So the weather is supposed to be 71 degrees and Stormy. I love summer storms. Well I like it when it rains and its’ warm out. I can’t wait to see how tomorrow turns out, if possible I’ll take pictures. I’ve also gotten really good at making my chocolate soufflés. I’ll have to work on a lemon variant next.

There hasn’t been a lot happening other than school. I’m finishing up my final project and getting ready to hit the real world.

I did however make an impulse purchase this past weekend. Well not really an impulse purchase, I’ve been keeping tabs on this TV for a month. So after going to Best Buy, seeing it was on sale for $300 less, and that there was a 2 year financing plan I bought it. I guess the 800 dollars in reward certificates helped a lot too. The employee was fairly shocked, and remarked how she hasn’t seen anyone with 38,000 reward points before. It became somewhat of a spectacle as other employees passed by and she would show them the total as she was finishing the transaction (I had to print out the certificates there). But I love the TV, it has passive 3D. Which is what I’ve been waiting for. I originally was going to wait a while to buy one, but I realized what would I be waiting for. What could be offered in a passive 3D TV that wasn’t offered in this one. So I bought it. Aside from it’s 3D feature it has internet connectivity, some sort of motion wand for control, and LED backlighting so I’m fairly pleased. Too bad it weighs a ton. My 57″ DLP weighs like 20 pounds-ish, this LG TV weighs 40. It’s crazy.

But I do believe Passive 3D is the way to go. The benefits far outweigh the disadvantages (“half” resolution and reduced brightness). The glasses are simply polarizers so they don’t require batteries, and they don’t cost $150-$200 for 1 pair of glasses. The passive glasses cost 2 for $25. The lack of cross-talk is nice, and so far the quality is excellent. But until they find a way to make 3D a necessity, much like HD is, I don’t see it going anywhere fast. It is cool, don’t get me wrong, but people can get by without it.

If you’re looking to improve your gaming chops, 3D may or may not help but an electric jolt to your temples might. I’m waiting for someone to develop some type of helmet that provides a constant electric current to give them the upper hand in some kind of tourney. You know Korea might already have developed one for Starcraft 2 Tournaments.

So as some of you may be aware the PSN has been down for about 6 days now. Gamers are in an uproar about it. Even CNN has covered the story. A lot of people believe that some splinter cell of anonymous did it. There may be some truth in that. But regardless, the reason they originally attacked Sony was because of the George Hotz lawsuit. While I think Sony was well-founded to protect their property from getting pirated, Hotz really can do whatever he wants with what he buys. Posting the root key online however, not cool. Despite being down for 6 days, Sony has left all but the vaguest of descriptions for the situation. Though there are rumors that jailbroken PS3s have taken advantage of the PSN store and basically looted it with fake credit cards. We’ll see what happens.

What bothers me the most is this entitlement that people are feeling to free product. I think jubylives, a commenter on a forum thread, puts it the best. I completely agree with him. Plus, I find it very sad that people haven’t been able to find something else to do for 6 days. Whether it be single-player gaming or spending time with real human beings in the tangible world. PSN users are entitled to nothing because of this outage. It’d be different if we were paying 50 bucks a year to be able to play online, but the service we are being given is free. F-R-E-E. You don’t pay a cent for it. I think Bionic Commando 2: Re-Armed is the only game affected by this outage because of the DRM, but overall single-player still works (unlike the leap year bug of 2008) and there are thousands of other things you can do that don’t require the PSN. It’s like if you bought a car and it broke down after using it for a couple years. The dealer doesn’t have to gift you anything to fix it. Maybe not the best analogy but I think it’s relevant.