Hu1u for n0n-US residents

If you want to watch Hulu or one of the US TV network's webcontent (which is usually solely for US residents) and have never been able to because it requires you to be watching in the US... this guide is for you.
How to bypass the country check at South Park Studios and in other places.

1. Get Firefox.
2. Download & Install "Modify-Headers"
3. Go to Tools -> Modify Headers
4. Click Configuration and check Always On: Enable ... and Open Modify Headers ....
5. At the top select "Add" from the drop down list. Type in X-Forwarded-For in the field to the left of the drop down list and 12.13.14.15 in the other one. Nvm the third field
6. Press "Add" and select your new lines and press Enable/disable if it isn't already enabled.
7. ????
8. Profit and watch South Park.

If someone can confirm that this works, it would be great.

Update: ok this doesn't seem to work for Hulu but it did work for comedy central. For Hulu, seems there are these VPN solutions.

The Future is here

This article about iPhone's very slow (almost negative!) adoption in Japan is really fascinating. Basically it says that the iPhone is eons behind all the other phones in Japan, it is clunky and has too few applications. This being the phone that is revered in (world-minus-Japan). Seems in Japan people replace their home PCs with phone/mobile devices and most phones feature really good cameras and get this, TV tuners. How cool is that!! Basically the fact that iPhone relies on a home computer to sync media and get updates completely misses the point.
The future is here, only in Japan :-) I wish I could click my heels three times and show up there...now! Really good article.

Useful trick!!

Just enter 'pwn' in front of any youtube video before the word 'youtube' and it'll send you to a download file.
For more details, see here.
Very nice :-)

DRM-free?

These Apple people are such sneaky people... makes me not want to buy anything from them!!
Although they are making their music in iTunes store DRM-free, they insert your email info into each song/video you purchase so that they can trace songs. Seriously Apple people???
Some thoughts:
- can't you just take out the email via a text-editor?
- wouldn't there be privacy concerns here for the consumer?
- seems Amazon puts inserts a watermark as well, but not related to the purchaser - only that it was purchased from Amazon.

Update:
Amazon doesn't watermark the songs itself. The labels that provide the songs do themselves so the good news is that the songs are not individually marked; i.e., the same song bought from two different accounts is bit-wise identical.

Interesting stuff

A most lovely sight is the descent into San Francisco, especially at night. When coming from the north, you fly south along the bay and then make almost a 360 turn before landing. The runway starts almost at the water so you fly low along the water and then you touch ground.
Sydney airport has a similar runway, but I have only landed there in day light, early morning to be exact. So none of the loveliness of the lights along the water.

On other news, "Footage from a video camera handed out by an Israeli human rights group appears to show Jewish settlers beating up Palestinians in the West Bank." The article is very sad and it still amazes me that Palestine can be legally occupied like that. It boggles the mind.
However, what was more surprising was the beautiful, practical and feasible solution to counter human rights violations, implemented by these people.

The human rights group called B'Tselem seems handed out about 100 video cameras to the palestinians in the west bank region.
The thinking behind the project is that when trouble flares, rather than just giving a statement to the Israeli police or army, video carries much more weight.
"The difference is amazing," says Oren Yakobovich, who leads the Shooting Back project.
"When they have the camera, they have proof that something happened. They now have something they can work with, to use as a weapon."

I really really liked this idea of handing out video cameras to build accountability. A wonderful use of new technology.

Nikola Tesla

Recently the hubby and I watch the movie The Prestige with Wolverine and Batman. In the movie, Wolverine contacted Nikola Tesla to build him a teleportation machine. Now as any physicist or engineer will tell you, Tesla is a name that is regularly heard in relation to magnetic fields and AC current. But I thought to myself, "how did Tesla get involved in the movie and the whole idea of teleportation? Why did the directors think of Tesla?".

After reading the following article, it all became clear! I knew Tesla invented AC current but wow - he invented so much!! and it seems he was famous for running currents thru his body to light up bulbs. Many argue that his work was much more important that that of Edison and yet the latter won is credited with more. Also there is some debate whether Tesla invented radio waves or it was really Marconi who is considered to be the father of wireless communication.
And then there was Tesla's idea of sending waves thru the earth (so called terrestrial waves) to maybe light up every part of the earth? :-) was he responsible for a huge explosion in siberia?

He seems to have been an amazing inventor.

I recommend reading this article to get an idea. It doesn't require any background knowledge and then you will see why he is the man :-) Also a lot of things that are referenced in the movie now make sense!

My new camera

I have a new camera!! yay!! It is Canon IXUS 850 or ELPH SD800 depending on your location - the former is the european name and the latter.. wait for it.. yes american. But .. magic.. they are the same.
Anyway It is a very cool camera, because of several features - first it is wide angle in a subcompact - though it is maybe a bit bigger than the average subcompact. Meanwhile it has a 3.8 optical zoom. Now the really nice features: it has image stabilizer so it compensates for shaky hands. Then there is the face recognition - the software is on the camera so it recognises the face(s) and focuses on them - for example when i was taking the above pic with my mac - it found the image of my face on the mac and focused on that!! how cool is that!!
I think we are going to have a very nice relationship :-)
For those who are interested, i got it from Dell for $280.
I love new gadgets!!

My Birthday

Is my birthday soon? Why is it that during the time of my birthday I had no idea what I wanted.. oh no, I had everything I wanted. And when my mum and my husband asked me about what i wanted i couldn't say what. But now.. alas, I have something i want. So can my birthday be next week? :-)Check out this beautiful female binary watch .. which is ultra cool. or is that ultra geeky? I don't know and I don;t care. This is one watch that I want! :-)
The only thing is that I saw this watch on the wrist of thi guy at the conference last week.. and it is pretty big watch. It kind of engulfed his hand. So I just have to make sure it doesn't swallow me up... but to be swallowed up by a binary... may be that won't be so bad! :-P

Extreme 3D experience

I found the following extremely cool 3D experience.

Try the virtual barbershop experience here - you have to put on your headphones and close your eyes.... and wait for the magic. It is amazing!

Also try the other ones the guy has posted - the second link has a woman whispering - and it is so funny some of the comments on that page... seems it was big success for a lot of the guys. One guy went so far as to think of the possibilities if this kind of thing was used in porno movies!

Return of the Fly

Yoo hoo... yes I mean you! Hello!!
I feel like I should re-introduce myself it has been so long since i have written. Yes yes my name is Phly, Gad Phly. Now, will you get me a martini? shaken, not stirred.
WHat!! you have no martini? fine,.. get me my new favourite drink, Mai Tai. yummmm.

Anyhow, i realized that I have gotten out of the habit of updating my blog. It really does end up being a habit - update blog or just send an email about the interesting item to some people? these days i have been emailing.
But with the following item things are going to change.
I read this BBC article about the new bear robots the US military are developing for the transport of casualties in battlefields. The future is coming!! According to the website:

1. Teddy bear face designed to be reassuring (How cool is that!!!)
2. Hydraulic upper body carries up to 227kgs (500lbs)
3. When kneeling tracked "legs" travel over rubble. Switches to wheels on smooth surfaces (ok this was also very cool - i think you can even tell how that would work based on the picture of the legs)
4. Dynamic Balance Behaviour (DBB) technology allows the robot to stand and carry loads upright on its ankles, knees or hips for nearly an hour

Hasta la vista.... senor bear!