This guy is hilarious

It's fucking cold!

After college I spent six months in Korea re-learning the language. It was a period of partying, drinking some soju, partying some more and then drinking some more soju. Student life is fantastic in Korea (if you're not in High School) and I loved that place. Not only it was Motherland but I had some characteristics that were very attractive to several native girls. Ooo lah lah.

One night I met two of these native females for dinner and the schedule was as usual. We met at the New York Bakery in Kangnam subway station and we'd then decide where to go, what to eat and what to do next. It was cold like crazy, something in the neighborhood of -20 C (which is -4 F) and it was windy.

After the restaurant was settled we decided to walk there instead of taking a cab, and since it was cold, both girls got closer and held my arms very tight. So there was I, walking in the crowded night of Seoul, with two cute girls cuddled tight in my arms. It would have been great, but the cold didn't let me think of anything else. It was like the wind was penetrating through the seams of my coat and hitting me hard with its gelid hands!

I never felt so cold in my life.

Until now.

It's been so cold in the Seattle area (no, not -4 F) and snowing so much (what was it, 20 inches in the last week?) that my very soul is frozen.

Help!

Future World IV - My Pet Peeves

Follow this link for part I on this series.
Follow this link for part II on this series.
Follow this link for part III on this series.

Since the three first installments of this series were so serious, I'll try to make this last one a lot lighter. This is gonna be a list of the stuff and people I hate in the Internet.

And enjoy some music while you read. This is Marisa Monte, the best Brazilian singer ever, singing "Amor I Love You" (Love, I love you). If you want to forward, she starts singing at 0:45.



(1) Acronyms
I guess everybody knows the basic. LOL means Laughing Out Loud, BRB means Be Right Back and ROFLMAO means Rolling On the Floor Laughing My Ass Off. But don't you hate when people use acronyms that are too obscure to make sense at the first sight? I understand acronyms should be used to save time, but whose time are they saving? Not mine, since I have to research to find out what these fuckers are trying to say. Who the fuck knows that NALOPKT means Not A Lot Of People Know That and RTFM means Read The Fucking Manual (just noticed that the answer could be NALOPKT)? It's FUBAR.

(2) Hysteric Hyenas
You know who they are. They write you an email with 100 words and 50 are LOL. What's so funny that these people are constantly laughing out loud while they're typing something in the Internet? I'd like some of what they're smoking. I could do with some laughing.

(3) Wannabe Don Juans
These guys are always looking for girls in chat rooms and message boards. They're always sending you private messages trying to determine your gender. And as soon as they realize you're a guy they lose interest in you completely (thanks God).

(4) Scams
There are several types of scams but some of them are classic. Like when the Crown Prince of Nigeria writes an email asking you to transfer 10 thousand dollars to his account so he can free his father, King Ngorosi, who's in prison after a military coup. Of course, after his Majesty is free he will send you 10 million dollars.

(5) Chain mail
You probably get 4 or 5 of these everyday, telling you that life is beautiful, everybody loves you and that if you forward this email to 500 people something wonderful will happen to you. Fail to do that though, and your dick will fall off.

(6) Spam
I'm Asian and, despite the stereotype, I'm perfectly happy with the size of my dick. What's more important, my wife is happy too. And for your information, all the girls who have had the pleasure of handling my dick were very happy and satisfied. So, please stop sending me all these emails with information on how to increase my dick by 2 inches! Who wants to double the size of their cock anyway (kidding!!!!!)?

(7) Statistics
93.5% of the statistics in the Internet are invented.

(8) People who upload fake movie torrents
Have you guys ever downloaded a copy of "Iron Man", sat in front of the computer with your wife and then clicked on the movie just to see a guy sucking another guy's cock? No? Yeah, me neither. But it must be embarrassing.

(9) Pop-ups
God, I used to hate these. Now, most decent browsers have pop-up blockers but there are still a couple of them that make through the filter. Usually the ones that actually pop up are those with a wide open pussy when you're in the office and there's a girl reading over your shoulder.

