New Free Halo 3 Map: Cold Storage

Got this via the Xbox.com Marketplace RSS feed: Celebrate Bungie Day!

Grab this new multiplayer map free.
Grab this new multiplayer map free.

Cold Storage Map

Once, the Cold Storage facility was a vibrant, active research center on Installation 05. An accidental contamination resulted in an unforeseen outbreak, which compromised the Forerunner center. Now, emptied and silent, watched only by a local caretaker, the abandoned structure serves as a reminder of how something as powerful as science is ultimately beholden to nature. This new map is available free starting on 7/7.

Downloaded it a few days ago. Haven’t got a chance to try it out yet.

High Risk Credit Card Holders Logic?

Not sure if you caught my recent entry on how Consumerist Banned Me From Commenting, but Consumerist just posted their The Consumerist Comments Code, which I’m not sure if I have a factor in causing or not.

The first point they make is: No junk comments:

Your comment should be a meaningful response to the issue raised in the post. Objections to an editor’s headlines or writing style should be emailed directly to the post’s author. Verboten: “Why is this on Consumerist?“, “tldr”, “Why did they even shop there in the first place?”, “This is a non-issue”, “Slow news day?” “Pwnd” “Yawn”, “First”, “People still ______” (use dialup, eat fast food, breathe air, and so forth), “Old news”, “lol”, “This is why I don’t shop there,” etc.

My comments aren’t exactly “Why is this on Consumerist?”. Usually I provide one or more reasons why it should not be on Consumerist.

What happens if I break these rules?

You may be banned. We might warn you in the comments. We also might not. If you ignore a warning, you will probably be banned. If you feel your ban is unwarranted, email your appeal to moderator@consumerist.com and we’ll see if we can work it out.

I find it quite useless to try to warn users inside the comment section. Often times I would post a comment and never return to see the story again. I wonder why they don’t just email the user giving him the warning.

Anyway, Consumerist recently posted this article: Risk-Based Pricing Is A Myth and I have long wondered a very similar question.

How exactly does increasing interest rates or charging late fees help you in getting money from someone who’s already late paying the bill? Logically, I’d try to make it easier for them so they actually can pay you.

As noted in the article, late fees and high interests rates don’t mitigate risk, they just make credit card companies filthy rich. I like the idea of how if you’re late on a payment or if your financial situation has changed (loss a job), decreasing your credit limit sounds like a good way to mitigate risk. If someone can’t ever make enough money to utilize their full credit line, I don’t see how increasing interest rates is going to make it work any better.

Though I do have to say, thanks to all you “high-risk” credit card holders, “low-risk” credit card users like myself can reap the benefit of rewards and cash back. For that, I thank you.

Happy 4th of July!!!

Happy 4th of July everyone!

Going over to TekMan’s place later today for some BBQ, games, and fireworks. 🙂

This is just going to be a post with random crap. Haven’t done that in awhile.

Pulled an All Nighter

Anyway, it’s been a very long week for me. I’ve been coming home at 3 or 4am every night. Last night I even pull an all-nighter. Haven’t done one of those in a long time. I can’t believe how hard it is now. I remember doing it all the time in college. Of course people were shocked to find me early at work at 9am in the morning and most of they correctly assumed I haven’t gone home yet. You see, I’m renowned for coming in late. ;p

Anyway, my manager came into my office at 2pm and told me that I look horrible and should go home immediately and if I need to, just work some more after I get some rest. I decided I couldn’t really function well after being awake over 24 hours.

Always Be Careful With Bengay

So parts of my arm have been hurting (not exactly why). So I decided to apply some Bengay which usually helps and by the next morning, the pain is gone. Anyway, after applying Bengay, I went to the restroom to wash my hands so I can resume using my keyboard and mouse without making them oily. The sound of water however made me want to pee. So I then took a piss.

After sitting back down at my computer, I felt a slight burning sensation in my *cough* area. I thought to myself, “that was a pretty dumb thing to do, Toland.” Good thing I had washed my hands beforehand, or else it’d probably be burning up downstairs.

More Free Tracks for Guitar Hero III and Rock Band

Time to jam.
Time to jam.

Just got alerted that there was a new free track for Guitar Hero III: Guitar Hero III July Song Track Releases:

Top Gun Anthem Single Track (available July 3)
Price: Free
Songs: “Top Gun Anthem” written by Harold Faltermeyer as featured in the famous movie starring Tom Cruise.

I guess it’s a freebie to celebrate the 4th of July. You can listen to the music on YouTube: TOP GUN ANTHEM

Since I was on Xbox Live downloading this free track, I decided to see what other DLC (Downloadable Content) was available for games that I own. Apparently they released new costumes for Ninja Gaiden 2 for 200pts each. I really have no need to pay $2.50 to get a new costume for Ryu Hayabusa.

