If you think Koei and Omega Force have run out of ideas to cash in on their Musou properties (Dynasty Warriors, Samurai Warriors), think again.
Released in Japan last March, Orochi Warriors is set to land in Europe (though Koei Warriors says it will be released in the US). What’s cool about this game is that Koei/Omega Force has managed to put the two properties together! And it will probably be a blast!
I’m so gonna wait for this!
Kaspersky has discovered an interesting mobile malware.
Dubbed as Viver (F-Secure: Trojan:SymbOS/Viver.A, Trend Micro: SYMBOS_VIVER.A), it works like RedBrowser (F-Secure: Redbrowser.A, Kaspersky: Trojan-SMS.J2ME.RedBrowser.a, Trend Micro: J2ME_REDBROW.A), only that Viver works exclusively for Symbian phones (RedBrowser works for phones that runs Java 2 Mobile Edition or J2ME, which includes most Symbian phones).
Those who browse sites for mobile software are forewarned. Viver is being paraded either as a photo editor or video codec.
This mobile malware sends text messages to a premium number, which translates to around US$7.00 (Php 322.00 at Php46.00 per US dollar). Fortunately for most Filipinos (who are on prepaid and on unlimited prepaid schemes anyway), Viver would probably not work.
It is really hard to keep a straight face yourself sane when:
1. people screw others nonchalantly
2. brazen attempts to break the law are exposed
3. the law is used to harass people
4. people lie as if they are telling the truth
5. the safeguards for a system are deliberately being broken
6. foot dragging is the game of the day
7. both parties accuse each other of the same charges
8. people pour money as if there’s no tomorrow and no one gets hungry
9. acts favoring relatives are committed
10. Team Unity claims 12-0 in Maguindanao and calls those who doubt the results as sore losers, even if Namfrel itself will not verify if this is true, since they had not witnessed how the votes were counted, and Tonypet Albano had the gall to call Adel Tamano names.
(Yes, this is an obligatory post. I wanted to write an open letter to Senator Fred Lim, but that would be for another day.)
I started blogging in 2003 at LiveJournal. Entitled The Lonely Vampire Chronicles, it is a very personal blog. It had somehow managed to contain posts about politics and technology, so it is also a mashup of my musings about my interests.
Why The Lonely Vampire Chronicles?
At that time, I was playing Castlevania: Symphony of the Night on PS2. So there. (Don’t ask me about the Lonely part. I think it’s obvious. =P )
In August of 2005, I had decided to get my own domain, AWBHoldings.com, which then hosted just this blog. The next year, it also hosted The Lonely Vampire Chronicles.
Why?
Because in my previous workplace, LiveJournal was suddenly blocked. Asking around, the reason given me was stupidsilly: LJ “was” a dating site.
Anyway, with the beauty of LiveJournal Cross-poster plugin, I was able to update my LJ blog this way, though I couldn’t read my friends page. After a few months, it was unblocked.
So what’s the use, then?
The LiveJournal version contains all the blog posts under the AWBHoldings network. Also, it contains several personal posts that I am not comfortable sharing with a lot of people (these posts are locked). Nope, contrary to what others say, these locked entries are not searchable.
So The Lonely Vampire Chronicles under the AWBHoldings network will contain personal posts that I feel are safe to share with you. It will be a recollection of things past, observations about the environment I’m in, descriptions of people I meet and see. Just don’t expect love-related posts. =P
Anyway, please welcome back The Lonely Vampire Chronicles, and I hope you enjoy throwing tomatoes at your monitors. Just kidding. Sayang yung kamatis.
PS: You might wonder how come there are few posts. Actually it contained a lot more, but I had deleted them. Most of them are work-related rants, anyway.
The fallacy of composition is committed when someone asserts that something is true of the whole if it is true of the some part of the whole. This is a dangerous fallacy, and is commonly committed in the context of social classes.
