DoJ on Internet porn

Crazy what the government is up to now, making Internet pornography such a center of its focus. Why are they doing this when there are things like...oh, say, schools that deserve the funding a bit more, in my opinion. I'm not really much into politics, and I don't know if the Department of Justice even has anything to do with school budgets on a nation-wide scale, but I do know that taxpayers' money is going where it shouldn't be...

Sure, I can see how kids looking at porn on the Internet can be a problem. However, I think that's a problem that parents should be handling, not the government. Besides, if they want to make the Internet a better place, why don't they kill off the adware and the spam?

Job hunt spring '06

Hmm...today I applied at PC Land and the University Computer Service Center. I ended up on a wild goose chase trying to find the latter one, but I finally got my application in, haha. Now all I can do is pray that I get one of those jobs, or else I'll be applying at Wal-Mart and stuff in a few days.

Initial mp3 rip complete

Just finished ripping those last two CDs that came in the mail. 7.02 GB of a music library as of now. I'm excited to finally have it all done! Woohoo! =D Good night!

Kyle Foley moves out

Well, I helped my roomate, Kyle, move out today. He moved here to get closer to a girl that he was interested in, and since it's now clear that she has no interest in him, he has no reason to stay. I'll have a new roomate on Feb. 15th. It'll be some dude from the Netherlands. O.o Until then, I get some quality alone-time; woohoo.

Initial mp3 rip almost complete

Well, I've got two CDs coming in the mail that were sun-damaged that I couldn't rip, but I'm finished ripping all the CDs that I currently have. 6.98 GB worth of music. That's 3.6 days. 87 hours, 23 minutes, and 3 seconds. I think I have enough to keep me entertained for a while!

Initial mp3 rip progress

4.94 GB...almost done. huff puff pant pant

Sony CD DRM

Hmm... ripping CDs to create my mp3 collection is such a long and boring task. I'm up to 3.48 GB now. Teaching myself how to get around copy protections was sure fun. Some of those copy-protected CDs install rootkits on your computer without your permission. That and your CD's software communicates to Sony via the Internet every time you play it.

Using spyware is definitely not a justified way to control piracy. Yet another strike against Sony in my book! Definitely don't blame the artists; it's not their fault. Some artists, such as Switchfoot and Dave Matthews Band, are opposed to the copy-protection measures and have posted ways around it.

My life in fall 2005

I haven't written in forever, so here is a nice, big update. Of course, as most people who read this blog (which is absolutely no one by now, haha) know, my family moved to Texas at the beginning of July. I took that month and relaxed. I didn't have a job or anything.

I went back to school on my first semester of academic probation. The spring semester of '05 was especially difficult for me, you see... I had to take Digital Design (for the second time) and another object-oriented programming class. These classes took up all my time, and I just didn't manage my assignments or projects very well. The software that I was required to use in Digital Design is crappy, to put it nicely, so I ended up not finishing any of my projects in that class, despite me neglecting other classes' work to try to work on them.

Well, of course I had to take Digital Design in fall '05 yet again. This time, I knew how to work the software, as I had spoken with my professor about it. I also had the lovely object-oriented programming class, a signals & systems class, and technical writing. Digital Design yet again took up a huge portion of my time. The programming class took up another huge portion. I ended up not being able to finish my projects in the programming class since I gave it second priority to Digital Design, so I withdrew. I did set aside every Tuesday for Technical Writing, so I got a good grade in that class. Signals and Systems turned out badly because of a horrible teacher and concepts that I had a really hard time grasping (mathematical symbols confuse me). To sum up my fall '05 semester, I had no social life and I ended up .06 points away from where I needed to be to get off probation.

My Thanksgiving Break was nice, though. I went to my old friend Ralph Steinert's house back in Suffolk and got to see old friends and just hang out. I got to read the second Eragon book, which was really good. Thanksgiving dinner was cooked by Ralph's brother Joe, and it was definitely awesome.

Christmas Break I went back to Texas to see my family. When I got the news that I was put on academic suspension for this spring (so I can't take classes), we had a short time of distress, but other than that the break was nice. Christmas was awesome. My grandma came down from Tulsa to spend it with us. I got an iPod Nano and my old Spyderco Endura back that I lost over the summer. I got clothes and CDs and candy and stuff, too. New Years Eve my whole family watched March of the Penguins. It was the first New Years Eve I've had anything alcoholic, too; I had a nice, tall glass of Guiness Draught. Spending the evening with the family was nice, but the penguin movie was not-so-hot. I love Morgan Freeman and all, but you can't just have him narrate a documentary and call it a movie worthy of theatres and DVDs.

Also over break I quit FFXI and switched to World of Warcraft. I switched to World of Warcraft for a number of reasons... FFXI requires me to set aside huge chunks of time to get anything at all accomplished. Everything is group-oriented, so you'd have to wait for these groups to form, whether it be for leveling, quests, monster-hunting... I never really had time to play anymore. Also it was difficult to find enough people willing to help with certain things that I'd want to get done, like the Chains of Promathia missions. Ugh. On top of these things, Square Enix has horrible customer relations. Maybe it has to do with being a Japanese company, I dunno, but that's no excuse in my book. In December they released a patch that made leveling solo as a Beastmaster extremely inefficient. I was a Beastmaster. Beastmaster was the "solo job"; no parties will invite one for leveling. I picked Beastmaster so I could level on my own time so I wouldn't have to set aside such huge chunks of time. Well, this change caused a huge uproar with almost all the Beastmaster veterans including me. We all sent in complaints and suggestions to fix their mistake, but they didn't listen or even address us. Big mistake... That was the last straw, so I quit and took my friends with me.

Oh yeah! Funny thing that I forgot to mention. On my way to Blacksburg from Suffolk after Thanksgiving Break, I got my first speeding ticket. I called the court and payed for it the very next day, on November 28th. Well, I got a letter in the mail before Christmas Break saying that the girl didn't put my information into the system correctly, so I had to call her back. I finally got a hold of her on December 28th and gave her what she needed, and all was good...supposedly. Well, I get back to Blacksburg from Texas and I see a letter from DMV saying my license is suspended for not paying! Argh! If I sent them a check, would they have ripped it up? Was this a joke? Well, I called the court again and told them that the fault wasn't mine, and they said they fixed it. I am going to run up to DMV tomorrow and see if my license is back in order.

Right now I'm looking for a job or two to keep me busy and alive during my semester off. I'll be taking classes again starting summer.

Well, goodbye for now! Maybe now that I don't have such a huge update to write I will not be afraid of visiting my own blog and updating it again.