(10) Mediocre people
Nowadays, all idiots with mediocre IQs want to write a blog and show how funny and smart they can be. They think people care what they have to say and laugh at their stupid jokes. Well, reality check for you people. Nobody reads, nobody cares and nobody laughs. Only people with superior IQs (like me) should write blogs.

Well, there are more stuff that I hate in the Internet, but I also hate writing long posts and probably by now the song is over. I may continue the list later, let's see (I also hate when I can't find a good ending for a post).

You know what I'm sayin'?

This is pretty old but it's still funny to hear Asian guys talk like that.



And just so you know, I don't know what you sayin' because you ain't saying shit, mathafacka!

Music has no color and no race

Black people, please be smart and understand I mean no harm when I use the word "niggas".

Black niggas


Korean niggas


Mexican niggas


Brazilian niggas


Iranian niggas

First snow in Bellevue, WA

At 10:00 PM of Friday, December 12th, it's snowing for the first time this winter. It's beautiful but I hope it doesn't stick.

Future World III - Big Brother

Follow this link for part I on this series.
Follow this link for part II on this series.

I was amazed by my own brilliance. The solution seemed so obvious and functional. Of course it would be difficult to implement and lots of scenarios would have to be thought over and over. Creating a system to identify everybody in the Internet is a Herculean job, worthy of big company (Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and others at the same level) efforts.

There was also potential to earn some money with it. Placement of ads in the website, a fee to obtain the IIN (Internet Identification Number), synchronization of data through the IIN and the works. This potential made my plan even more brilliant and I was enthused about it. I had to share it with people. I had to have external feedback. Not that I would pitch the idea to anybody and I don't even know if this is the first time someone thinks of it. I just wanted to know what other people thought about it.

So I mentioned it to a friend who's also been a netizen for a long time and happens to work in a field closely related to it (he runs an amazingly popular website and makes tons of money). He listened to my idea with his usual attention and he also seemed amazed. He had a look of astonishment in his face and I thought that, after overcoming the brilliance of my idea, he would embrace me and say something like "Let's make this happen and make money together!"

Instead, what I got was his disappointed face and the words "You're getting more and more conservative with age."

I confronted him with my examples of suicides (described on part I), how children were using the Internet and that we should make it a safer place. He argued that although dangerous, since the Internet is a place like anywhere else, the weak will always suffer and the strong will always prevail. Those children, in his opinion, would have failed anyway. Furthermore, he said people should have the right to anonymity, otherwise we would have this Big Brother controlling what everybody does.

Funny thing, I concluded. I thought I was being innovative and promoting a safer Internet, but my friend thought I was just being conservative and maybe advocating a state of absolute control in the virtual world. A dictatorship, shall we say.

I understand his arguments and they're not completely lacking in merit. After all, the real world provides us with opportunities for anonymity. I can send a letter and not write down my name and address. I can also write stuff in somebody's walls. I can make prank calls. I can place an anonymous ad on a newspaper. I can drop a letter in somebody's front lawn.

Probably there are lots of other things I could do and still stay anonymous, but the point here is that there's a lot of work involved in the process and there's always the chance of getting caught in the act (in at least one of the cases I mentioned, I can go to jail if I get caught). In the real world it's not easy to be anonymous, not mentioning the fact that people who want to stay anonymous are probably involved in suspicious affairs, like crime.

My friend and I didn't have much time to talk on that day so what he probably didn't get (and I didn't have the smarts to explain) is that there's a difference between privacy and anonymity. I'm all for privacy. If there's somebody smoking weed or jerking off to a picture of Hyori Lee in the privacy of their homes, I have nothing to do with it.


(By the way, Hyori is looking damn good in that picture. I may have to exercise my privacy later.)