The converse is fallacy of division. It is committed when someone argues that what is true of the whole must be true of the parts that constitute the whole. This fallacy is also commonly committed in the context of social classification.
When I was still a kid (I can’t remember what my age was back then), I got hold of this thick, yellow-covered book. I must not be too young by then, since I could understand the book; it was in English. It opened my eyes on the history and the story of other nations, of other people. That’s what hooked me with history.
By the time I stepped on high school, I had read enough books that my first year social studies teacher noticed that I knew more than what the textbook contained. After trying out two other students (one of them my brother; yes, we were in the same year, but that’s another story), she tapped me. For the division level history quiz. I should have kept my mouth shut during recitations. I should have flunked my exams.
Back then, I just came from a not-so-freak accident, and the doctor had just removed the plaster cast from my right leg. I was nervous. I was made to report to school on a Saturday for review sessions. I tried skipping these sessions, but of course I couldn’t.
While I did not win (there’s always someone better than you), the world did not end then. That was not the last contest I was entered in, either. I was tapped to be the school representative in the second and fourth years.
—
The fourth year was the most troublesome. I only joined one contest each for first year and second year. Fourth year, I was made to join five (one of them as an alternate). Good thing teachers then had foresight; they made schedules so that no two contests were held the same day (though they failed once). Luckily for me, I did not have to have mutant powers to attend to these “distractions”.
Of course, I did not win. There were close ones, though.
There was this contest about the United Nations. The rules were simple: those who got scores more than or equal to the cutoff will advance to the next round. In our year level, only one met the cutoff. I was one point less towards the next round.
Then there was one contest where honesty did me in. That contest had three rounds. The first one was a written exam, and the top ten scorers advance. The second one was an oral exam, and the top five scorers advance. And so on.
So I got in the second round. And there was that question that only I got the correct answer. Except that I misspelled it. The proctor marked it as correct; it seemed she did not know the spelling, either. And the honest boy I was, when I heard the answer being announced by the exam master, I raised my hand and pointed out the mistake. Foolish kid.
—
Shy kid that I was (I will never be a politician), I was not able to get to know a lot of people. Joining contests is a dream come true for those who wants to expand their social circle. For me, contests were just a bunch of faces lumped together for a day.
And funny thing was, you get to see the same faces. One of them I considered the worthy adversary. And why not? The combination of brains and looks is very rare; he was the embodiment of it. He came from one of the best public schools in Manila. He finished high school with honors (valedictorian). And he was one constant face in that bunch of faces.
In all the contests that I had joined (except for two), he was there. And since he is a bright kid, he got all the medals, while I get to go home with certificates of participation.
I call him the worthy adversary because he was that kid who met the cutoff score.
—
Don’t get the idea that I am bright. I am not. I just read a lot. The truth is, I’m very poor at math; heck I can’t even recite the multiplication table! (So please don’t ask me to.)
That yellow-covered book was not mine. But a high school classmate, upon learning that I love history, gave me a history book. The same yellow-covered book. It’s in tatters now, but still readable.
As for the worthy adversary: I have no news. Maybe he’s overseas, swimming in dollars. Or worse, a drunkard in a dingy alley in Sampaloc, with five kids. The “or” is highly unlikely, though.
Does Moore’s Law apply to memory cards?
Samsung announced it has created an 8GB microSD card. It has doubled the known max microSD card announced by SanDisk last February, which in turn was an upgrade to the 2GB microSD (released August 2006).
Wow. Fifteen years ago, 3.5 inch, 1.44MB floppy disks were state of the art. Now, 15 mm × 11 mm × 0.7 mm cards rule. No wonder floppy disks are dead. I am really that old. And don’t even get me started on monochrome green monitors!
At Day 2 of iBlog 3, a talk entitled “The New Prosumer” was scheduled. Norman Agatep of ad agency Euro4d delivered the talk, and here he talked of a kind of marketing strategy. As the event was about blogging, Mr. Agatep’s talk must be out-of-scope at first glance. But his idea makes sense.
