White is coming...

After the DRM toolkit thingy, Sony fills up again the news headline. But this time it’s Sony Computer Entertainment of Europe’s white PSP ads.

The billboard located somewhere in Netherlands. It says "PlayStation Portable White is coming"

The advert that shows a white woman clutching a black woman’s chin receives a diverse reaction among Americans. Some of them said that the advert is racist while other sees nothing wrong about it. Actually it is intended for the Dutch advert of the white ceramic PSP not for Americans.

The controversial white ceramic PSP

"Whilst the images used in the campaign were intended solely to highlight the contrast between the different colors available for the PSP, we recognize that the subject matter of one specific image may have caused concern in some countries not directly affected by the advertising," the company said in a statement. "As a result, we have now withdrawn the campaign."*

Another version of the advert

As for the Dutch ad, Sony is promising to think twice about selling products with the imagery of interracial fighting from here on out. "In the future, we will apply greater sensitivity in our selection of campaign imagery and will take due account of the increasingly global reach of such local adverts and their potential impact in other countries."*

*source: MTV News

Ark’s Point
>I can’t see anything wrong about the advert. I say it because I’m not affected of the racism issues among black and white people. But if you ask a black people, he probably might say it’s racial. That’s the logic of this problem. We know that racism is a critical issue to the citizens of United States and most of them are black that are more affected on that matter so we can’t blame them reacting violently on the advertisement.

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Desktop ClocX

Personalize your desktop with this cool tool. ClocX is a free analog clock application for Windows 98/ME/NT/2000/XP/2003. You can choose from different designs and colors. Customize its size and transparency. Also have an alarm function that can play sounds, execute programs and even shutdown your computer. Here are some available skins on the full version.

Direct link to ClocX download

Standard Version (879KB)

http://clocx.php5.cz/files/ClocX15b1.exe

Full Version (6545 KB, contains Standard version + addtitional clock images)

http://clocx.php5.cz/files/ClocXfull.exe

For more skins visit http://www.clocx.tk

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Cloth Folding Trick

If you are finding a hard time folding your clothes this short video can help you. If you can’t understand what the lady in the video saying, just follow what she’s doing.

I have a hard time figuring out on how to do it. Good luck.

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FIFA World Cup 2006: Now Playing

I’m not a huge football fan or even a little. I only enjoy watching it but don’t have favorite team in particular. We don’t have a cable so I will not able to see it regularly. Football is not that popular to us Filipinos compare to the well loved basketball. Maybe because were not that much exposed to this kind of sports. So I make a little research.

FIFA or Fédération Internationale de Football Association was founded on May 21, 1904 in Paris, France. The first World Cup was held in Uruguay, where the home nation took the first World Cup title. This was held every four years. Due to World War II, after the 1938 World Cup, the tournament was not played again until 1950. Brazil leads with total of five World Cup title, they got their latest on the last 2002 World Cup held in Yokohama, Japan.

Here is the complete list of World Cup winners

1930 held in Montevideo, Uruguay -Uruguay won over Argentina 4-2

1934 held in Rome, Italy -Italy won over Czechoslovakia 2-1

1938 held in Paris, France -Italy won over Hungary 4-2

1950 held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil -Uruguay won over Brazil 2-1

1954 held in Bern, Switzerland -West Germany won over Hungary 3-2

1958 held in Stockholm, Sweden -Brazil won over Sweden 5-2

1962 held in Santiago, Chile -Brazil won over Czechoslovakia 3-1

1966 held in London, England -England won over West Germany 4-2

1970 held in Mexico City, Mexico -Brazil won over Italy 4-1

1974 held in Munich, West Germany -West Germany won over Netherlands 2-1

1978 held in Buenos Aires, Argentina -Argentina won over Netherlands 3-1

1982 held in Madrid, Spain -Italy won over West Germany 3-1

1986 held in Mexico City, Mexico -Argentina won over West Germany 3-2

1990 held in Rome, Italy -West Germany won over Argentina 1-0

1994 held in Pasadena, USA -Brazil won over Italy 0*-0 (*-penalty 3-2)

1998 held in Paris, France -France won over Brazil 3-0

2002 held in Yokohama, Japan -Brazil won over Germany 2-0

2006 held in Germany -on going-

On the on going FIFA World Cup 2006, there are 32 competing countries in 64 games.

FACT: Philippines is ranked 191 in FIFA World Ranking-Asia

See Full Ranking here

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Overprotective Sony BMG

Sony Digital Right Management (DRM) a toolkit designed to prevent people from pirating CD’s. If you think that this is a good move from Sony, to cut down piracy, read this first and you tell me if it’s a nifty one.

How does DRM works?

The DRM toolkit found on the CD’s of Sony, it turned out, surreptitiously installed software in your PC that prevented it from copying CD’s. You don't have to be ripping the CD, either--just playing it from your CD-ROM drive triggers the installation. If that wasn’t bad enough, it opened a backdoor that potentially allowed viruses in an even introduced incompatibility issues with computer CD players, DVD players and even car stereos.

