Up to this point in my life.

So my dreaded birthday is coming up again; which, means I start over analyzing my life and lack of achievements.

 

WORK:

I now, currently have 2 years of technical experience in which 1.5 are focused in .Net Programming. I have now worked for and consulted for 11 companies, and 2 government agencies. I still haven't applied for my certifications and have lots of new technologies to learn.

 

LIFE:

Still a loser. No girlfriend or friends within a 100 mile radius that I can hang out with on the weekend, but it's not like I'm looking or going to make a point of trying anytime in the future. I will always be an introvert and stay in my cave (dark bedroom).  I basically talk to only 2 of my friends from college, via online chat, on occasions.

Definitely been gaining weight, even though some of the gain is muscle, most of it is fat. I'm now seeing the effect of aging has on the body with some joint pain mostly in my feet. I really need to change my life and get healthier.

 

ENTERTAINMENT:

I'm starting to get bored; hence for the reason for buying a Wii, XBox 360, and World of Warcraft with expansion pack. Video games are just not as fun as they use to be, but it helps pass the time.

I have now watched 3,342 movies and tv-series. I now subscribe to 29 podcasts and visit Digg.com more often then I should.

 

Well, I predict that not much will change within the next year or so.

Microsoft Research: MySong

Another interesting concept coming out of Microsoft called MySong, and who says Microsoft isn't innovated? Check it out : http://research.microsoft.com/~dan/mysong/

So basically what MySong does is help make a melody of notes for your song based on your criteria (happy factor and jazz factor) and factors in your voice. Take a look: http://research.microsoft.com/~dan/mysong/mysong_1.swf

The software uses Hidden Markov Model as it's Artificial Intelligence approach to select the best melody sequence and notes to harmonize with the user's voice.

My complaints about Netflix

I really love how Netflix has revolutionize the video rental industry, no late fees, a self containing rental queue, ease of setup and returns, etc.. But, there is one major annoyance, beyond the scratchy DVDs I get, and that's the lack of showing me what are the good movies.

Recently I have notice is that the "New Releases", that it never shows any new popular released DVDs.

  The movies that are currently shown in the list are "Becoming Jane", "Beowulf", "Away From Her", "Jane Austin Book Club", "Sweet Land", and so on (mostly down hill from there if you can believe it). Where the f*** are the new movies like "No country for old men", "There will be Blood", "American Gangster", "The Mist", "30 days of Night",  etc...

What it seems to me, is that Netflix is only showing the least popular movies in the "Popular New Releases" category to offset buying these crappy DVDs. I first started thinking this when I viewed the "Movies you'll love" category. A category in which it is suppose to guess what movies I might like based on the ratings of my other movies. The suggestions are way off mark on what might be considered good, and I know that there are a few that should be listed instead.

I'm not too hard to figure out, heck I give most movies a 3 out of 5, 99% of the time, but the only movies I have in this section are very lacking any interest to me.

The worst section of them all is the "Watch Currently" section. This  is suppose to be a customer grabbing, new feature that gives the option to watch some movies instantly online. The thing is, the selections of movies are most often ranked under 3 stars. It is rare to find anything above.

To sum up, Netflix please stop jerking us around and give us better knowledge of the real popular movies and better choices. You will lose popularity real quick if there was any real competition (blockbuster doesn't even count).