my wife and I both like to watch. It fills a space in our hearts that was previously filled by the Pie Maker.

Glee: Making musicals ok for straight people too. This show brings show tunes and pop rock to you in equal parts, not to mention hot people in their late twenties pretending to be high school cheerleaders. That is how porn work too, just saying. I knew I would like this show when a high school boy used the memory of him accidently committing vehicular manslaughter so not to prematurely Glee when making out with girls. I probably watched that clip a thousand times. And you can’t beat women dressing in cheerleading outfits and dancing raunchy. I think this is considered family TV too, which makes me think your kids might be perverts.

So if you are depressed this winter bask in the warm glow of new television. There is enough good stuff out there to keep you from jumping in the shower with that light bulb hat on and ending it all. Keep an eye on the page and John and I will update it every Thursday and Tuesday night until we get distracted by something.

CTRL

John — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 00:27:00 +0000

CTRL is a web only show on the NBC website. Now I don’t know if you all have noticed, but they now put the TV on the interwebnetpostcom. I know, I was surprised too. CTRL is a short show or I guess really a long commercial, either way when you are done you have been entertained and want to drink some Nestea. (I hear it’s liquid awesomeness) Anyways the show is about a guy (Buster from Arrested Development) who has a real jerk for a boss (Van from Reba) and a crush on the office secretary (cute asian girl that has been in a lot of things, but you can never name one) and he spills some Nestea (the drink that goes in your belly) onto his keyboard. Most of the time if you spill things on your keyboard at work you just switch it with the guy’s next to you and go on with life, but in CTRL it gives his keyboard super powers and whatever command he prompts on the keyboard has real life consequences.

So I know it sounds stupid and maybe it is, but the cast does a great job and the story is nice. Its like a short play more than a TV show, the sets are minimal, the cast is small, and the plot is simple. It’s a great way to just sit back and waste a couple of minutes watching some funny people be funny. If you go into it looking for some quirky shorts I think you will come out on the other end more than happy, if you go into it looking for a new favorite TV show you may be a little disappointed. So if you are still waiting for next week when new TV starts up give it a try.

http://www.nbc.com/ctrl/

Grey’s Anatomy In Space, but not really.

John — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 23:44:00 +0000

I recently watched Defying Gravity, a new ABC show that is being described as Grey’s Anatomy in space. As I watched I realized that whoever thought up that comparison was either an idiot or had never seen Grey’s Anatomy. (that sounds dirty) This person apparently doesn’t have the ability to differentiate ideas and concepts. He goes around comparing apples and oranges, he tells people things like “up is like down, but in Australia”, and once he acquired third degree burns after attempting to plug his own dick into a wall socket after mistaking it for an extension cord. The latter being extremely upsetting because it wasn’t really that long a ding dong, but in an effort to abide by journalistic integrity I do feel the need to report (for the ladies) it was wider than normal.

Now that I have the requisite dick joke out of the way, it was really solid science fiction, that was light on the nerd factor. The pilot introduces great characters with well thought out back stories and interesting motives. This is a rare thing on television and even more rare in science fiction. The genre gives vast freedoms to story and plot, but characters usually come from the bargain bin. Defying Gravity is really a solid show, but if you are looking for quality sci fi I’m afraid you better look fast slumping ratings may send this show to join Firefly and Virtuality.

The cast is composed of the guy from early edition that got the news paper early and the really hot blond chick from a Nickelodeon soap opera that came on when I was a kid called “Fifteen”. At the time I was “Thirteen” and really liked “Fifteen” mainly because of her, “twelve” years later I finally got to see her in her undies and it took me back. I immediately felt confused about my pants getting tighter and had a craving for Power Ranger gummy snacks. (two wiener jokes, Good Blog!)

So here’s the short of it: It’s not Grey’s Anatomy in space, it’s more Lost in space, but not the Danger Will Robinson kind, , more like the Freckles and The Other Lost…in space. The characters are solid and the nerd factor is low, considering it takes place on a spaceship. The stories are slow paced, but they aren’t used up and gimmicky. If you are looking for new episodes in the summer here is your show. Give it try, you might like it. I give it a solid 7 out 10 rings around your anus. (Not even subtle with that last one)

My First Review

John — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 04:35:00 +0000

The time honored review. For thousands of years it has allowed unqualified, unintelligent men and women the ability to criticize things they have no business even thinking about. So with that in mind I shall review something so great that no person has ever dared review it…TELEVISION. Not one specific show, not a certain brand, make, or model. I won’t compare LCD to plasma, flat to round, big to small. No, this is bigger than any of that. I review TELEVISION the medium. Hold on to your keyboard, you’re not going to like everything you read.