So in the Internet, I'm also all for privacy. As far as I'm concerned, if you're there downloading all the porn that you can take or reading the most offensive material in the world, I have nothing to do with it (as long as it doesn't involve pigs and/or eels). But if you're there writing offensive posts or hate mail maybe somebody should know who you are just in case you cause some serious damage.

While privacy is good and should be respected, anonymity can be very dangerous. And in the Internet, doing things anonymously doesn't require work like in real life. On the contrary, in the Internet, anonymity is facilitated and even encouraged.

Future World II - The Solution

Follow this link for part I on this series.

To my knowledge, Korean netizens top the list when it comes to being annoying and rude. Excessive pride and a collective chip on the shoulders will never produce civilized individuals in an environment of encouraged anonymity. To add insult to injury, South Korea is one of the most wired countries in the world, and the mob mentality only increases the rudeness of these trolls. And, since the rest of the world is not that much better than the Koreans, the stage is set for pages and pages of stupidity.

Sports message boards seem to be an area of special interest to these idiots. And whenever Korea is slightly involved there's always the presences of the stupid Korean troll and the even more stupid antagonizers they seem to attract so easily. A good example would be the public message boards for the 2002 World Cup. It's been a long time ago but I remember that the conspiracy theory (Korea's progress in the competition was facilitated by bribes and not by their own football prowess) generated several heated online arguments. More often than not, these discussions became race oriented and people were talking more about the size of their dicks than football.

Another good example are the Major League Baseball message boards of whatever team has a Korean player. In the years when Chan Ho Park was performing well in Los Angeles, half of the posts in the Dodgers message boards were about him and most of them didn't discuss any baseball but were merely praising the Korean pitcher's talent (back then he was good), often in broken English.

The same thing happened when Chan Ho Park signed with Texas for an absurd amount of money. The Rangers message boards were infested with Koreans and their usual posts about Park and Korean Pride. By this time though, he wasn't performing well at all (that was probably one of the worst free agent contracts ever) and this attitude by Korean trolls of course attracted the worst reactions from people and, soon enough, nasty comments involving nationalities and races were more predominant than baseball discussions.

These insults would never take place in the real world or if the authors had to identify themselves. Most of the insulting comments are made by cowards anyway and cowards are not known to do anything that may harm them physically (like risking their faces to the violent encounter with an incoming fist).

So, what if everybody in the Internet had to identify themselves?

No, I'm not saying that you should supply your SSN, address, age, gender and cock size whenever you want to access porn or read the news in the Internet. No identification needed on downloads, only uploads. If you want to access content, you can do it anonymously, but if you want to create content you have to identify yourself.

In my solution, everybody would get an IIN (Internet Identification Number) and this would be linked to whatever governmental agency it is that keeps information from people in any given country. This number would not be available for everybody but then again, the authorities would have an easy way to track people if any virtual crime happened in the Internet.

The IIN would be necessary in any event where the netizen wants to contribute something to the Internet. Any website like MySpace, Facebook, Blogger and Orkut would require one. Anytime you wanted to post a comment on a blog you would need one. Anytime you wanted to create an user on a message board you would need one. Anytime you wanted to create an email address you would need one.

I believe that with this IIN in mind, assholes around the world would have to think twice before contributing something harmful or stupid. Although a lot less fun, the Internet be a lot safer place for everybody.

Christmas lights and other nuisances

Yesterday I finally caught a break from the rain (it's not a myth, it rains 9 months a year in the Seattle area!) and managed to install the Christmas lights in our house. I'd like to thank whoever created this tradition of stapling wired lights outside your house during the winter. My frozen hands would like to thank your ass for that.

Anyway, after going through the motions and spending half an hour on top of the roof wondering if I would be increasing the statistics of males who get hurt performing this annual obligation, I declared my part was done and was prepared to connect the electricity. There would be no problems like in Christmases past because my experience made me test all segments of the icicle lights beforehand and throw away the defective ones. So I called my daughter and my wife and connected the lights.


