Hijinks Inc.

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  • The 10yr Rule

    The theory is that every ten years your investment doubles in value, and now I have proof!

    So I haven’t exactly been actively investing in the stock market for ten years, but unbeknownst to me just under ten years ago my Grandfather took out an Educational IRA (much like a 529 plan) on my behalf, at the time he invested $400 in an American Century fund and set it up with a DRIP (Dividend Reinvestment Program)… Now ten years later, even though the fund has dropped significantly in value, his original investment is now worth $903 thanks to that DRIP. Pretty cool.

    Now the 10 year rule is a nice thought, but I’m sure it doesn’t always apply. And in todays market, it hard to imagine any investment doubling in value.

  • Hulu Goes Public

    Hulu is set to go public tomorrow, during the course of the private beta they’ve added quite a bit of content from various networks and content partners… here’s the full list their content partners.

    • FOX
    • NBC Universal
    • MGM
    • Sony Pictures Television
    • Warner Bros. Television Group
    • Access Hollywood
    • AST Dew Tour
    • BNET
    • Bravo
    • Broadway Video
    • CenterStaging
    • Chic.tv
    • Chiller
    • CHOW
    • CNET
    • Comedy Time
    • E! Entertainment Television
    • ExerciseTV
    • FEARnet
    • Ford Models
    • Fox Atomic
    • Fox Movie Channel
    • Fox Reality
    • Fox Searchlight
    • Fox Sports
    • Fox TV Studios
    • Fuel TV
    • FX Networks
    • G4TV
    • Gamespot
    • Gamespy
    • Hidden Universe
    • IGN
    • Image Entertainment
    • Lionsgate
    • LX.TV
    • MEN7
    • Mojo
    • Movieola
    • My Network TV
    • National Geographic Channel
    • National Geographic Digital Shorts
    • NBA
    • NBC Sports
    • NBCU TV
    • NHL
    • Oxygen
    • Paley Media
    • Red Bull
    • Reveille
    • Salient Media
    • SciFi Channel
    • Shout! Factory
    • Sleuth Channel
    • SpaceRip
    • Speed
    • Sundance Channel
    • Taste TV
    • The Fight Network
    • The Golf Channel
    • The Onion
    • The Style Network
    • Thought Equity
    • TV Guide
    • TVG
    • Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation
    • Twentieth Century Fox Television
    • Twentieth Television
    • Universal Pictures
    • USA Network
    • Versus
    • Vuguru
    • WatchMojo
    • Wine Library TV
    • World Wrestling Entertainment

  • Firefox 3 Beta

    A forum post on another website I run reminded me that not everyone has been enjoying the awesomeness of the Firefox 3 Beta, so if you fancy yourself a tech savvy internet user, go download it!

    New download manager: It now sports a more streamlined look and incorporates a search function.

    OS Specific Themes: Firefox now looks like it’s native to your operating system. Never been a huge issue for me since Firefox is theme-able, but it’s a nice touch.

    New Address Bar: It now searches your browser history as well as your bookmarks as you type a web address. My main complaint is that when searching your bookmarks it only displays the full URL, and not the root domain as well as the full bookmarked URL (does that make sense? Like if you have hulu.com/recent/episodes bookmarked and you type hu into your address bar, you might expect to see hulu.com listed as well as hulu.com/recent/episodes… but it’s not).

    They’ve also added an outline of a star to the address bar, clicking it results in adding the page as a bookmark, the star will now display as solid blue. Clicking it again brings up a prompt with the option of editing bookmark details or removing it.

    Non-intrusive prompts: I really like the way Firefox handles offering to remember a password for you, it displays as a bar along the top of the page and no longer steals focus.

    Improved memory usage: Firefox not only starts faster, it uses up less resources. Yay!

    If you’re at least marginally good with computers, I would recommend at least giving the beta a try. The rendering engine can be a little weird at times, and there are very few compatible add-ons right now, but it’s coming along nicely.

  • Apple Announces SDK – And it doesn’t suck

    Apple just announced the release of the iPhone SDK, and the good news is it isn’t anywhere near as lame as I thought it was going to be.

    Random pieces of info:

    • Major plus, applications will be available from “App Store” right on your iPhone.
    • Free applications will be allowed at no cost to the developers, otherwise Apple will be pocketing a clean 30% of revenue from application sales.
    • Costs $99 to get access to the SDK. Not cool, but certainly could be worse. SDK available today.
    • Software upgrade (2.0) won’t be release until June it looks like. Lame.
    • Update will be iPod touch compatible, only once again there will be a “nominal fee” charged for the upgrade. Lamer.
    • With Microsoft Exchange support the iPhone is actually shaping up to be a decent enterprise level offering.
    • VC Firm KPCB is setting up an “iFund” to the tune of $100m to support “new ventures”.

    Apps that were demoed:

    • EA demoed a toned down version of Spore for the iPhone, looks pretty sweet.
    • AOL is releasing AIM for the iPhone and I could care less, hopefully Google with follow quickly with GoogleTalk.
    • SalesForce.com demoed an application that had no meaning whatsoever to me, looked cool though.
    • Sega (I guess they still make games :P) showed a preview of Super Monkey Ball for the iPhone, looks like a major acid trip.

  • Handheld Gaming Fevor, Part 2

    Last time I diatribed about the DS and it’s awesome (yet limited) library of games. That thought motivated me a few weeks ago to pick up a used PSP from my local used game store. First game I played was Dungeon Siege: Throne of Agony. My first impression was, “Holy crap, these are amazing graphics for a handheld!”

    I played the original Dungeon Siege on the PC years ago, and it’s claim to fame was a beautifully rendered 3D environment with no load times. The PSP iteration of the series met the graphical bar and even looked a little better then the PC experience I had back in 2002. Now granted, DS:ToA was released four years later, but lest we forget, it’s a freakin’ hand held game!

    I’m echoing the sentiments of just about every writer that’s played good games on the PSP when I say that this is the closest thing to a console experience I’ve ever seen on a 2×4 inch screen. I’ve since picked up a trio of new and old games to try out on my new toy. Such as… (more…)