Many people boycott the audio CD’s of Sony and gain bad reputation to the consumers. And they label Sony BMG as consumer-unfriendly. According to computer experts, the patch created by Sony might cause some computer to crash. Microsoft and Symantec called DRM as a backdoor Trojan virus.

PC World include Sony BMG as one of the Winner and Loser of 2005 list twice,

LOSER: Sony BMG Entertainment

Adding copy protection to CDs is onerous enough, but Sony BMG Entertainment and its tech partner First 4 Internet went completely beyond the pale. Insert certain Sony BMG CDs into your PC's disc drive and they would secretly install First 4 Internet's XCP software, which not only limited the number of copies you could make, but also made your system vulnerable to hack attacks. Sony BMG then posted a "fix" that made matters worse, before issuing a recall of the music CDs, offering refunds and promising to discontinue using XCP. It turns out the record company knew about the vulnerability for at least two weeks before blogger Mark Russinovich made the news public last Halloween. Thanks for sharing, Sony.

EXTREME LOSER: Sony BMG Entertainment

Researchers at Information Security Partners recently identified a security flaws with SunnComm's MediaMax, an alternative copy-protection scheme found on other Sony BMG CDs. The flaw could allow a remote attacker to hijack a user's PC. This time, Sony responded with a patch almost immediately--which was quickly found to have the exact same flaws. Can you say "consumer boycott?"
Not only Sony BMG is into copy control issues, EMI Music's Copy Control is a Macrovision based technology that effectively makes ripping a CD digitally a hassle. But according EMI, their Copy Control technology doesn’t install or have “rootkit.”

Would you boycott Sony BMG and EMI audio CD's?

I own one EMI CD with Copy Protect technology, Dramachine by Sugarfree and I dont have problem with the CD.

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Mabuhay Pilipinas

Happy 108th Philippine Independence Day

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NBA Finals 2006: Fearless Forecast

Dallas Mavericks vs. Miami Heat

Both teams are on their first appearance on the NBA finals.

Who Should Win

Dallas Mavericks

Mavericks do a lot of hard work to be in this year’s final. If they make it, I’m looking forward to Dirk’s first MVP award. Terry and Stackhouse also contribute a huge part for this along with the Dallas basketball soldiers.

Who Will Win

Miami Heat

After beating Detroit during the Play-offs, I knew Heat will be this year’s champ. Statistically speaking, the Dallas Mavericks has a huge advantage when it comes to bench scoring, but who’s going to stop the raging flame of Wade, Walker, Payton and O’Neal.

Prediction: HEAT in SIX

These are only my opinion. You can comment violently on the FEARLESS forecast.

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Speak English Please!

According to European Chamber of Commerce, 75 percent of 400,000 college graduates have sub-standard English skills. It’s a shame for us Filipinos that is noted as one of the best English speaking nations. Also in official achievement test given to graduating high school students in 2004-2005 school year showed that only 6.59 percent could read, speak, and comprehend English well enough to enter college. And the worst is 44.25 percent had no English skills at all. And we are nearing the bottom rank when it comes to international achievement test in all subjects.

What happen to our knowledge we learn from our beloved teachers and professors. It looks like our country’s education system is already deteriorating. Many factors can affect the quality of education taught in school, like in public schools that is lacking of teachers, classroom, desks and chairs that leads to a two up to three shifts of classes per day. So the students spend less time in school and gain limited information. On the other hand the problems encountered on the private schools are the hiring of less experienced and not well trained teachers. That’s not only the problem, according to Matthew Gray an American who trains Filipinos to speak with American accents for jobs at call centers, there is plenty to blame, cell-phone text messaging and the popularity of foreign soap operas dubbed into the Filipino language. While Neil Perez, an English and Literature lecturer at the University of Santo Tomas, blames the decline on the influence of pop culture and domestic media, where the dominant language is “taglish,” a combination of Tagalog and English.

Even Pres. Macapagal-Arroyo has ordered the education department to make English as primary medium for instruction nationwide, the decree does not have the force of law to compel schools to do. The bill passed by Eduardo Gullas in 2004 to make English the medium of instruction at all levels in schools, still sits in the House of Representative.

Not only the government are eager to raise the Pinoy youth English skills. Private sectors like the European Chamber, along with other local business groups, recently launched a program called “English is Cool”, aims to revive the fading English of Pinoy youth. According to Rina Tanchoco, the program director, the decline of English among Filipinos is “definitely repairable and reversible”. That gives a lot of hope, so better take the opportunity of having those programs. In an increasingly globalize economy, English is a key for employment overseas. We may be left far behind by China and India.

facts source: The Philippine Daily Inquirer
AFP

Funny, writing this took a lot of time, I honestly admit I’m not proficient in English. So if you have seen any grammatical error on my article, feel free to comment.

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