Not one but three segments were defective and had parts on it where the bulbs didn't light up! How can this happen? Why did these lights fail when they were tested and worked perfectly just 15 minutes before? Why is a man supposed to risk his neck going up the roof twice to perform one job? And why do they send us spare bulbs if it's nearly impossible to remove the defective one without breaking the socket? And why, after you successfully replaced a defective bulb, the part that wasn't lighting on still doesn't light on?

I was so pissed off I started yelling in the middle of the afternoon. "Fuck these Chinese people and their fucked up products!". This wasn't cool for two reasons. First, I don't know if the lights were made in China (it was probably Malaysia or Vietnam, but who can tell the difference between gooks?) and second, there are lots of Chinese people in our neighborhood. But, being Asian myself, I say stuff like that without fear of physical repercussions. Plus, if things get hot, I can just go ahead and pretend I'm Chinese. People may find it hard to believe due to the obvious differences between Chinese and Korean (Koreans are way better looking), but I only have to practice my morning "Ni-hao" and that will be alright.

Anyway, at that point I was so pissed with the Chinese (hey, at least they're not Filipino, right?) that I decided we needed Japanese food. I always thought the Japanese to be the mildest of the Asians and maybe their flavorless food would help calm down my anti-Asian disposition. Those chinks delivered. The food was fantastic, although one of the courses wasn't all that Japanese.


I was feeling much better after dinner when my wife informed me it was time for our one year old tradition of building the gingerbread house. She had gotten one of those kits from Toys 'r' Us and we were ready to replicate the picture in the box!


Needless to say, the house didn't turn out like the one above. The icing provided in the kit is too hard so it's difficult to spread, making decorating the house like the picture virtually impossible. At the end of it, my daughter looked like a snowman, so much icing she had over herself and if I could absorb sugar through the skin I'd have gained 5 pounds.

Looking back, it was a fun day altogether and, jokes with my fellow Asians aside, we learned some valuable lessons. First, don't ever use icicle lights to decorate your house. Those things have a failure rate that's too high no matter where they were produced. Second, make your own icing when decorating the gingerbread house. Third, any time spent doing Christmas'y things with your family is fun.

And, to end this on an even more Christmas'y note, my daughter created a new song while we were working on the gingerbread house, sung to the rhythm and melody of "Jingle Bells": Gingerbread, gingerbread, ginger all the way! O what fun it is to build a gingerbread today, hey!

Creative, isn't she?

She got it from her daddy.

Future World I - The Situation

I've been an active netizen for several years now and I consider myself lucky to have witnessed the dawn of this amazing new world, the Internet. What for a while was just a way for people in academic fields to communicate with each other has gradually become what it is now: a virtual place where anybody has immediate access to billions of people and more information than a human being can consume in his or her lifespan.

In theory, it's beautiful. I never felt so connected before (even when I was working with Donnie Brasco back in New York). As an intelligent and well educated man (this blog will never be accused of false pretenses of modesty), I'm naturally curious about everything and different subjects catch my attention each day. Then, having access to the Internet is a bless because with a few clicks of the mouse and some help from search engines like Yahoo or Google, I can find all the information I want in close to no time. I don't even remember how my life was before the Internet. And I don't wanna remember.

But, at the same time it connects people and provides access to all sorts of information, the Internet can also be disturbing and harmful to those who are not prepared for it. Among several others, three cases come to my mind, the suicides of Megan Meier, Ryan Patrick Halligan and Abraham K. Biggs.

Megan and Ryan were 13 year old kids who committed suicide due to cyber-bullying (by the way, the girl was tormented by an adult: a fictional boy created by one of her friend's mother!) and Abraham was a 19 year old student whose broadcasted suicide was followed by several idiots who cheered him on while he was dying (those who want more details should follow the links).

In the two first suicides, the Internet was used as means to bully and arguably ended up causing the deaths of those two kids. In the case of Biggs, the Internet allowed people to watch his death and the audience, instead of trying to prevent it, reportedly dared him to do it. The common factor here is the Internet. I can imagine the pain and desperation of the parents and if they ever claim the Internet caused the death of their beloved children I will understand completely.