Television raised me, it taught me my ABCs, how to count, how to act socially, and even how to love. (In thirty minute chunks and I do my best work after eight) So know, that as I write this it comes out of a place of love, there is no hatred in this post. With that said we’ll start with the rating…bum, bum,bum,bum…bum…bum. I give it a 4 out 10 fuzzy channels. I know its low, really low. A 4 is below 5 and just barely above 3. That is a vast improvement from where it started though and I can only hope that it will continue to get better. And it’s not all TV’s fault, we all need to take a step back and look at what we’ve done, lest we do it again.

TV is democracy at its most raw. If a show doesn’t get viewers, it’s quickly cancelled never to be seen or heard from again. This makes TV a perfect reflection of us and lately it’s looking less like the prom queen and more like your prom date. (she was a four you know it) While I don’t expect Television to be pristine and clean, I do expect it to be dignified or at least not dropping a baby in the dumpster behind the gym before the first dance. And that brings us to our first problem.

I DIDN’T KNOW I WAS PREGNANT: What the fuck, WTF, What the fuck? This is a real show, it is made by dozens of dedicated professionals, thousands upon thousands of dollars are put into each episode, its shot through fucking space before it reaches your house, it is no small effort, people are making this on purpose. Let me sum up the show for you with this simple equation: Fat + Stupid = baby in a toilet. That is pretty much every episode. I won’t comment on the situation anymore than that. What bothers me is that this is presented to you for your entertainment and even more disturbing its on Discovery Health. This would be a channel that pretends to want to educate you. Stop watching this shit, it’s bad for you. Discovery Health should make a show about shit like this making you dumber. Whoever came up with this show should be killed, this brings us to our next problem.

PEOPLE SHOULDN’T DIE FOR US TO MAKE TV: Never should the premise of a show require that someone die. It doesn’t matter that its cheap to make because our legal system makes court hearings public property. I doubt when laws were made regarding the open and translucent legal system, that lawmakers had true crime TV in mind. A translucent legal system is required for a free nation to exist, people must be able to make sure that court proceedings are on the up and up, but people do not need a thirty minute murder mystery based on someone’s dead son or daughter. And more over the court doesn’t need to happily hand over evidence, crime scene photos, and tapes. This is bad TV, I should know I have made hours of it. (yeah yeah I know it’s hypocritical of me, but leaving out would be too, so shut up) Lets all make a deal right now, if someone you know dies don’t go on TV and fucking talk about it to anyone other than a legitimate news source and only if its legitimate news…

NEWS: On any given day the world generates roughly two hours of useful news. This means that 22 hours of 24 hour news channels are filler or the same two hours 12 times. Head Line News at least doesn’t try to hide it. Here is how you know when there is too much news on TV, networks come up with things like “The beer Summit”, “Benifer”, and you know more about John and Kate’s marriage than your own. We just need to back up off this shit a little bit. Just a little, I’m not saying all you need is a newspaper, I would never encourage reading. (other than this blog) I am getting too tired for a clever segue at this point and I doubt anyone is still reading…

IT IS GETTING BETTER THOUGH: As bad as TV is now it used to be a -4. Never let an older person sit down and tell you that “Two and a half men is too dirty” or that “lost has too much sex”. Back when TV first started and “The greatest generation” was watching and minorities weren’t allowed on it unless to serve a white person. Will and Grace may have had some trashy humor, but at least it wasn’t you 1970s gay joke that required short shorts, and a poodle. You may get a little upset over some of Sponge Bob Squar Pants fart jokes, but at least he won’t introduce children to anyone name Hooey Fooey or some other terrible stereotype.

And that my friends is all the bad I will ever speak of Television. I will only draw your attention to the good from here on out. There are too many other people happy to bash someone’s hard work. Instead I will endeavor to sit through hours and hours of crap to hopefully find you the diamonds in the turds. I will only review the good and never any shows that break my rules or Television laid down for you in great length above.

Billy

Web Game Review – Red Remover

John — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 19:47:00 +0000

Red Remover

Another Cool mindless web game … or is it?!
This is a cool little puzzle game that has 1 rule. That rule is to get all the red blocks off the screen. You can click them to make them disappear or make them fall off the screen. That’s the only rule!
Oh wait, you have light-red and dark-red objects. So you click on the light-red objects to get them off the screen but you have to make the dark-red object fall off the screen.

Crap, you need to save the green objects too, and the blue ones can be saved or taken off the screen. And then! you have to factor in 4 different directions of gravity! Lets check out some gameplay footage …

So this is a pretty fun and time killer. You can play through each stage once, then again to make par, then again on bonus mode. Once you accomplish all of that, 5 bonus stages are unlocked for a total of 45 stages.