Despite hyping on the specs of their consoles, Microsoft and Sony are still playing catchup on Nintendo in the latest console wars. Despite someone calling the Wii as two duct-taped GameCubes, it is still the console to beat.
Information Arbitrage explains why:
Nintendo and Apple products are being effectively pushed by evangelists. Sure, slick advertising augments these more organic efforts, but make no mistake: in general, people that own Apple products love them and talk about them. Frequently. The same with Nintendo and the Wii. I just can’t get people to shut up about these products. But I can’t say the same for Microsoft and Sony, notwithstanding how cool or slick their graphics are or how many features and functions their consoles have. Either I don’t know the people that are the evangelists (notwithstanding the fact that I know dozens of people that have the Xbox 360 and the PS3, yet never evangelize to me about them) or they are just not into spreading the gospel. And this is a problem. And raises risk. The holy grail is to have millions of evangelists out there pounding the pavement for you, completely unpaid. They are the best sales, marketing and PR force money can’t buy.
They are the prosumers.
How can this happen for Nintendo? Simple. Someone gets a Wii, invites his friends over, then play Wii Bowling. Friends are impressed, even if they don’t play games, and may want to get one.
And I tell you, Mac users are very good Mac evangelists.
Now, try that with PS3 or Xbox 360. Just read the fanboy blogs/comments.
One of the films that I liked is The Patriot, which starred Mel Gibson and featured then relatively newbie Heath Ledger. In that film, Gibson had a line that resonates today:
I have long feared that my sins would return to haunt me, and the cost would be more than I could bear.
And indeed, the sins of 2004 has come to haunt us.
This year’s electoral exercise has shown that some of us are too paranoid; some of us are overeager to protect our candidates’s votes. Let’s have some examples:
‘Protective dads’ presence in Munti, Taguig explained
Atienza campaign HQ searched by Lim
Protesters vs Tiangco surround Navotas town hall
‘Binay made unlawful arrest’
Group blasts media, quick count for polls
We must be vigilant, yes, but not overly so. Paranoia can be unhealthy, too.
Anyway, let’s just hope that counting will be accurate and fast. We cannot afford another 2004. However, everything is not going smooth. Several groups have accused ABS-CBN and GMA7 of “trending” with those unofficial quickcounts and exit polls. Then, the threat of the “machinery” swinging into action remains. Namfrel starts on a bad note, being hampered with software glitches, slow entry of election returns, even missing/harassed volunteers.
So for those who have moved on, it seems that is not possible. 2004 has been a watershed year for Philippine politics. It has turned our politics into a plague that has turned some people into zombies, unwilling to face reality and instead suffer from the illusion that the sins of 2004 do not exist. It has turned our social and political institutions into relics of war. It has turned rule of law as a joke. It has turned our youth into virtual blind-deaf-mute, unwilling to rise to the occasion to secure their future (and instead aims to move out).
The ghost haunts us. It needs to be exorcised. As my aunt always tells me, there can be no peace if there is no justice.
***
We all know that the system sucks. The question now is, what are YOU doing to change it?
This is the challenge that is facing us, and now I am challenging YOU, the reader, to think about these things:
1. What is the problem?
2. What causes this problem? What are the factors that lead to the problem?
3. What are the symptoms of the problem? Can we identify the effects of the problem?
4. What are needed to solve this problem?
5. How can we solve this problem? How long will it take? What will be our objectives?
6. How are we going to implement the solutions?
7. What are the indicators that will show that the solutions are working? How are we going to maintain the momentum of change?
I know it is not that simple. But as the cliche goes, it all begins with the first step. So think, post about it, and please let me know (by posting the URL in the comments).
As for me, it will be a series of posts, and I hope I get to start on it. Wish me luck.
—
BTW, I was able to vote.
And also, a personal look at Alan Cayetano, from Mam Noemi’s experience. Take that, Ben Abalos!