One of the main characteristics of the Internet is the anonymity it allows its users most of the time. And sometimes it translates into unaccountability. Of course, if you don't have to identify yourself it's easy to be whoever you want, it's easy to hold whatever opinion you want and it's even easier to say whatever the fuck you want to whoever you want without the fear of any appropriate retribution. That's why we see a lot more fights in message boards or instant messaging servers than we'd see in normal life. That's why we see more insulting and, in general, a more daring attitude. And, it also helps assholes to externalize feelings that they'd be penalized for if done in other situations.

For instance, I have a friend who's a tech blogger (check his channel on YouTube!) and he is black (checked with him and he doesn't like that "African-American" bullshit). One of these days he received this comment to one of his videos on YouTube (for those who don't want to click the link, they called him the N word and made some comments about his ethnicity). I doubt that the cocksucking cuntmuscle who wrote that would have had the guts to say it to my buddy face to face (he runs 5 miles a day and lifts weights, I wouldn't wanna fight him). This asshole is probably a normal citizen who happened to enjoy the anonymity of the Internet to express something that would be severely reciprocated in real life.

This anonymity also makes people feel safe and secure and this sense of security makes netizens more open and they usually reveal more about themselves. This may lead to good things. Shy people can find a door to express themselves and there's a surprisingly high number of cases of people who fall in love through the Internet. Sometimes though, this situation makes people more vulnerable and sensitive to insults or inappropriate information.

So, on one side of anonymity we have this daring attitude, this disregard for accountability and the willingness to insult anybody and anything. On the other side, we have people who feel protected and thus are more susceptible to harmful environment. It's an ideal scenario for potential disaster, like those suicides mentioned above.

But, how can we make the Internet a safer place for everybody?

To be continued with the following entries (I want to commit to this series while I'm inspired):

Future World II - The Solution
Where I discuss a possible solution

Future World III - Big Brother
Where another point of view of my solution is thrown in the mix

Future World IV - My Pet Peeves
Where I rant about some annoying people in the Internet

Love of a thousand years

Don't mind the dreadful clothes and laughable hairdo, this guy sings like a mother fucker.

Cell phone blogs and other resources

My last few posts have been all about cell phones and I confess I love talking about the subject. It's amazing how technology improved in the last couple of years or so and now modern cell phones can easily replace several other gadgets. It's what we, people in the know, call convergence.

There's a line dividing cell phones into two main groups and they're usually called feature phones and smartphones. Most feature phones nowadays are pretty smart as well, but the main difference is that there is an operational system in smartphones and people can write native programs (applications) for these phones. Usually, one can use two or more applications at the same time (unless it is the iPhone), and this is called multitasking.

The line dividing feature phones and smartphones is getting thinner every day and most feature phones nowadays can handle some Java applications. But in addition to a better software, smartphones also tend to have better hardware features like faster processors, higher quality cameras and more internal memory.

I've been using smartphones for about 5 years and I'm still loving every minute. I like having a converged device in my pocket. Not to show off to other people, but because I love the possibility of all that power only inches away from my hands at anytime of the day or night. Anywhere I am, I can be productive, I can listen to music, I can watch videos, I can take pictures or even make a simple phone call. All of this in one and only device, my cell phone.

There are several places in the internet one can go for information on cell phones and I'd like to list my favorites. These websites and blogs offer valuable information if you're looking for unbiased opinions, honest reviews and some fun in the process.

1. AllAboutSymbian and The Smartphones Show

The first one is a blog and they talk exclusively about Symbian phones. Phones using this OS account for about 40% of the world smartphone market. That ends up being the totality of the higher spec'd Nokia phones, some Sony Ericsson, Samsung and a few LG.

