tentang Things You Steal Daily

i don't want to preach. i just want to state the obvious. and there are people who don't know that this what a lot of bloggers do is wrong. but fact is, if you do it, you the owner and people who work on that product could come after you and sue you.

i'm talking about distributing copyrighted materials, illegally.
in other words, piracy.


Do you know that :-

it is wrong to download songs and movies and programs from the internet without paying for it. unless it is distributed free by the copyright holder or third party who is distributing it legally. the copyright holder may not come after you if you download a song illegally but go after the distributor instead, but be aware that you can be charged just for downloading.

it is wrong to distribute copyrighted materials without consent of the copyright holder. a lot of bloggers host, or provide links to download songs illegally. be aware that the blogger that owns that blog could be charged, it doesn't matter if the blogger was the one who put the link or someone put it in the comments section. but the owner must be responsible.


Backups.
if you decide to backup (make a copy of) your DVD or games installer or music CDs, it is fine. but do not distribute it. treat it like the real thing. it is your responsibility.

if the backup copy you made (with your name written on it) ended up in the hands of some piracy ring and because you made such a good job ripping, they used you back up as the master copy, produced millions of pirated copy, and sold them world wide. if the piracy ring gets busted, you could be charged too.

unlikely, i know. but it can happen


it is not a good feeling anyway when people like me, walking past pirated DVD of a movie i worked on. and knowing full well the sale of that pirated DVD is not helping the company.

so my blogger friends, please stop putting those illegal download links. sounds fun. but it is wrong.



tips: if you want to share a music for friends to view on your blog, use sites like youtube.com. because there is a copyright issue, youtube will remove it. so if it's there on youtube, it is pretty safe to share.

tentang Song for WoWers Like Me

lol found this on youtube on IGN channel. pretty hilarious. oh.. contains some visual that is not 'sopan'

tentang The Hour for Mother Earth

so during yesterday's earth hour we did the same as last year. made dinner and have it during the hour. except that this year i took some pics. just a few really not too much.

earth hour this year was a little different from last year. we live in gawler now, a small town with more people. in roseworthy where we lived last year there were about 20 houses and most people weren't home at the time. so earth hour or no earth hour, it is always quiet in roseworthy.

but living in town, be it a small town, i can see most houses turn off their lights. and it was a kinda delightful sight. i can't help but think about next year. we might still be in gawler to participate in it but we might also already be back in malaysia. if it's the latter then we can't say 'we already did that 2 hours ago, ha!' to fellow malaysian back home lol.

but anyway, to those who participated yesterday, regardless of how it may or may not effect our home planet's well being, thanks. it is the thought that counts.

and btw, dont blame the electric provider company for not turning off the street lights anymore. we need that. older people need it. cars need that. it is for many obvious safety reasons that the streetlights are not switched off. so please guys.. think a wee bit more like a matured person

:D

tentang Xchange Widget's Death

a few days now i've noticed nuffnang's little bugger at the bottom right corner of my page haven't been loading properly. they load, yes, but contents did not appear (the word 'Loading...' is con considered content!). on other people's blogs they seem to work fine. in fact i dont see any other blog's widget that 'died'. maybe there were but i missed it

just in case that maybe i made a mistake editing my template file and stuffed it up (whot.. i'm only human!), i got the script from nuffnang website and pasted over the old script. simple.
save...
...computer says no. 
*facepalm. something about 'bid' not closed properly.


so i got the next Xchange script nuffnang provided on their site (hey they know there's problem with teh script!), a script for blogspot users (like me) who had problems installing the widget (again, like me).

save..
...Done!

i use the mighty firefox for browsing. so to test it, i reloaded my blog on my browser. but to properly test, i decided to load the blog on Firefox, IE and Chrome. so i started testing my blog.hum..


Mighty Firefox!!!
this has been my browser of choice since 2004 i think. ditched IE and never came back.

same as before, the page loads fine. except for the nuffnang Xchange widget. it is there.. all the GUI is there.. and in says 'Loading..' indefinitely. *facepalm again. wonder if i let it load for a day will there be any difference? but i'm not that patient.


