Archive for the ‘geekery’ Category

Let the Travian addiction begin

8:41 am, January 4th, 2009 | No Comments »
Posted in boythings, gaming, geekery, internets by Jarod

Thanks to the crazy88 boys I’m now semi addicted to Travian. It’s one of those sassy online in-browser strategy type games. I played Utopia on and off here and there, but seems a little different. Somewhat more refined.

Once I’ve been playing for more than a few days I’ll post a mini review. Be warned though, it might only consist of a few (swear) words if I end up getting smooshed by people bigger than me.

Planes on final approach

11:28 pm, January 2nd, 2009 | No Comments »
Posted in bikes, boythings, geekery, photography by Jarod

Since moving to the inner west I’ve wanted to head down to the north end of the north south runway at Kingsford Smith Airport. You know, to generally be a camera nerd and take photos of planes rushing 50 odd metres overhead. This morning, I finally go around to it.

I know I know, that photo is tiny. Smash this link to see it bigger though.

Goosync… three weeks on

11:20 am, December 31st, 2008 | No Comments »
Posted in bikes, geekery, internets by Jarod

A little while ago I did a little mini review on Goosyncing Google Calendar to my Nokia E71. Well this is the even shorter review which takes place after using it every second day or so.

The only negative that both Liz and I found is that a week or so ago we both couldn’t sync for a few days. An error message stating that a connection couldn’t be established or something. We presumed their server was down and were just patient and things returned to normal pretty quickly. Other than that it’s been a bundle of joy which works nice and seamlessly such that you don’t know it’s there.

If you want to sync your Google Calendar to your E71 (or anything on the S60 platform), get Goosync. Don’t worry about the subscription version unless you’re a super duper mega power user, the free version will do fine.

Sombrero!

4:42 am, December 29th, 2008 | No Comments »
Posted in boythings, geekery, photography by Jarod

It’s a long story. You wouldn’t want to know.

Wtf, Virgin?

8:15 pm, December 20th, 2008 | No Comments »
Posted in geekery, girlthings, internets, whinging by Liz

I’d been with Vodafone for what seems like forever. They’ve always treated me nicely, and I’ve never had a problem with them. I even managed to pull Jarod over to them. Then we decided to get new phones, and went out and assessed all the carriers. Virgin came out on top because we could call and sms each other for free. Winner!

I figured I wouldn’t notice any difference, seeing as both Vodafone and Virgin piggyback off the Optus network. And, to begin with, I didn’t.

Then I got an email that said the following:

“Hey, just wondering who is this? I went to gmail on my ph and it logged into ur account.”

At first Jarod and I assumed it was spam or something bizarre like that, but curiosity got the better of me and I replied asking for a few more details. Turns out this guy was legitimate, and he too was on the Virgin network. Alright, I thought, I’ll just keep changing my password every couple of weeks, and change my settings so my Gmail app sends all it’s stuff over a secure network and we’ll be fine. Perhaps the thing that controls the packet data had a hiccup which ended badly.

But then a couple of days later I went to log into facebook for the first time on my phone (sad, I know). To my surprise, it had prepopulated with someone elses email address. Luckily for them, it hadn’t saved their password.

Today, I sent an MMS to Jarod with a photo of Train (sending a test message to see if the MMS was set up on my number). A couple of hours later I got a message from someone saying ‘Who is this?’. Apparently they’d received a photo of a baby from my number. Jarod still hasn’t received anything.

So, wtf Virgin?? If it wasn’t for the fact I don’t particularly want to pay out my contract right now, I’d be switching back to Vodafone. At least they didn’t share my log in details with other people, or send incorrect messages to people I don’t even know. Seriously.

And, no, I have not yet contacted Virgin customer service as I believe it will be a huge waste of time to get through to someone on the frontline who will probably tell me that nothing is wrong. I will probably go into one of their stores during the week and see what they have to say. But yeah, if you’re considering going to Virgin… don’t.

The space above our kitchen cupboards

3:21 pm, December 13th, 2008 | No Comments »
Posted in bikes, boythings, geekery, local by Jarod

Two Shiny New Nokia E71s

6:19 pm, December 2nd, 2008 | 5 Comments »
Posted in boythings, geekery, internets by Jarod

Over the weekend Liz and I hyped ourselves up over the Nokia E71. So much so that on Sunday we ended up visiting a Virgin Mobile Phone Store in the city and picking ourselves up matching phones and plans.

I know, it doesn’t seem like me. I’m usually a tenth this impulsive… but in reality, the feature set on the E71 was just that good. Wireless LAN. 3G Internet’ing. Big screen. Qwerty keyboard. MP3 Player… and stacks more.

Initial impressions of the E71 are good. There are a few things that it doesn’t do as well as my hard as all hell 5140i. But as I use it more and more I’m finding workarounds and new features that seriously impress me.

I’ll attempt at writing a more complete review of the phone when I’ve been using it a bit longer. For now though I’ll leave you with the fact that i banged out this post over the course of about 10 minutes while my work PC was crashing and rebooting. Yep, I like having a second super small keyboard on my desk.

World of Goo Review

7:53 am, November 30th, 2008 | No Comments »
Posted in boythings, gaming, geekery by Jarod

As Liz mentioned yesterday, I was (am?) thoroughly addicted to a game by the name of World of Goo. To know what it’s all about, hit play on the youtube’ish video below.

Yes! I know!! And it’s only twenty bucks. Twenty bucks is nothing when compared to how much fun you’ll have channelling the old days playing lemmings, the incredible machine and bridge builder.

Ok I’ll confess. I was going to try and sit down and write a proper review instead of my normal three paragraphs ones. But just looking at different levels in screenshots on the net, I’m seeing new and better ways to arrange Goo blobs for better structural integrity. Suffice to say I’ll be loading World of Goo in a few minutes.

But first. If you’re still interested check out any of these reviews. I still haven’t seen a bad one yet. Rock Paper Shotgun. The Dead Pixel Post. Evo Gamer. Eurogamer.

Just thought I should mention…

7:21 pm, November 29th, 2008 | 1 Comment »
Posted in boythings, geekery, girlthings, internets, whinging by Liz

Jarod has become a little obsessed with this game. About a World of Goo. The engineering side of his brain is delighted. So you might not hear from him for a bit.

I did try to play it, but Jarod would lean over and tell me how my structural balance wasn’t right, or something like that. I just wanted to play with goo.

Bike Porn

6:08 am, November 27th, 2008 | No Comments »
Posted in bikes, boythings, geekery, photography by Jarod

Rest in Peace SB600 known as ‘Flash B’

10:36 am, November 23rd, 2008 | No Comments »
Posted in boythings, geekery, photography by Jarod

I never did post the final chapter in Flash B’s short life. Apparently the damage sustained by the fall was too much for the repair shop man to fix. He suggested sending it to Nikon Australia for a more thorough autopsy, but I declined knowing they charge like wounded bulls.

So Flash B is now sitting on my desk here at home. His only purpose is to weigh down paper and as a constant reminded not to let light stands topple over.

Rest in Peace Flash B. You served me well.