Unexpected Results of Piracy

Ack! So I missed the Mythbusters episode... TV sucks without Tivo... : (

Anyway, on to the post!
I decided to pick up AFI's "I Heard a Voice" As I checked out, I realized that I do not formally own any AFI music. It turns out, I was listening to a copy of my friend's disk. I would have never bought this CD, if I had not listened to their music before. This brings up the conversation of a different side of piracy. I'll admit, piracy is probably hurting the artists' sales quite a bit. However, its not all bad for them. If their music is more readily available, people can discover it, and sales are going to result from that. It also has to do with a mutual respect and trust between artists and their listeners. If an artist releases good music that will play on every device, most honest people will have no problem paying for it. However, once they start encumbering it with DRM, some fans may begin to lose respect and download the music illegally.

And, by the way, AFI's "I Heard a Voice" is an awesome CD. It comes with 18 songs, so you'll definitely be getting your money's worth. ; )

Mythbusters: Moon Landing Hoax

Hey all. I normally don't watch too much TV, but Mythbusters has quite an interesting episode on tonight. They are trying to bust the "Moon Landing was a Hoax" myth. I'll be watching it. I never doubted that we actually landed on the moon, but it will be interesting to see what they say. It's on at 9 PM (Eastern) on the Discovery Channel. More info here.

A Good Summer Reading Book?

Yes, it is true. "The Book Thief" I loved it.

From the start, I did not know what to expect. It takes place in Nazi Germany during World War II. I figured that it would just be another "Anne Frank" or "Number the Stars," but I was entirely wrong. From the first page, I felt a huge "Lemony Snicket vibe," (see A Series of Unfortunate Events) and my thoughts were right. The novel is narrated by "Death" or the "Grim Ripper" if you will. He's constantly giving away clues to the ending and feeling you in with bold centered text. Flashbacks and flashfowards give you a better understanding of the characters. The writing style is what hooked me.

It's about Liesel and her story with her foster parents. I do not want to give away much more than that. I think it is best read without knowing much of the storyline but pieceing together the parts of it by yourself. If you want a larger synopsys, I would check here.

If you read it and love it (or maybe think I'm crazy) feel free to post your comments.

HL2 CTF (the good ole' days are back!)

So I have been playing some Half-Life 2: Capture the Flag lately. Not really any other reason then because my friends can tolerate me kicking their asses constantly ; ) , but it reminded me of the old CTF days. We started up a dedicated server running on my computer. More and more people joined and eventually we had a real game going. This is quite a big deal because, recently, there has not been one server with people. Of course, my DSL couldn't handle it after a while, but then we moved to other server and all was good. I talked to one of the people behind the mod, and he said that the new version (1.75) should be due out soon. In the new release, you see yourself holding the flag and corpses gib (think Team Fortress 2\ Unreal Torneyment).

If you haven't played the mod, and have HL2\DM, its definitely a must. Even if you don't have HL2\DM, I would just buy it for this mod. The addicting gameplay is similar to the style of an Unreal Tournament CTF but uses unique tactics with the gravity gun. CTF has a small community. So, chances are, you'll be playing with the same people quite a bit. If you join a server, chances are, you'll see me. My name will be S.Alive 7sunami.

Website
Game Link
A MUST read guide to everything HL2CTF.