Internet Explorers.. explore!!!
point of note, i am so not a fan of IE. once i asked people how to uninstall IE :P. but for the sake of this blog, i tested it.. on a neglected, unupdated IE6. to my horror, my blog barely loaded half way. the entries load fine (and rather quick) but only up until the first thing on the right column. i guess IE had problems to load the 2nd widget on that column and timed out leaving the page half-loaded. what widget was it..? the offender is the nuffnang ads widget for sidebar. O M G

but after refreshing the page 4 or 5 (maybe 7) times i managed to get IE to load the whole page. including the Xchange widget is working properly. it is alive!!yay!


Chrome Up!!!
freshly downloaded and installed. i installed it once before and decided chrome and firefox is pretty much similar. but i prefer firefox's searchbox that is customisable.. and users can add (or delete) search engines to their preferance. thats why i decided to uninstall chrome the last time. but that was over 6 months ago i think.

loading up the blog on chrome was unexpectedly fast. that could possibly be just luck. so i'll just ignore the fast loading time for now. my focus now is to see if the blog loads properly. and the answer is, yes it did. everything loads fine. and it loaded fine the first time. it is like a 'strike' in bowling. even if it's just a lucky strike, it is still a strike. lol


so the verdict.. 
my blog (kusut-blogs.blogspot.com) is designed for Firefox.
but it is actually best viewed on Google Chrome!


lol. i seem to have gone off-topic. the nuffnang Xchange widget actually did not die. it works fine. only that it does not work properly on my laptop using firefox! maybe there is some messy coding in there and undiscovered bug still lurking around. and together with my extremely messy template (the.xml file) the widget just became pening and refuse to work in such a kusut environment.

and owh... this is just some not-so-proper comparison done by some blogger who have no idea what to write today. so dont take it seriously lah :D

tentang Gingers and Shallots

our asian food would use these two ingredients a lot. i don't know how to cook at all (seriously) before we moved to adelaide. but since living here i have started to learn how to cook and i think i am 10 times a better cook then i was. well maybe more because i started off with 0 knowledge in cooking. instant noodles and boiling water is not considered cooking

but i learn to cook using substitute or minimal usage of these two crucial ingredients. my wife is an excellent cook and i reckon she makes the best nasik lemak and nasik minyak in gawler (because we are the only malay living here).

shallots ang ginger isn't unavailable in the shops here. they are easily bought. but the real reason is because of money. have a look at this pic i took last week.

that's in aussie dollar (AUD). and roughly, AUD1 = RM3.
*pengsan!

tentang Button for bloggerunited.com

a long time ago i made some buttons for for bloggerunited.com (read here). they were made really quickly and on a whim. i have a confession to make.. it was really messy and not thought out properly. the size isn't standard and they almost sucked :P

but the good netizens of bloggerunited.com (BU for short) liked it and a lot of them used it as their BU badge. pretty cool. and i am honoured.

what is BU? read my year-old post about it here, they are no longer beta and have made a lot of improvements since then.

now that i've got over my preferance of big buttons, i've made a new smaller button (width of 80px) for my blog and of course for everyone to use.

feel free to copy&paste the code below into your blog :D


<a href="http://www.bloggerunited.com" target="_blank"><img border="0" alt="*bloggerunited.com" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzuHKOGMs1NNrsCU-C9IedxaAd3oAcSSSlZO8XiPsm8ROXN-Ablh7aY0hNeHENNa4O2kAgzfATmjIgE4_qka1pvW4AOxfNpIZQzKELSx6kg11zRxkf85KZC-qk7VJBAoUTB9ptq3pfDEE/s320/bloggerunited_btn.gif"/></a>

if you like it, let me know ya. thanks!

tentang Shrek Forever After (2010) Trailer

i didnt know about this movie coming out at all. suddenly today while surfing and watching youtube trailers, i found this. Shrek Forever After. the 4th installation, and suppossedly final chapter, of the Shrek movie franchise. check it out.. oh btw, i like the 'theatrical trailer' better :D

