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iTunes 4.5 breaks all of the old tools for both decrypting encrypted AAC files and for downloading shared songs over the network. This guy not only figured out the entire authentication process but has written an application/library for playing back iTunes music in other programs besides iTunes or over a network. His whole site makes for an interesting read.
-CGP fo Life-
This excellent MacOSXHints.com article explains in detail how to use your firewire equipped mac to record HDTV signals at full resolution for free. All that is needed is a HDTV cable box with FireWire (Since April 1st the FCC requires your Cable company to offer you one), a mac with firewire, NinjaMonkey, and tons of hard drive space. The only downsides are some HDTV signals are encrypted (unplayable), the files can only be played back in VLC, and video at 1920x1080 and 1280x720 (1080i and 720p) takes up huge amounts of drive space.
-CGP fo Life-
Apple put the smack down on PlayFair twice, so grab FairTunes while you can.
"Convert any authorized protected iTunes song into an unprotected, uncompressed file.
Supports AIFF, Wave, QuickTime, System 7 Sound, MuLaw, and AVI file creation.
Easy to use - no complicated setup needed.
Built for Mac OS X"
And unlike PlayFair no PC or iPod is needed. Download and share it before they get DMCA'ed to death.
-CGP fo Life-
More proof that some people have far too much free time on their hands, someone has recreated the Delorean from the Back to the Future movies and is selling it on ebay. From the auction:
"You never will again in this accurate recreation of the DeLorean Time Machine made famous in the Back to the Future movie series. This recreation was painstakingly researched for nearly 5 years before construction. Dozens of original photographs, details, and interviews with the original vehicle builders and collectors were compiled to make sure no detail was left un-accounted for. All of the interior and exterior Time Machine components were made to last, but at the same time not damage the integrity of the original vehicle. From custom fabricated aluminum work, to vac-formed plastic, and cast resin - this vehicle faithfully and accurately recreates the look and feel of the original movie car. Stainless steel body panels, grey leather interior, 5-speed manual transmission, V-6 engine with Bosch Fuel injection. Motion picture parts replicated through archival photos and extensive research; working interior and exterior lighting system including the "Flux Capacitor", "Time Circuits" and exterior "Flux Dispersion Banding""
-CGP fo Life-
Online game apparently created by/for this Czech company to promote Crate and Barrel aficionado Quentin Tarantino's new film Kill Bill in Eastern Europe. Here is the Kill Bill Game Link. Now you too can slice and dice, enjoy.
Unxmaal.com points out the Rasterbator. A very very cool website that takes any image you give it and makes it HUGE, and rasterizes the image into various sized dots. The resulting image is broken up into pages and downloadable as a pdf file. Then you can print the hundreds of pages out when you get to work the next day. I love the smell of hot toner in the morning.
-CGP fo Life-
Business as we know it in the San Bernardino Valley is at a standstill. Warehouses, couches, and sleazy motels all over Van Nuys and Chatsworth will be empty and KY-less for the next 60 days as the porn industry has put a voluntary stop to all productions. Darren James, has been tested HIV positive. He reportedly got it riding bareback in Brazil. Some news agencies are reporting that another actor has tested positive as well, but no name has been released. The 1200 regular actors and actresses are tested about every 3 to 4 weeks, and not a single HIV case has been found since 1999.
-CGP fo Life-
The TailViper is a small device that goes on your skateboard and makes crazy sparks when it comes in contact with rough surfaces. How long till someone grinds through a gas station and blows themselves up?
-CGP fo Life-
Alex Borstein, who plays the voice of Lois on the soon to return television show The Family Guy, has updated her website with some great news for Family Guy fans:
"Well, after my first week back at Family Guy I can say that we are going to deliver some funny freakin' stuff. It's a great group of writers with still more to start in the next coming weeks.
We will be very busy in the next few months getting the new story ideas together and then writing them. In late May we will start to record the new shows. "
In some bad news, rumors reporting that Futurama might return are unfounded as the production team no longer wishes to work together and production costs for the show are much higher than most other animation shows.
-CGP fo Life-
Moshdaddy sent us this. Dont know who made it, dont care.
