The Geekcast #190 – Use Your Xbox on Two Screens
Posted on : 24-02-2010 | By : Aaron | In : Episodes
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Geek This Week:
Aaron:
Not too much geeking out for me this week. I’ve been watching mostly the Olympics and enjoyed the USA win over Canada in Men’s Hockey. One cool thing is that Nissan is heavily advertising the Leaf, which we featured on our show just two episodes ago!
Drop7: still a time-suck.
Gozer:
My new favorite podcast! Talkradar, it’s a gaming podcast that discusses new games and retro stuff as well. The thing that really hooked me is that whenever they discuss a game, they play the music and/or sound effects from that game.
http://ocremix.org/ This is a website devoted to video game music remixes. They have a little something from almost every game console.
Mass Effect 2 – I have all recruited, except the robot, and have completed every loyalty mission. Now i am just exploring the galaxy searching planets and trying to find anomalies. The anomalies, when discovered, turn into little bite sized missions.
I am a renegade, so i don’t take crap from anyone. Example, there was this women reporter being a bit nosy, so when my renegade option came up i hit the right trigger and it made Shepard punch her in the face!!
I am also tryina get with Jack, who is a female biotic. She’s crazy but is opening up to me. I did get an opportunity to have some meaningless @*# with her but told her i wanted to get to know her better. I figure since i am playing the bad guy this game she would be a good character to try to get with.
Last but not least, i am extremely excited about someone i am going to meet very soon.
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Tech and Gaming News:
Apple bans most (but not all) sexy apps
Apple has tightened its restrictions on sexy or suggestive apps for the iPhone and iPod Touch, and many of the most popular programs in the iTunes app store have been removed.
While speaking to the New York Times, Apple executive Phil Schiller explained, “It came to the point where we were getting customer complaints from women who found the content getting too degrading and objectionable, as well as parents who were upset with what their kids were able to see.”
Several days ago the developer of the Wobble app posted the results of his discussion with Apple on his blog. The Wobble app, which adds a jelly-like wobble motion to any user supplied photo, was recently removed because advertisements suggested it could be used on photos of breasts.
I have spoken with Apple, and the following are the new rules:
1. No images of women in bikinis (Ice skating tights are not OK either)
2. No images of men in bikinis! (I didn’t ask about Ice Skating tights for men)
3. No skin (he seriously said this) (I asked if a Burqa was OK, and the Apple guy got angry)
4. No silhouettes that indicate that Wobble can be used for wobbling boobs (yes – I am serious, we have to remove the silhouette in this pic)
5. No sexual connotations or innuendo: boobs, babes, booty, sex – all banned
6. Nothing that can be sexually arousing!! (I doubt many people could get aroused with the pic above but those puritanical guys at Apple must get off on pretty mundane things to find Wobble “overtly sexual!”)
7. No apps will be approved that in any way imply sexual content (not sure how Playboy is still in the store, but …)
While most apps containing bikini-clad women are threatened, Phil Schiller defended the Sports Illustrated app to the Times. “The difference is this is a well-known company with previously published material available broadly in a well-accepted format,” he said.
As of this morning, a Playboy app was also still available, suggesting Apple may accept sexual content if the developer is associated with a strong brand.
Apple has struggled to keep the app store clean, but these new policies remove many of the store’s most popular programs. Parents can enable the app store’s parental controls and adults can simply choose not to download content they do not approve of. In a blog post today, Fortune.com columnist Philip Elmer DeWitt linked the purge to next month’s release of the iPad tablet computer, which will run iTunes apps and which Apple plans to market for home and school use.
http://scitech.blogs.cnn.com/2010/02/23/apple-bans-most-but-not-all-sexy-apps/?hpt=T2
United Nations identifies e-waste as an urgent and growing problem, wants change
By Vladislav Savov posted Feb 23rd 2010 at 5:40AM
The reality of it is that electronic waste is rapidly populating ever-growing landfill areas in so-called developing countries and the issue has now garnered the attention of the United Nations. The UN Environment Programme has issued a wide ranging report warning that e-waste in China and South Africa could double or even quadruple within the next decade, whereas India could experience a five-fold rise. Major hazards exist in the unregulated and informal recycling of circuit boards and techno gadgets, as processes like backyard incineration for the retrieval of gold generate toxic gases while also being wildly inefficient. The whole point of the report is to encourage some global cooperation in setting up modern and safe recycling facilities in the affected countries to ameliorate the problem, though being generally more careful in our consumption and disposal of electronics wouldn’t do the environment’s chances any harm either.
http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/23/united-nations-identifies-e-waste-as-an-urgent-and-growing-probl/
Metal Gear Arcade mixes 3D glasses with head-tracking for this season’s hottest new look
By Paul Miller posted Feb 21st 2010 6:10AM
The arcade game is based on Metal Gear Online, but the head gear adds 3D and head-tracking to the experience. There’s also a physical gun controller, and the sit down arcade cabinets pump out your gunplay in huge 5.1 sound. This new arcade incarnation of the game will be playable at the AUO Expo in Japan this week, but we have no idea how long it will be until we can look this badass from the comfort of our own couch. Hit up the source link for a riveting video in Japanese that details this exclusive, outside-the-house experience.
http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/21/metal-gear-arcade-mixes-3d-glasses-with-head-tracking-for-this-s/
Wal-Mart buying Vudu streaming movie service?
By Joseph L. Flatley posted Feb 22nd 2010 2:52PM
According to The New York Times, the company has indeed agreed to purchase Vudu — giving it a leg up on digital distribution and helping to brace against a declining market for DVDs. Details are scarce, but apparently the two companies have been informing Hollywood studios and TV manufacturers about the plan all day — so an official announcement can’t be too far off.
http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/22/wal-mart-buying-vudu-streaming-movie-service/
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Test a Geek:
1) Q: What does the .1 in 5.1 surround sound stand for? A: The .1 refers to the “lfe” low frequency effects channel that only requires one tenth of the bandwith the other channels do.
2) Q:Who founded Wal – Mart and when was it founded? A: The company was founded by Sam Walton in 1962,incorporated on October 31, 1969, and listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 1972. Wal-Mart is the largest private employer[5] and the largest grocery retailer in the United States.
3) Q: How many miles will the Nissan Leaf go on one charge? A: Nissan claims the Leaf will go 100 miles on a single charge.
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How To: Connect 1 Xbox to 2 screens / Play any media file or online videos on your 360.
Connect your Xbox 360 to 2 screens
If you’ve got one of the component/composite dual video cables – the one that comes in the box with most 360s – you can have your console display on two TVs simultaneously. The trick is to flick the cable’s switch to Standard Definition but hook up the composite (yellow) cable to one screen and the component (the red, green, blue) cables to another. It won’t be high-def, but it could be handy if you’re staging a mini LAN party.
Play any media file or online video on your xbox 360
The free app Tversity neatly sidesteps the pointless video/audio restrictions Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo alike slap on their consoles, making them able to play any format. Again, you’ll need a PC on the same network, but it’s a simple matter of installing the program and having it scan the folders you keep your media in. It’ll replace the standard network file-sharing system Windows uses, but behaves pretty much the same way at the 360′s end. As well as that, it’ll convert unsupported files on the fly – though you’ll need a pretty beefy PC to do this with large video files, otherwise you’ll be waiting ages. You can also add online video URLs on the PC’s end – including Youtube – and then access those from the console.
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Ask A Geek: This segment will return on a future episode of The Geekcast
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Open Source Software: This segment will return on a future episode of The Geekcast
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Hack: This segment will return on a future episode of The Geekcast
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The Geek’s View: This segment will return on a future episode of The Geekcast
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