Trailer -



Theatrical Trailer -
-click to view-
(http://playlist.yahoo.com/makeplaylist.dll?sid=103829813&sdm=web&pt=rd)

i think it does look a better then the last one. especially when i look at the wicked witches, they look a lot better and somehow more.. properly modeled. the story maybe isnt too not-serious like the last two movies, not that i expect a movie like Shrek to have a serious storyline.

i have to admit i am not a Shrek fan. but i have seen all the Shrek movies. to me, the best of the three would be the first Shrek movie. it is simpler and a lot more funnier.

read more info about this movie here (via IMDB)

tentang Intense Debate Comments System

starting my last post i have made changes to this blog. i installed a comment system called IntenseDebate.

i wanted to install disqus but somehow it did not appear on my blog. i have a feeling it has something to do with my messy messy template file. so i ended up using this

no matter. i dont really know what the differences are between those two. i just wanted to upgrade :D.


i am a n00b with these commenting system things. and i would really really like to hear your opinion about it. do u think IntenseDebate is a good change or is it too complicated? is it loading too slowly or is it awesomely cool you cried.

so fire away friends. comment on the box below or just throw it in the shoutbot ^^




and oh... for my past posts i think something happened during installation and it disabled the comments for previous posts. sorry. lets just move forward shall we :D

tentang Northern Lights in Adelaide (repost)

so last weekend we went to the city and spent the day there doing the usual, window shopping, lepak2, and had dinner at this thai restaurant. eventhough it rained that day it was still a fun day.

after dinner we went to the art gallery (because we've never been there). the usual.. some cool, some weird, some i think tried too hard, and some totally bizarre art is displayed. meh.

then later, when night falls (and luckily the rain had stopped), the Adelaide Festival light show called The Northern Lights started. they turned the old buildings on North Terrace (it is the name of the road) into canvas of art where colourful 'skins' are projected onto the builing giving them instant makeovers.

here are some of the pics i took that night. there are more but i'll figure out where i'll upload em and post the link here ^^









these pics are of the same building -

and the video how the lights change. sorry i timed it horribly. but i hope u get the idea :D

after a few minutes the projection will change and reveal a new 'skin'. lol i make it sound like skin for laptop and mobile phone :P

more info on Northern Lights light show in Adelaide

For 38 nights, the sandstone cornerstones of our city take the spotlight from dusk until 1.00am. Created by internationally acclaimed, The Electric Canvas, uses digital software and giant projectors to turn Colonel Light's 19th century vision into a 21st century vision in light.

- Adelaide Festival website

this year the Northern Lights will be from Saturday, 27 Feb 2010 to Monday, 5 Apr 2010. so if you happen to visit Adelaide during this time, dont forget to go see it!

visit the Adelaide Festival website for more info

tentang Alice in Wonderland 2010 my thoughts

lol i almost forgot to write this review-ish post. it is NOT a review per se, just what i think people should know before watching the new Tim Burton movie. we went to watch it yesterday morning. beautiful morning.

the movie is not a remake of Alice in Wonderland. and it is not even Alice in Wonderland. it is the story about Alice years after the original story takes place. AND.. i made the mistake of half expecting the movie is sort of the continuation of Disney's Alice in Wonderland (i seem to repeat the movie title a lot huh?) back in the 50s.. but it is NOT.

all characters have been 'tim burton-ized'. that is, redesigned to the director's bizarre style. so if u are not a fan of the deisgn from movies Nightmare Before Christmas, Edward Scissorhands and Sleepy Hollow; u wight not like this movie.

also.. to parents who plan to take their kids to this movie, i dont think it is a good idea. i think this one could give them kids nightmares. and if your kids are the 'ganas2' type, i think it could introduce them to even more violent behaviours. so parents.. be aware

Alice in Wonderland did not completely entertain me. visually it is impressive, yes. and the environment & character design is pretty cool, however cliche-ly tim burton.. but still pretty cool. the storyline is a little too serious lah for me. if they would have gone with more bizarre and twisted in a more fun environment, i'd like it more.

i dont know how it looks like in 3D because we went to watch the normal silver screen one. i do think people wont miss much. but i do wonder how Cheshire Cat would look like tho.. floating around like that. would be awesome