The second link is a video podcast produced by one of the guys who run AllAboutSymbian, Steve Litchfield. It's obvious that Steve is a cell phone maniac and he loves the subject a thousand times more than I do (and that's a lot!). In this podcast he has more freedom to talk about all smartphones. Symbian, Windows Mobile, Palm, iPhone, Blackberry, everything is game for Steve Litchfield.

In fast paced, 10 minute videos (produced at a rate of four or five every two months or so), Steve reviews the latest smartphones with his extreme knowledge of the subject. Sometimes he even gets prototypes of models still not available to the general public. But what's really amazing about this guy is that it's clear that he's doing this to help other people. While some bloggers seek self promotion and profit, Steve Litchfield does it to inform and help those ones in need.

Don't get me wrong, bloggers need to be compensated for the work they do. But when you do it with the honest desire in your heart to help other people, it really shows in the quality of whatever you produce.

2. The Cell Phone Junkie

This is a podcast that talks about more generic subjects regarding cell phone technology. In about one hour episodes (uploaded every week religiously on iTunes), Mickey and Joey talk about everything: devices, providers, data&voice plans. I really don't know how they find material and patience to produce a one hour episode every week. And not happy with this weekly podcast, they decided to produce a bi-weekly show called "The Cell Phone Junkie Unlocked" where they talk about - guess what? - more cell phone related stuff.

Mickey and Joey have good chemistry and most of the times it feels like two friends talking about a subject they love. In fact, I believe they know each other for a long time, even previous to doing this podcast together. This translates into a dynamic and interesting show to listen to, ideal for when you're doing your daily 5 mile jog in the gym.

3. Howard Forums

This is not a blog, nor a podcast. It's a forum. You can read as much as you need but you have to subscribe to be able to post (just give them your name and e-mail address, no money, no biggie). There are several subforums to attend every specific need. It's worth being a member. When dealing with smartphones, a problem is sure to happen and more than likely that particular problem has happened before with other people.

I've never had any question or problem with any of my phones that couldn't be solved by a visit to this site.

4. Xda Developers

Now, if your phone is a Windows Mobile device made by HTC, this is the site you wanna visit. You don't know what the fuck is HTC? Well, they are the makers of the T-Mobile G1 (although you won't find any information about it on that site, since it's powered by Android and not Windows Mobile), AT&T Tilt, AT&T Fuze, the Sony-Ericsson Xperia 1, T-Mobile Dash and several others.

The guys in that forum know what they're talking about and you can get lots of interesting tips on how to fully use your Windows Mobile phone.

Well, that's it. Those are the sites I'd recommend for those who, like me, love cell phones and all they have to offer to make our lives easier.

The Mofo - N97, the mother of all phones

I've been writing about my phones quite a lot, so I believe anybody who's been following (did I write "following"? I meant "reading occasionally") this blog has a pretty good idea that I'm in fact a cell phone junkie. I'd even use that title if there wasn't already a podcast with the same name.

My main phone is the N95 8Gb (on top on the picture above) and I've been testing the E90 (on the bottom) for a while now. They're amazing devices despite being both a little long in the tooth (2 years is a lot in the cell phone industry) and for my personal use they kinda complete each other. I love the 5MP camera on the N95 but I also love the big internal screen on the E90. I love being able to play video games on the N95 but I also love the ample qwerty keyboard on the E90. During this past week playing with the E90, there were more than a couple of moments when I thought that a combination of these two phones would be my ideal device.

Then, on December 3rd 2008, Nokia announced the N97. The gadget whore in me was drooling all over the keyboard of the computer while I watched the live feed from Barcelona. This baby has the potential to be all that I dreamed about and more. I know now that by June next year I'll be carrying a new phone and it's gonna be the N97.

I'm returning the E90 and I'll keep the N95 until the N97 is available. When that happens, the N95 will probably be inducted in the Hall of Fame for serving me so faithfully for over 2 years. I have too strong of an attachment to that phone to simply sell it on eBay. Furthermore, by then, its price would probably be below $300 and I simply refuse to accept that amount for such a nice piece of equipment.