About me

I'm a geek working as a distance learning specialist for a large corporation.

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First Stargate: SG-1 went down after 10 years. Now, Stargate: Atlantis has hit the wall after five years. That's all she (they) wrote. Next up... another spin-off (in the fall,Two Stargates down, one set to go

This week I had two days completely to myself. My wife took the girls with her to her sister's house early on Monday, and got back very late on TuesdayIt's official. I'm boring.

Comcast ran an "exclusive" interview with Joss Whedon, creator of the scif-fi series, Firefly and it's follow-up movie, Serenity. Fans of the series have been talking about a movie trilogySerenity/Firefly — End of the line

Okay, I get distracted for a little while and suddenly there's new stuff in the Star Wars universe. I can feel the geek in me slipping away... But at least IStar Wars trailers

Aquaman has been the butt of jokes for as long as I can remember. He was never one of my favorite superheroes, but ever since I saw the character portrayedReview: Aquaman (Mercy Reef)

[caption id="attachment_730" align="alignright" width="300" caption="The Dark is Rising sequence"][/caption] When the Dark comes rising, six shall turn it back; Three from the circle, three from the track; Wood, bronze, iron; water, fire, stone; FiveThe Dark Is Rising, except on film (Review: The Seeker)

Parkin's Lot: Stupid in America Godfrey Parkin takes the notion (supported by a study) that America's public schools, on average, produce substandard education, and applies it to corporate environments. As he says,America's schools ineffective? Challenges for corporate learning

Some of you know about the other site I had up, caddickscabin.com, that housed all my family pictures and some other stuff that less than nobody ever looked at. Well,Death of a domain: caddickscabin.com

Well, apparently you guys are really interested in my death. The last post, I want to end my life, but I'm too lazy, has been the top of the pageMaking a suicide pact

I just caught up on my JMSNews reading and found a few items I thought I'd point out. First, we have a tentative release time for Babylon 5: The Lost TalesBabylon 5 / JMS updates

I finally got around to seeing Crash tonight. As you have probably heard, this is an excellent movie. A little hard to follow at times, but well worth the effort. ThereReview: Crash

Watchmen broke ground as a comic book/graphic novel. The movie was extremely faithful, with few exceptions, to the book. Is that a good thing? Going in to this film, I thought,Review: Watchmen

The coolest thing about The Illusionist is that every trick he does is something that can be performed practically. The movie does use a little CGI because of production constraintsReview: The Illusionist

Diabetes breakthrough Before you get too excited, let me say this: from my read of the article, it's a long time before humans could benefit, and even when they can, you'llA cure for Type I diabetes?

[caption id="attachment_1017" align="alignright" width="466" caption="Gwen and Rhys Cooper saving children from the military"][/caption] Russell T. Davies has a knack with stories. He's very good at writing stories that - despite plotTorchwood: Children of Earth - Review

Does a sex offender live near you?

National Sex Offender Registry

Familywatchdog.us is a pretty impressive site. Not only does it provide an extremely important service, but it is a great use of technology. It also shows how a little information can be used to make your life very public.

The purpose of the site, as you might guess, is to let you know whether any registered sex offenders live or work within a certain distance of the address you enter. The . . . → Read More: Does a sex offender live near you?

SkillSoft buys NETg

[article no longer available]Thomson Announces Strategic Realignment of Operations; Company to Sell Education Businesses – MarketWatch

[tag]Thomson NETg[/tag] and [tag]SkillSoft[/tag] have been trading 1st and 2nd place in the [tag]enterprise e-learning[/tag] space for years. Yesterday, SkillSoft announced it is purchasing its biggest rival for about $285M.

NETg Sale Agreement Signed * Thomson has agreed to sell NETg, a leading provider of continuing corporate education and training, to Skillsoft PLC (SKIL) for approximately $285 million. The . . . → Read More: SkillSoft buys NETg

‘Halo’ – Game Over?

Variety.com – ‘Halo’ pic loses its studios

[tag]Fox Studios[/tag] and [tag]Universal Studios[/tag] have backed out of their deal to finance the [tag]Halo movie[/tag], based on the popular [tag]video game[/tag] by [tag]Bungie[/tag] and [tag]Microsoft[/tag].

The studios exercised their option to back out right before a deadline that would require an advance payment to Microsoft, who also would receive 10% of the movies profits.

While the exit of two studios would seem to imperil “Halo,” . . . → Read More: ‘Halo’ – Game Over?

Eudora goes Open Source

Monkey Bites

The post is missing a few details (perhaps because they aren’t available), but it looks like the popular Eudora email client from Qualcomm is being completely re-written, using the Mozilla Thunderbird code-base as its engine, and released to the public as open source.

Eudora is a well-loved if somewhat outdated email client that many people (Qualcomm claims millions of users, which sounds accurate) continue to use just for its unique feature set. Eudora . . . → Read More: Eudora goes Open Source

Stephen Colbert, a Greenscreen, and ILM

Star Wars: Community | ILM’s Greenscreen Challenge Entry

Stephen Colbert, of the Comedy Central’s Colbert Report, issued a challenge to the public at large to put his lightsaber antics in front of a greenscreen into a full battle with monsters.

ILM picked up the challenge and ran with it. The result: butt-kickin’ Jedi political commentary.

And it came in second place!

Go to the Colbert Report site to see the winner, and some other great . . . → Read More: Stephen Colbert, a Greenscreen, and ILM

Review: Heroes Ep 1-3

I’ve been holding off on posting my thoughts until I felt I had a real grasp for quality of the show. Well, I can now say that I firmly believe this to be the best new show of this year. Heroes has it all: drama, mystery, suspense, action, and special effects.

After the first episode, I was impressed, but it still seemed like it was missing a bit of the punch I was hoping for. . . . → Read More: Review: Heroes Ep 1-3

Stargate SG-1 ends its run on Direct-to-DVD

Slice of Scifi – Science Fiction TV & Movie News, Interviews & more » BREAKING Stargate SG-1 News

This is both great and disappointing.

On the one hand, we get to see the end of the Ori storyline. That’s excellent. I’m glad they figured out a way to make that happen.

On the other hand, it’s direct-to-DVD. That just screams “second-class”. Hardly fitting for a record-breaking, high quality TV series.

There will be a total . . . → Read More: Stargate SG-1 ends its run on Direct-to-DVD

Torchwood trailer

YouTube – Torchwood – First proper trailer

Someone has posted a preview trailer for Torchwood, the Dr. Who spinoff series. It’s basically a character list and some special effects, but I like the look of it. I’m still in.

[tags]Torchwood, Doctor Who, John Barrowman[/tags]

VeinViewer

From Elliott Masie’s Learning TRENDS newsletter comes news of a new tool to help doctors and nurses.

Projected Vein Locations: This weekend I saw a fascinating new “performance support” system – one that helps doctors and nurses find veins easily when drawing blood or inserting an IV. At Wired’s NextFest in NYC, I had a chance to demonstrate “The VeinViewer” by Luminetx. Using near-infrared beams, the device locates veins and arteries below the skin and . . . → Read More: VeinViewer