There's no way to go back. You can't arrange them by penis.

Several years after the Hot Coffee mod for GTA: San Andreas was released, it looks like the public outrage was mostly generated by political panderers, sensationalist media and opportunistic lawyers. Most gamers just don't give a shit:

Any buyer upset about hidden sex in the violent game could file a claim under a settlement the lawyers struck with the game’s makers, Rockstar Games and its corporate parent, Take-Two Interactive. Of the millions of people who bought the San Andreas version after its release in 2004, exactly 2,676 filed claims.

Apparently this has been around for a while, but it is new to me.

(See also: Requiem for a Day Off)

I'm not going to embed it here, but there's a youtube video of a Spore goatse creature. Pretty funny, actually...

Well, I just ordered 3 tickets for the UT vs. Kentucky game on Nov 29. Surely I can find a couple of willing football fans here to join me? Oh yeah, the tickets are on the "house". The seats are in a corner nosebleed section (PP), but that was the best available. I should have checked when seats first went on sale Monday.

Anyway, just throwing that out there...

...and the food fetishist's wet dream.

But no mention of the uncanny valley...

MUTO a wall-painted animation by BLU from blu on Vimeo.

(Previously)

Hell yeah, I'm $300 richer today than I was yesterday. Time to go to Wal-Mart!

But don't get me wrong, if they're giving money away...

When will we have the photography equivalent of Free Speech Zones?

Last summer, the FBI launched an international search for two men after crew members and riders on a Washington State Ferry reported their unusual behavior — namely that they were taking pictures below deck, in areas that don't hold much interest for most tourists.

A ferry captain snapped their photo, which was passed along to the FBI.

Turns out the men, both citizens of a European Union nation, were captivated by the car-carrying capacity of local ferries.

"Where these gentlemen live, they don't have vehicle ferries. They were fascinated that a ferry could hold that many cars and wanted to show folks back home," FBI Special Agent Robbie Burroughs said Monday.

Photo of the recent eruption of Chile's Chaitén volcano. (More photos)

I've recently added immeasurable value to my life by buying a couple of cool gadgets, and I thought I'd share with everyone:

• Neverlate Executive alarm clock. This uber-alarm clock has a "his and hers" alarm (aka dual alarms), which can be customized for each day of the week. It also has a third alarm for each day of the week, for a total of 21 individual alarms (plus a separate "nap" alarm) possible in a week. I like to set my first alarm each day to the radio (NPR), and then another alarm some 10 or 15 minutes later using one of the four available buzzers, and I switch those up throughout the week to keep from getting too acclimated to any one of them. It also has a "gradual awake" option to increase the alarm volume over 5 seconds or so, and a "descending snooze" option that cuts the snooze length in half each time you hit the snooze button. You can also customize the snooze length, display brightness, and just about every other aspect of its functionality.
• Logitech Harmony 550 universal remote. This is also extremely customizable, and will work with nearly any IR device, even those not in its database, by "learning" the control codes from the original remote. While the driver software absolutely SUCKS in more ways than I care to detail, the remote itself rocks once you've programmed it sufficiently. The remote's primary mode of operation revolves around programmed "activities", such as my "Watch TV", "Computer", "Xbox360", "Wii", and "DVD". As long as you only use this remote to control devices, it remembers the state of each device (power and input channel). So, going from TV mode to computer mode turns off the cable box, switches the TV to the computer's HDMI input, and switches the audio receiver to the appropriate input. Plus, every button on the remote can be programmed to whatever function you want and associated with any active device in an activity.

How great is it that 30 Rock actually gave such an accurate description of the uncanny valley, complete with a modified version of the image on the wikipedia page, all wrapped in the context of Tracy making a porn video game?

Picked up a copy of GTA4 last night at the local GameStop's midnight release, got home by 12:30, and only played for about three hours. This whole "work" thing is getting in the way of loftier pursuits.