Archive for the ‘current events’ Category

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iOS 5/5.0.1 jailbreak for iPhone 4S and iPad 2 (A5 devices) is HERE — instructions, link, and tips

Friday, January 20th, 2012

Okay, here we go. Greenpois0n has released a jailbreak for A5 devices. Currently it’s only available for the Mac, but a Windows version is “coming soon” (sorry to disappoint those of you without a Mac — just have some patience).

The jailbreak is called “Absinthe”, it’s untethered, it works (verified), and you can download it here.

Now, let me add a couple of tips. At the end of the jailbreak process, the tool will tell you to “Unlock the screen, if necessary, and tap the Jailbreak icon”. Note that when you unlock the screen, you will NOT see an icon titled “Jailbreak” but you will see an icon titled “Absinthe”. That’s the one you want to tap on.

If Absinthe hangs for any reason, go into settings, and turn VPN on and then off again. This should fix any hanging problems. If it doesn’t, reboot, and try VPN on-off again.

For more detailed instructions, try here: http://www.iphonehacks.com/2012/01/how-to-jailbreak-ipad-2-absinthe-ios-5-0-1-ios-5.html

Happy jailbreaking!

Posted in computers, current events, tips and tricks | No Comments »

iPhone 4S Jailbreak SCAM ALERT REDUX

Wednesday, January 11th, 2012

Hey all, I’m just here to let you know, once again, that there is still no jailbreak for the iPhone 4S or iPad 2. The latest scam I saw today really annoyed me, because it’s trying to take the limera1n/blackra1n good name and sully it. It’s a “product” called ”Easyra1n”. I think the reason that this particular one is cropping up is because we are actually close to a real A5-device jailbreak from the hard-working pod2g. Last week, pod2g tweeted that he had successfully jailbroken an iPhone 4s, and posted screen shots of it. He went on to say that the jailbreak might be available as early as this week.

However, a few days after that, pod2g had to take that statement back, as it turned out that the exploit he used to jailbreak was based on an iPhone developer kit and doesn’t work with a regular old iPhone 4S. So at the moment pod2g is working on a way to translate the dev kit jailbreak into a jailbreak that will work for the rest of us. So, obviously, the jailbreak has been delayed again. Hopefully not for TOO long, though.

In the meantime, I repeat, THERE IS NO JAILBREAK FOR IPHONE 4S OR IPAD 2 YET! Anyone who asks for your money for a working jailbreak for those A5 devices is scamming you out of your cash! Do not get taken by these a-holes!

Again, for all things jailbreak, visit http://limera1n.cc.

Posted in computers, current events, tips and tricks | No Comments »

Castro’s Death Probably E-mail Virus Hoax…

Monday, January 2nd, 2012

There are currently rumblings on Twitter that Fidel Castro has died — go to http://hashtags.org/castro to see them — however it is also believed this may be a hoax to spread a virus via email. So if you get an email saying Castro has died with a link, or, worse yet, an attachment, I would STRONGLY advise you NOT TO CLICK ON IT. I will follow this and post if Castro has actually died. If you see no post from me, assume it is simply a virus. This happened a few months ago, the exact same scenario…

Posted in bizarre, computers, current events, politics | No Comments »

R.I.P. Steve Jobs

Wednesday, October 5th, 2011

In 1984, my parents were in an electronics store looking to buy me an electronic typewriter for Christmas when I was in the fourth grade. They picked the typewriter out, it had simple word processing. While waiting in line, my mother, a technical writer, went to look at a brand new Mac 128k. She came back to my father and said, “Put the typewriter down. We’re getting this.” And thus began my love affair with Apple.

I stayed with Macs until 1996, when I finally traded in my (overclocked) Mac LC III for a Dell setup. I wanted to be able to play more games, and the games all seemed to be out for Microsoft systems. I never felt fully comfortable using a PC. I’m using one right now, and I still don’t feel comfortable with it. But I know the setup better than I know a Mac setup now, and the parts are cheaper. But I recently bought a MacBook Pro, and immediately fell back in love with Macs. I use it all the time now. And the gaming field has been a leveled a bit; more games are available for Macs now. I used it every morning to surf the web — until I gave in and bought an iPad 2. For the longest time, I thought, you know, I have no use for an iPad. I have the MacBook; that’s plenty. I have an iPhone (I bought the first iPhone when it was released, and have bought every once since then, and if God is willing and AT&T waives the $250 “premium” fee, I will be ordering one on Friday — if they don’t, I’ll be ordering one on November 19th — an iPhone 4S, that is…I specifically wanted this one because I thought it might be the last iDevice Jobs had direct input into…). But then the iPad came, I opened up the box, fiddled with it for 5 minutes, and instantly fell in love. Now I use my iPad for virtually everything, although I do write on the MacBook, and my PC is still my main computer for gaming, or for work (especially HTML or graphic design work). If I could afford one, though, I’d buy a top-line Mac desktop without blinking.

My only regret is that Jobs didn’t enter the gaming field and release something to kick the Xbox 360′s sorry ass. I have a PS3 and love it, but imagine what Jobs would have created. What’s that? You can’t imagine what he would have created? That’s the point! He would have released something so funky, so out there, so…Jobs…that it would have changed the entire console gaming industry forever.

So there’s the story of how Steve Jobs changed my life. Thank you, Steve, thank you. And when you get up to Heaven, I have a feeling God is going to want an iPad.

Godspeed, Steve Jobs, Godspeed. You were taken too soon. You were the Thomas Edison of our time. I am honored to have lived in the era that saw your greatness realized.