Some of the puzzle elements are pretty tough, especially when trying to complete the stage at par. I think the 39th level was toughest for me. Timing was so important. If you have any questions about solving a stage, shoot me an e-mail or write a comment and i’ll help out if i can.

There is also an Edit mode where you can make your own levels, looks pretty cool and easy to do but I haven’t really played with that feature.

Should you play it? Yes

Total play time: 3hrs (2 days on and off play time for me)

My rating: 8 out of 10 glasses of white wine.
You can play it here at http://www.silvergames.com/game/red-remover/

Thanks for reading. Keep checking back for more info from Jacksboro.

Funny People – A Movie Review – No spoilers

John — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 03:05:00 +0000

All reviews contain my opinions based on my experiences.
Please play the game, watch the movie, or read the book to decide if you like, dislike, disagree or agree with this review.

Funny people,
Written, Produced, Directed by: Non other than , Judd Apatow. The guy that created the blockbuster “Super Bad” which was fantastic! ($121.4M Box office Gross, not to mention the DVD Sales!)

This is Judd Apatow’s second movie of the summer. It’s made $22.7M in its first weekend. The First was “Year one” with $19.6M in it’s first weekend and $41.8M Total gross (Data from IMDB 8.3.2009) Year one was a mediocre flick that I would rather not get into because it wasn’t good. At all! It felt like they shot alot of Michael Cera and Jack Black improv, then in the edit room they said “ok what do we have” and slapped a bunch of shit together.

Let me get back to the point of this post. Funny people.

Was it funny?
Yes
Was it sad?
Not really
Was it long?
Yes!
Rental or theater?
Theater if you have the time and money. Might be a better rental.

Funny people is a story about a famous comedian named George Simmons(Adam Sandler), his experience with a rare disease and his glimpse at death. Everyone knows and loves George, it’s pretty cool what they did with the movie. They used a ton of old video and photos from Sandler’s early years and used it as “George reflecting on his younger years”.
The film was steadily funny. I often chuckled really hard at Jonah Hill or Jason Schwartzman’s characters.
There were a crap load of cameos in this movie. It was like an episode of entourage! We had James Taylor, Andy Dick, Paul Reiser, Norm MacDonald, Dave Attell, Sarah Silverman, Eminem, Ray Romano and a couple others that I can’t think of.

This isn’t a very “Apatow” movie with the tons of improv. It’s not really a Sandler movie with the loud crude humor. Seth Rogen is a funny guy and the movie has a decent story. The Movie was funny and sweet BUT …. at 2 hr. 16 min. it was was to fuckin’ long. I found myself looking at my watch 4 or 5 times and questioning “is this movie over yet”.
If they would trim 3o minutes of crap off this movie, then it would have had a better score from me.
[drumroll] Final Score [drumroll]

3.5 out of 5 pigs in a blanket

Pros:
Good date movie
2.25 hrs means you get your $9 worth
Neat Story
Cool use of Adam Sandler archives and history

Cons:
Too long!
Should have been funnier
Still angry about Judd Apatow’s “Year One”

Come back often to read all of our news and reviews!
Thanks For reading!

An Ode to the Freakout – Tribute to Taylor McKinney

John — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 01:33:00 +0000

I was looking for “freak out” videos, Taylor posted this video and told me to check it out. I told him I didn’t have time to watch it and he needs to “rhyme it to me” … here is the rhyme.

There was this young lad who liked to play WoW,
Until his mom decides, that’s enough for now.

She cancels his account and sends him to his room,
where his thoughts are filled with hate and doom.

With the help of his brother and a hidden camcorder,
we are able to watch this emaciated lad’s life fall into disorder.

He huffs and he puffs and he rants and he rages,
that he will no longer be able to grind for ages.

He writhes and twists and falls to the floor,
his convulsive screeches are probably heard next door.

He battles his inner demons for over a minute,
until he remembers his butt – and decides to put something in it.

This is where the story takes a grisly turn my friend.
He actually tries to shove a TV remote into his rear end.

He tries and fails and starts to rue,
the day he told his mom he had reached level 52.

He storms into his closet and exits 2 seconds later,
Nick H. will probably comment on this rhyme because he’s kind of a hater.

Unfortunately for him, he emerged with a shoe,
and what exactly was he going to do?

He sobbed and yelled as he took blow after blow to the head, wishing that he would soon be dead.

The heavy blows began to take their toll,
as this poor child lamented in his tortured soul.

As the fit cooled, he began to hyperventilate and threw open his door.
Due to line of sight, this is a freak out, that we would see no more.

-Taylor McKinney, 2009
Taylor’s Facebook