Rants

Okay, here's a good one.

So apparently, a modification called "Hot Coffee" to Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (story here) has pissed off some politicians and parents who are afraid that kids might see it.

Okay, let me get this straight. GTA:SA is a game where you are required to kill people, usually in bloody, disturbed ways, and you can run around beating old ladies to death with tire irons, blowing up cars, and causing all kinds of destructive mayhem, but... people are upset at a patch that shows a couple of people having sex?!!!

People, get your fucking priorities straight already!!!

I am getting tired of this hypocritical attitude people have when it comes to "protecting the chiiiiiiiildren!" Apparently it's okay to show kids murder and wanton destruction, but sex is verboten, no way, that will corrupt their minds!

Get a grip, folks. Turn your brains on; if you want to protect kids from something you perceive as "evil", protect them from all the "evil", otherwise you'll just look like freakin' hypocrites. The fact that politicians are taking these people seriously is disturbing.

Tiger cubs breastfed by woman die

Gee, I'm so surprised.

NOT!

You would think the staff of a zoo would know that human milk is inappropriate for cats. Even I know that, and I'm not a vet or an expert by any stretch!

Not to mention, one cub died several days before the other, which you'd think would have clued them into realizing "Gee, maybe human breastmilk is inappropriate for cats." But noooo.

Two innocent animals die because people don't know how to take care of them properly. I'd expect this to happen with untrained persons caring for cats, but a ZOO? What the hell?

Sorry, I just had to rant. All our tigers at Vanishing Species are healthy and plump and beautiful, and it's not like we're swimming in money there, either. This didn't have to happen.

-Z

I'm really getting tired of seeing this crap spammed all over the net. This is simply a new method of spamming, in which the companies get Internet users to do the spamming instead of doing it themselves. The companies doing this really love it; they basically promise someone a free gadget, and that person will spam for them until the ends of the earth!

Yes, I realize that a few folks actually are getting free PSPs and iPods and the like, but only at the cost of annoying millions of people (collectively) with all this extra spam. Just think: In order to get a free gadget with these deals, you have to get at least 3-5 other people to sign up as well; this leads to exponential amounts of extra SPAM!

Folks, pleeeease avoid the "Free xxxx" deals. All they're doing is paying you to spam, and this makes you NO BETTER than your typical junk E-mail spammer. Also, avoid helping others when they post these links, as this just continues to encourage the problem. I can't even read online forums and usenet anymore without seeing "FREE PSP!" or "FREE IPOD!" plastered all over the place!

So this morning I get in my car to go to work, and put on 93.1, and.. Party 93.1 is GONE! What the hell? They're playing boring 90's rock music now!

Party 93.1 was an AWESOME South Florida radio station that played nothing but dance music. New dance, classic dance, you name it. They had these great classic freestyle mix shows at noon and filled a market that simply didn't exist anymore in this area.

They seemed to be doing well, too, with lots of promotions, and lots of people I know were listeners.

So why the hell did they abandon their market? They were the ONLY dance radio station in this market at the moment; there are already several rock stations. How can they possibly hope to compete? Not to mention they now have millions of angry listeners wondering where the hell Party 93.1 went. Power 96 is completely useless now, since they play nothing but hip-hop. So us dance music listeners have nowhere to go.

I called the old number, but couldn't get through. I bet thousands of former Party 93.1 listeners are complaining at the moment. I honestly hope they get mercilessly harassed into changing back to the dance format.

If not, I'm going to miss hearing all those freestyle tracks again. It was such a great path through memory lane...

UPDATE 3/25/2005: I'd like to thank everyone for their comments here. I never expected my little rant about this station dying would draw so many comments. It just further proves what a great station this was and what a crime it was for Cox to do a format flip. Hopefully dance will be back; Party 93.1 had good ratings, so I bet some other company is working on filling the hole... The market is out there!

Another UPDATE 4/19/2005: This has become a somewhat popular post, so any trolls or flames will be deleted. Thank you. }:)

UPDATE 4/29/2005: I found Salsa 98.3FM playing Freestyle today a bit after noon while scanning for radio stations across the dial. The fact that a Spanish station is playing Freestyle with english lyrics shows that there is indeed a market for it!

Okay, pardon my French, but, what in the FUCK has happened to the Discovery Channel?

Every time I turn it on, all I see are shows about rebuilding cars, motorcycles, turning semis into trebuchets, and so on. It seems that Discovery Channel has turned into the Gearhead Channel. Most of the good programming I remember seeing on it years ago, such as wildlife documentaries, science-related programming, shows about aircraft, war documentaries, and so on have either completely vanished, or moved to spinoff channels that I don't get.

Not that I have anything against gearheads, and sometimes I do find those shows interesting, but overall the channel's transformation is negative. Why not spin the gearhead stuff off to another channel, and keep the regular "Discovery Channel" a home for general science and technology programming?

Sad, really...