Freyburg

Celebrities, living lives of ease, luxury, and quite often chemically enhanced euphoria, will sometimes hit a brick wall where their body says “whoa, stuff comes OUT of your nose, no more of that thank you, famous person” and promptly check themselves into rehab to recover from “exhaustion.”

Funny, the rest of us just sleep in on the weekend, but I digress. It appears that rehab is not quite what it’s cracked up to be; it’s more like an exclusive spa with the occasional wagged finger. Apparently, some spas even have a list of fine wines available, along with masseuses, chiropractors, and an array of other servants and hangers-on for the discerning drug-ravaged actor/heiress/model.

In the second of our retrospective series (also entitled “killing time before Season 3 begins”), we look back at the Patrick Troughton era, with the usual digressions and trenchant bon mot for which we have become notorious. (feed, web, direct download)

I’ve never really watched Ze Frank’s video podcast, but apparently it’s got a rabid following on the internets. So much so, in fact, that Hollywood’s come knocking at his door. I’m more interested in the fact that a video podcast became an avenue to mainstream work, and the fact that for all the hectoring about the MSM done by many and sundry Internet personalities, they still seem to succumb to the big(ger) bucks of the “dinosaur” media.

While usually my Metro duties consist of taking pictures at parties and various other fashionable events around town, I had a chance to nerd it up recently and cover the launch of the World of Warcraft: Burning Crusade expansion on Monday. The resulting article is here, in the “Power Play” section (go to page 8 of the PDF).

Things that didn’t make it into the article include the fact that apparently another reporter came by, asked a question or two, and left, and from the impression I got the poor fella didn’t know much about the game. The people in the line up seemed pleased that, by contrast, I knew my stuff about WoW. Also, I talked to one of the sales people inside (power of the press means I got to stay warm and not freeze in the lineup ) and she was pretty amazed that people would line up for a game. She was even more amazed that my girlfriend is a way better player than I am. Or that my girlfriend even plays the game. Or, let’s be honest, that I have a girlfriend.

In what can only be called an explosion of coolness, Neal Stephenson‘s “The Diamond Age” is going to be made into a mini-series by the Sci-Fi network, with George Clooney acting as executive producer. Previous mini-series from Sci-fi include Dune, Children of Dune and a little number called Battlestar Galactica, so they’ve got a pretty good track record.

I’m pretty excited, since Diamond Age is my favorite Stephenson book. It’s not as crazy as Snow Crash or as comprehensive as the Baroque Cycle, but for my money it’s one of the coolest future worlds and best thought-out stories about the effects of nanotechnology on society and culture. W00t!

A report in the Guardian details how the Bush administration is setting up aircraft carriers, cruise missiles, and other military hardware for a possible widening of the war, aimed squarely at Iran. Because with Iraq running so smoothly, the White House clearly needs new challenges.

John Draper, aka Cap’n Crunch, is known primarily as one of the best phone phreaks to ever jerk around Ma Bell as well as one of the pioneers of Silicon Valley. But he’s fallen on hard times, as the Wall Street Journal outlines in this article.

He also has a video podcast about computer security, which can be viewed here.

Hollywood has a long tradition of abandoning really good movies to the marketplace while promoting crap like A Night at the Museum (which has been #1 at the box office for a few weeks). It seems Children of Men, which is easily one of the best films of the year, is suffering the same fate. To be fair, a grim movie about the end of the world isn’t quite the box office draw with the wide appeal of Ben Stiller/dinosaur hijinks, but the point still stands.

And if you’re interested in how they pulled off the insanely cool “one-take” seamless special effects in Children of Men, check this out.

The fight in Iraq is less about the Americans, apparently, and more about the Sunnis (in collusion and sometimes conflict with Al Queda elements) versus the Shia. The Guardian has the goods on a very, very messy conflict.

Makes more sense than you’d immediately think. iTunes can handle PDF files, but until now I’ve only seen that feature implemented with a couple of podcasts from music magazines where they include the actual magazine as a file. Reading a magazine on your computer is kind of a “meh” experience, but properly formatted, I can see reading it on your phone (especially with the iPhone’s finger powered zoom functions) as being quite viable. Same goes for books….and it’d be a new revenue stream not only for Apple but for book companies. Plus it’d be a great way for indie authors to publish their own work at virtually no cost. Will it replace books? Of course not. There’s something intangible and solid about a book that can’t be beat by electronic gear. But being able to carry around music, videos, a portable net surfing device AND a reading library in my pocket would be OK by me.