Anyway, it turns out that Rock Band is also release a new free track. According to *** DLC Week of July 1st – CrĂĽefest Pack plus free song!:

Hey everybody, next week for DLC we have the CrĂĽefest Pack for $.99 per track (80 Microsoft Points) and a track from the movie “The Rocker” by Vesuvius absolutely free! Also check back on Monday and I may have some other news-type-stuff for you.

[…]

“Promised Land” – Vesuvius
(All tracks utilize the original master recordings)

[…]

“Promised Land” – Free!

You can go listen to Promised Land and watch someone play on YouTube: Promised Land- Vesuvius Rock Band Guitar Expert. Sounds like another song celebrating July 4th, Independence Day.

VG Cats Sketch – SO CUTE!

So while I was working late tonight (till about 4am), I got bored easily and often needed to find things to distract me. I ended up on VG Cats site and saw this post: Professionals have standards.

Inside they featured a sketch drawn by Ian (artist of Three Panel Soul):

Ian McConville VG Cats

Three Panel Soul is a new webcomic I’ve been reading, though it’s been a hit or miss for me. Updates are pretty infrequent (sort of like VG Cats) and the jokes are a hit or miss. I do love their drawing style as everyone looks cute. I was introduced to TPS by Angel when I mentioned I missed Mac Hall (another webcomic by Ian) and she told me he’s drawing for a new one.

Aeris and Leo are just too adorable in the sketch!!! They are like in their chibi baby form! So cute! I wish I could hug and squeeze them!

They made wallpapers of it and I immediately made that the new desktop background for my laptop:

Speaking of cute, I recently purchased my first Woot Shirt. Some of you may have probably seen me wear it already: It’s Going Out Faster Than It’s Coming In:

It's Going Out Faster Than It's Coming In It's Going Out Faster Than It's Coming In

The t-shirt was definitely cute and only cost $10 when it was first posted. I like the little turtle and rabbit origami made from dollar bills.

Consumerist Banned Me From Commenting

So I’ve been reading Consumerist pretty much since they’ve started and even advocated people to read them a long time back. Anyway, slowly and slowly, the quality of the articles have gone downstream and like mainstream media, they’re much more about trying to get more readers, often times posting stories that diverge from their helping consumerist theme. And for quite some time, I’ve been commenting on how the quality of Consumerist has gone down hill and I can’t believe some of the crap they’re posting these days.

One such story was: Buy Super-Cheap Costco Gas Without Costco Membership. This was a story advocating readers to defraud Costco, where there was a trick to allow any American Express card user to purchase Costco gas without having a membership. This trick has been around for quite some time, but it does NOT belong on Consumerist, nor should they be advocating readers to defraud a company.

I posted the following comment:

Consumerist Banned Me From Commenting Consumerist has long forgotten the difference between a “deal” and “illegitimate loophole”. I’m waiting for the day they start posting price mistakes. Whatever gets readers, right?

I’m not saying I’m all high and mighty and won’t try my hand at ordering what is obviously a price mistake once in awhile. I’m saying crap like that does NOT belong in Consumerist.

It’s like those security hole researchers. When they find a security hole in a software, they don’t go and tell everyone how to do it and then ask if it’s ethical. They try to contact the software company first and hope the issue a fix fast.

I guess we can never really expect Consumerist to be of that quality. And yet I had high hopes when they just started. Sigh…

I guess it finally struck a nerve because when I went to post a comment yesterday, I saw this:

Consumerist Banned Me From Commenting
Comments are not enabled for this account but you can still clip articles and follow friends. If you have any questions about your status, please send us an email from your profile page.

Then I went to my profile and saw this:

Consumerist Banned Me From Commenting

I guess Consumerist has no problem criticizing other companies, but when people start criticizing them, they ban users from commenting. I’m actually surprise that comment hasn’t been deleted yet.

I’m not really that avid of a commenter, but I do have 125+ comments) under my belt and they’re not junk comments like half of what gets posted on Consumerist these days.

I’ve sent an email to them asking why comments were not enabled for my account anymore and am awaiting their reply.

Interestingly, they posted a story I had submitted to them earlier this week: Wal-Mart Fails To Change Your Oil And Lies About It

Tipster Toland pointed us toward the Stonecipher Report which contains an entry about a weary traveler who, against his better judgment, decided to get his oil changed at Wal-Mart […]

Anyway, I’m much more of a fan of this new anti-consumerist site: Not Always Right | Funny & Stupid Customer Quotes

Update: Just got a reply back from them:

You’re a go for comments!

Guess I got a nice moderator this time, though I didn’t really get a reason why I was banned in the 1st place.