It turns into a lag fest. You may think I benefit as host, but no. I’m lagging too.

People time out and others cannot connect. Games do not have enough players.

Despite these problems, MW2 continues to choose me as host.

Why?

Perhaps there should be a “you suck at hosting” list or even an opt out of hosting option. But Big Brother IW is rolling in $$$ so I doubt anything will change.

CSS3 introduces the rgb and rgba background properties. Simply put, instead of hexes, colors can be determined by their rgb values.

This is background:rgb(0,0,0); , which is black.

That’s nothing special. rgba, however, combines background color and alpha value, or opacity.

This is background:rbga(0,0,0,.6); , which is black and 60% opacity.

Please note that rgba only specify a specific element, whereas opacity property define an element and its children. The latest Firefox and Webkit browsers support this, IE8 and below… not so much. It only supports rgb.

CSS Tricks has a whole list of browser support. This is a handy property that replaces the 1px translucent background image.

Her last album was 55 minutes long and contained 5 songs. 5! And her soon to be released album is a 3 disc 124 minute epic! So Newsom plays the harp, and she has a slightly squeaky voice, and she’s probably best known as Andy Samberg’s girlfriend, count this as one of my guilty pleasures.

Bitch, that one care package is mine! I killed 4 mf’ers in row, not you! Now we’re both sniper bait. And why the hell would you steal an ammo package? Maybe I want to set a trap for the enemy, not you, my teammate!

I’m dead and a hijacking is imminent… go ahead and take it. Else, earn your own.

Emergency Airdrops, those are traps. Here’s the deal, I get the good shit. You can have rest once the coast is clear. Yes clear, since the enemy will close in like flies on shit. I want to ambush, but that depends on you not being a greedy SOB.

Follow these guidelines and you can be sure I don’t realize you’re an asshole.

This is Ellie Goulding, the UK’s latest electro-pop sensation. I like her songs thus far, but I can’t help but notice how she is the antithesis of the modern popstar. Hoodies on stage? Banging drums? The most awkward choreography ever (not just live, but on her MV’s too)? She’s not bad looking (like a pre-op Lady Gaga), but she seems about as graceful as Meg Griffin. I doubt she can pull off being a popstar. This, on the other hand, seems like more her element:

Fortunately, with the right production she could be a more mainstream version of Bjork, I look forward to her new album.

Bonus: Mind blown

Put up new main website and tweak blog. I’ve pretty much put off being a web designer for now (until my fear of web design clients disappear), so bye bye portfolio site and hello basic introduction site. Also, let’s face it, some of the feature on this site is not used (flickr stream, tumblr blog, etc.), so time to scale back on stuff. While I’m at it, re-tweak the design to something more coherent.

Finish this lecture. Building Dynamic Websites. I’m a self-taught web developer and I already know most of the stuff in the lecture. While commendable, it leaves pretty significant gaps of knowledge that would have been filled in an academic environment. Thanks to Academic Earth, I can attend a Harvard lecture without paying for it or padding my college application. In general, keep up with my education.

Start running. Just because I’m tired of feeling like a slob everyday. This is the simplest way to exercise with some measurable metric of achievement. My goal this year is to able to do x-country distances.

Upgrade my stuff. I have a lot of crap I want, and I need the money to buy it. Shortlist includes computer part upgrades, an e-reader, a new car, a fedora, new shoes. Ultimately, I can have enough income flow to GTFO from home and live on my own.

Blog about all of this (and blog in general) Write more, write better, just keep writing. This is the only thing keeping me sane in this time. Can’t put it off anymore.

Notice gaming is not on this list. I’ve been doing plenty of that already. I could probably do less of that.

For some people, the ruling in Citizen United vs. FEC means the beginning of corporate domination of politics. The beginning? Was corporate money in politics not an issue at one point?

One of the biggest mistake many people and our elected legislators make is believe that their intentions matter. Like the current heathcare reform, the intention is to cover every American’s health insurance, even though it won’t and it explicitly bars illegal immigrants access. It’s the thought that counts.

Same deal with Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act. The intent is to cap the amount an individual or corporation can contribute to a political candidate and party organizations and prevent corporations and other organizations from “electioneering”. Awesome. That’s exactly what will happen because I believe.

Thanks to BCRA, the money spent on presidential campaigns went from in 2000 $343 million to in 2008… $1.32… billion. Pat yourself on the back McCain & Feingold.

Waste of money in my opinion, as each additional vote became exponentially more expensive as a result. Still, as a libertarian, even intentions contrasting outcome does not bother me. For me, process matters.

What process deems a corporation like ExxonMobil to have less right to free than a corporation like the New York Times? But NYTimes is the press and they have freedom of the press. Clever, so what process determines that NYTimes is the press and ExxonMobil not the press? Whereas the NYTimes editorial board condemned the ruling on Citizens United, shouldn’t ExxonMobil have the right broadcast how they feel about Citizens United? What if they published a book on their position, is that a punishable offense? Rights matter, and they apply to all persons in America, including AIG executives and Pharmaceutical Reps, Teachers Union members, Non-profit founders… etc.

No, corporations are not persons despite legal president to the contrary, but its owners and operators are. So do New York Times journalists have the right to speech while ExxonMobile executives do not?

I believe there is none, which is why the Supreme Court ruled Citizens United accordingly.

As for the outcome of this ruling? If the passage of BCRA was any indication, nothing that would change anything. I hope, rather than spend large amounts of money secretly, this would allow more transparency in the process. And I doubt corporations can convince Americans to vote for a certain Senator as well as getting your fat ass to McDonalds. Others see corporate takeover of democracy, I see a massive waste of money that will make corporations look like Martha Coakley in Yankees garb.

In short, a victory for free speech,

FOX, give him money and The Simpsons

I’ve already covered how much I despised the little Fidel Castros running hosted server that caused me to almost quit the game. Now my ire is raised towards Infinity Ward’s matchmaking system.

How did I end up in a dozen laggy games in a row?

First of all, it’s about as transparent as North Korea. What determines who hosted the game? No idea, but they sure suck at it. How do I report cheaters? Let IW take of it, while I see the same cheaters in games over and over again. Patches? That may be happening, but there’s no way to see the changes.

Tens of thousands of gamers depend on a single entity to make sure games run smoothly. Might as well call it healthcare reform.

I think I prefer return to the thousands of little fiefdoms that are hosted servers. They can’t be bad? I mean mostly bad, but not all bad right?