Posted in computers, current events, personal | No Comments »

Partial Transcript of Stephen Colbert’s “super-PAC” press conference

Friday, July 1st, 2011

Okay, guys, I’m still looking around for a full transcript of this, but this is the best I can do for now. Anyway, these are a few highlights from Stephen Colbert’s press conference yesterday after the government green-lighted his “super-PAC”.

Excerpts follow…

———-

COLBERT: “One way to get a lot of cash is with a political action committee or PAC, a private group of like-minded citizens formed to promote a candidate or an issue. … Some maybe candidates out there, already have exposure because they’re on TV — like Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum, Mike Huckabee, and Sarah Palin, who are on Fox News. … I thought, why not me? So I decided to form ColbertPAC.”

COLBERT:  “[Our intent is]…to poke fun at lax campaign finance laws that treat corporations as people whose feelings will be hurt if they cannot express themselves freely, generally by donating large amounts of money to political candidates.”

COLBERT: “I hate my parent company! they never let me do anything. [Laughter] Everyone else’s parent company let them do it. Karl Rove is a paid employee of Fox News and he gets to talk about his SuperPAC American Crossroads all the time.”

COLBERT: (Responding to a question about what he would do with the money: “‘…I don’t know. Give it to me and let’s find out.’”

COLBERT: “I believe in the American Dream. And that dream is simple: That anyone, no matter who they are, if they are determined, if they are willing to work hard enough, someday they can grow up to create a legal entity which can then receive unlimited campaign funds which can be used to influence elections.

Posted in bizarre, current events, politics, television | No Comments »

PSN back up

Sunday, May 15th, 2011

PSN is back up. Though there are tons of people trying to log in so servers are jammed.

Good luck logging in.

Will get back to more in-depth blogging soon.

Posted in computers, current events, videogames | No Comments »

Watson Beaten by Congressman

Wednesday, March 23rd, 2011

This story is a few days old but I figured I’d get it in there. Watson was beaten one-on-one recently:

Representative Rush Holt (D-NJ) beat Watson $8600 to $6200. Holt is a nuclear physicist and a 5 time Jeopardy champion.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/01/rush-holt-jeopardy-watson-_n_829672.html

(apologies for linking to the Huffington Post *grin*)

Posted in bizarre, computers, current events, science fiction, television | No Comments »

Watson’s Jeopardy Transcript

Monday, February 21st, 2011

I don’t have the time to copy and paste everything from the J! Archive, which archives all Jeopardy games, but I can at least give you links to every single question and answer in the IBM Jeopardy Challenge. You’ll see every question, every answer, who got which ones correct, and the wagers on Daily Doubles and Final Jeopardy. Roll over the dollar amounts posted on the questions to see the answer and who got what. Also roll over Final Jeopardy for the answer. In addition, the numbers in the top right corner of each question box indicate when that question was selected (1 for the first clue picked, 2 for the second clue picked, etc.)

Here ya go:

Watson Game 1 (Jeopardy round only)

Watson Game 2 (Double Jeopardy and Final Jeopardy)

Watson Game 3 (Full Jeopardy episode)

Posted in bizarre, computers, current events, science fiction, television | No Comments »

For anybody in Egypt who wants to bypass the government blockage of websites…

Friday, January 28th, 2011

(First, much thanks to Mateo Geoly for posting these IPs on Facebook).

Apparently — although for how long this will last, I do not know — you can get around Egypt’s block of communications/social networking websites by using the numerical IP address as opposed to the name (which has to be resolved by a DNS). So:

To bypass government blocking of website names, use numerical IP addresses:
For Twitter “128.242.240.52″
For Facebook “69.63.189.34″
For Google “72.14.204.99″

Posted in current events, politics, tips and tricks | 2 Comments »

Republicans on probation

Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010

As happy as I am with last night’s election results, let me state the following: The Republicans have been given a second chance, and they’re on probation.

The polling showed that people are just as sick of Republicans as they are of Democrats. However, the Democrats happen to be in power, and happen to have passed a lot of unpopular (disastrous) legislation, so the country “threw the bums out” without flinching.

But, as noted above, that does not mean the electorate loves Republicans. It merely means that they’re giving Republicans another crack at things, since the Democrats have caused a mess. So mark my words, fellow Republicans — we are on probation.

If we do not move forward with an agenda that is focused on limiting government and reducing its role in people’s lives, we will get tossed out in two years. Whether Obama wins or not. So we need to deliver on our promises of restraint on spending, restraint on government, and as far as “the party of no” goes, we have to keep it up, in regards to good ol’ Barry. We need to put the brakes on his administration.

Charles Krauthammer has prononunced, “The Obama agenda is dead.” I certainly hope it is. But it could easily rise up like a zombie and start staggering forward again, moaning “TAXXXX AND SPENNNDDD!!!” (and “BRAINNNSSSS”, I suppose).

So every single one of you who got elected with an (R) next to your name, watch your ass. Barry wants an end to “partisan politics”. Interesting, since it was strict partisan politics that got his horrendous legislation passed. Put the brakes on Obama, Republicans, and start moving forward with a plan for job growth based on the private sector.

Or in two years there will be yet another bloodbath — this time as Republicans are voted out in droves and Democrats are given a second chance.

Let’s not waste our second chance. Let’s move forward aggressively. Let’s live up to what we promised in the campaign, every last iota of promises we made. Then we will deserve the respect of the people, and, consequently re-election. Or perhaps control of the Senate.

Either way, this is not the time for Rs to rest on their laurels, or, worse yet, reveal themselves to be RINOs.

Rant over.

Posted in current events, politics, rants | No Comments »

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