Monthly Archives: April 2008

Controversy over new Pidgin feature

By probabilityZero | April 30, 2008

Newer versions of Pidgin have the text input area resize to fit the text typed in, similar to Google Talk. This made a bunch of people all pissy, and now they want to fork Pidgin. The new project, funpidgin, intends to be just like Pidgin, only with a development team that cares about the users [...]

Posted in Opinion, Tech and games | Tagged , | Leave a comment

“Would you kindly?” An analysis of free will in Bioshock

By probabilityZero | April 27, 2008

I’ve been putting this off for too long, so I finally sat down to write an analysis of Bioshock. I’ll focus on the concept of “free will” and how it is explored in the game. This will definitely contain spoilers, so don’t read on if you haven’t played the game.

Posted in Tech and games | Tagged | 5 Comments

Best things to do with a hacked PSP

By probabilityZero | April 26, 2008

I was lucky enough to buy a PSP back when they were ridiculously easy to downgrade and hack, though I hear it’s still possible even with newer firmware versions. I’ve helped a few friends downgrade and install after-market firmware, and it’s pretty safe and definitely worth the effort.
I thought I’d compile a list of some [...]

Posted in Tech and games | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Why I hope Clinton doesn’t win the primary

By probabilityZero | April 25, 2008

It’s no secret that I’m an Obama supporter. I’ll support Clinton if she’s the candidate, but I dearly hope she isn’t. I’m not a big fan of Hilary Clinton for several reasons:

Clinton received significant amounts of money from the health care industry.
Clinton has spoken out against violent video games.
Clinton suggested using military force against Iran.
Clinton [...]

Posted in Current events, Opinion | Tagged , | 6 Comments

I’m sticking with Ubuntu Gutsy for a while

By probabilityZero | April 24, 2008

The new version of Ubuntu came out, but I’m going to wait a while before upgrading. Right now, Ubuntu is really stable for me, and I don’t want to screw things up too much. There are a few things worrying me about the new release, like the beta version of Firefox and the overall awfulness [...]

Posted in Tech and games | 2 Comments

Analysis of the Longest Journey and Dreamfall

By probabilityZero | April 20, 2008

Earlier I wrote a post discussing whether video games can be art or not. Now, I’m convinced they can.
Just this weekend, I finished playing The Longest Journey and it’s sequel Dreamfall. They’re both essentially point-and-click adventure games (my current favorite genre of video games), but Dreamfall has some lame combat/stealth segments tacked on to appease [...]

Posted in Tech and games | Tagged | 4 Comments

Installing Nexuiz on Ubuntu Gutsy 64-bit

By probabilityZero | April 10, 2008

I’ve been having a lot of fun playing Nexuiz recently. I have played previous versions, but the newest one looks amazing. Full HDR effects, lots of detail everywhere. If you have a good graphics card, I’d highly recommend you try it out.
Anyway, installation is fairly simple. Nexuiz is in the Ubuntu repositories, but I recommend [...]

Posted in Tech and games | Tagged , | 2 Comments

State legislator rants about atheism during committee hearing

By probabilityZero | April 9, 2008

Rep. Monique Davis (D-Chicago) interrupted atheist activist Rob Sherman during his testimony Wednesday afternoon before the House State Government Administration Committee in Springfield and told him, “What you have to spew and spread is extremely dangerous . . . it’s dangerous for our children to even know that your philosophy exists!”
Yup, this actually happened. This [...]

Posted in Atheism, F***ed up | Tagged | 3 Comments

Two explanations for the global warming controversy

By probabilityZero | April 7, 2008

Despite the fact that I’m taking AP Environmental Science, I’m really not qualified to discuss the details of the greenhouse effect and global warming. I do know that they are issues with legitimate scientific uncertainty, but also that the general scientific consensus is that they are both happening. So, I chose to analyze the issue [...]

Posted in Current events, Opinion | Tagged | 1 Comment

Medicine

By probabilityZero | April 6, 2008
Posted in Other | 1 Comment

I’m going to Sacramento State next year

By probabilityZero | April 5, 2008

I’ve decided. I got accepted to a few nice UCs, but I knew I wanted to live at home for the next year or so. So, my choice was basically between Sac State and a local community college. After careful deliberation, I made my decision. Yay! Next, I need to see if I can get [...]

Posted in Other | Tagged | 1 Comment