-CGP fo Life-
Playfair is a free open-source app to strip the FairPlay protection from AAC files purchased from the iTunes Store. It must be run first on the computer the music is authorized for, and then must be transfered to a PC or iPod but the results are DRM-less AAC music. The project was hosted by SourceForge.net until Apple sent them a cease and disist, the new server is somewhere in India.
-CGP fo Life-
Professional SteadyCam's cost thousands of dollars and require huge amounts of back and leg strength. A student at CMU has created one for $14 worth of parts one could get at Home Depot. Check out his site for instructions and sample videos that are quite impressive.
-CGP fo Life-
Subservient Chicken is a VERY strange mock webcam that allows users to suggest what a man in a chicken suit does. Type in what you want to see and he does it. Here is a list of the thousands of commands that the chicken will respond to with over 300 actions. Try asking him to: "riverdance", "bonghit", "moonwalk", "home alone", and the absolute best "die".
-CGP fo Life-
Antivirus company Intego has issued a Press Release regarding the first trojan horse that affects Mac OS X:
"The Trojan horse's code is encapsulated in the ID3 tag of an MP3 (digital music) file. This code is in reality a hidden application that can run on any Macintosh computer running Mac OS X.
Mac OS X displays the icon of the MP3 file, with an .mp3 extension, rather than showing the file as an application, leading users to believe that they can double-click the file to listen to it. But double clicking the file launches the hidden code, which can damage or delete files on computers running Mac OS X, then iTunes to play the music contained in the file, to make users think that it is really an MP3 file . While the first versions of this Trojan horse that Intego has isolated are benign, this technique opens the door to more serious risks.
This Trojan horse has the potential to do any of the following:
- Delete all of a user's personal files
- Send an e-mail message containing a copy of itself to other users
- Infect other MP3, JPEG, GIF or QuickTime files"
Maybe switchers will feel more at home now.
-CGP fo Life-
Those crazy dutch are at it again. In between trips from the coffee shops to the red light district, they have found time to shove chunks of metal into people's eyes and get paid MAD LOOT for it.
"The procedure involves inserting a 3.5 mm (0.13 inch) wide piece of specially developed jewellery -- the range includes a glittering half-moon or heart -- into the eye's mucous membrane under local anaesthetic at a cost of 500 to 1,000 euros"
-CGP fo Life-
Lik-Sang is now selling the GBA Time Machine, an adapter that lets you play Famicon games on your Gameboy Advance! The Famicon was the Japanese version of the NES, and with a cheap adapter you can use this with your american NES games. With the new NES styled (pictured above) GBA it's a perfect match.
-CGP fo Life-
For just £28,250.00 (auction price at the time of writing) you can finally fulfill your dream of being a Bond movie supervillian! This massive drill was used to dig half of the tunnel that connects England to France. Imagine the possibilities!!! Start a Batcave construction service. Dig a hole to china for quick authentic takeout. Start a mole person cult.
-CGP fo Life-
It's about ¥20,000, and only available in Japan, but who has 2 days to let the sun charge their iPod besides the dirty hippies following Phish?
-CGP fo Life-
MacNN is reporting that Mark/Space has announced The Missing Sync for the Tapwave Zodiac! The Zodiac is a palm based portable gaming device made by ex-Apple and ex-Palm employees. It's got a huge screen, good graphics and sound, bluetooth, SD slot, force feedback, and can run any Palm OS application. But, and this is a fairly big but, absolutly zero mac support. No palm or iSync. Tapwaves retail games, movies, and mp3's cannot be installed from a mac. You can however send normal Palm .prc files via bluetooth to the device. For $40, The MissingSync should do all of this and even transfer your highscores from the Zodiac to Tapwave's website. I love my Zodiac, maybe now that I can use it as a PDA I will love it more.
-CGP fo Life-
Reuters is reporting that the six main voices from The Simpsons: Dan Castellaneta , Nancy Cartwright , Yeardley Smith , Julie Kavner , Hank Azaria and Harry Shearer, are currently striking for a pay raise. The actors reportedly want to raise their pay from $125,000 an episode to $360,000 per episode! While this doesnt even come close to the $1 million+ per episode pay that Ray Romano or the actors from Friends recieve, each episode only takes about a day of work for these voice actors. Hopefully this will be settled soon.
-CGP fo Life-