^^

tentang Mascot Adelaide Fringe 2010

the adelaide fringe is an arts festival held here in Adelaide, South Australia. this year begining Feb 19 till March 14, the city of adelaide will be buzzing with performances, everywhere. buskers from not only around australia, but around the world would come here and perform in the middle of Rundle Mall. a very interesting time to come visit adelaide.

and around the city, massive blow-up astronauts, the mascot for Adelaide Fringe 2010, can be seen in the park, on top of buildings and one is crawling on the side of a building.



that massive thing is blocking the view for someone's office window. heh.. sux to be that person huh?

click to visit Adelaide Fringe 2010 website

tentang 82nd Oscar Quotes

still on the 82nd annual Academy Awards topis :P. here's some quotes from the awards night that i find really interesting.

I think the secret to directing is collaborating and I had truly an extraordinary group of collaborators in my crew.

— Kathryn Bigelow, Best Director for The Hurt Locker

..so if you’re out there and you’re listening, listen to me: If you want to be creative, get out there and do it. It’s not a waste of time. Do it. OK?

— Michael Giacchino, Best Score for Up

My advice to young film-makers is: the tools never make great films,
it's what you do with the tools. Telling a great story, entertaining
the audience. That's what is gonna win you an academy award.

— John Lasseter

and the promo video for the awards night. a short vid.. nothing much but i really like the colour. i know it's purple but i really like the tone and all.


more Quotes here (via telegraph.co.uk)
^^

tentang The New iPad - Academy Awards Commercial

The 82nd Annual Academy Awards Oscars was today and yeah i am sure people would have heard of the results (or start googling for them results right now). neway, refusing to flood the net with more Oscars results, i decided to focus on this:

Apple iPad commercial


April 3, that is the release date for US i assume. dont know what the release date for malaysia/singapore. hot gadget? could be just a fad. but i bet it would impress just about anyone. but yeah not literally everyone la


oh.. click for Academy Awards result^^

song : Yui - 'Again'

YUI - "Again"
Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood OP 1
English Lyrics from Deciphered Melody

owh please dont ask me where to download the song

^^

tentang The Karate Kid (2010) Trailer

i bet most people have seen the old The Karate Kid movies in the 80s. it was a pretty good movie. wax on.. wax off. lolz

now they're making a remake. Jackie Chan will be Mr. Miyagi (the old japanese karate sensei) equivalent. and Jaden Smith will be the karate kid. who is Jaden Christopher Syre Smith? he is Will Smith's son (btw, Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith are among the producers of the film).

okay.. my first impression would be a huge WTF but then i thought hey lets see what else is different. different is not always bad

after watching the trailer, i think it does seem like a fun movie to watch. not like Legend of Chun Li or Dragonball Evolution. (note, by Dragonball i mean the effect that the trailer had on me. trailer looked like it is such a bad movie that i never bothered to watch it. and i never did). not my first choice of movie to watch but certainly a first choice among 'light and fun' movies.

The Karate Kid (2010)

Trailer 1 -


Trailer 2 -


now wait a minute.. The Karate Kid is NOT learning karate but kung-fu instead? then why is the title say Karate kid??? if i go to the movies to watch a movie with the made up title 'The Tasty Karipap' i would expect the movie to be about tasty karipap right? if the movie turns out to be about some tasty popiah, isn't that just wrong and misrepresented?

Chan has told interviewers that film cast members have been referring to the movie as The Kung Fu Kid, and he believes the film will only be called Karate Kid in America, and Kung Fu Kid in Asia.

- wikipedia

so the title The Karate Kid only serves the purpose of continuing the Karate Kid franchise, not to describe the movie. well maybe they could make the title longer. say, 'The Karate Kid: Something Something Kung-Fu Something'. however, IMDB.com doesn't say that the alternate title The Kung-Fu Kid is official but rather as a working title.

anyway release date would be in June 2010.
10/06/2010 - Malaysia
11/06/2010 - USA
08/07/2010 - Australia (July? tsk.. tsk.. tsk..)
more release dates here.
and visit the official website for more information.