Been busy!

Yep, ok, so it's a long time between posts, but lets take stock of the situation...

My landlord's garden is dying because I haven't had time to water. My dishes from last weekend are in the sink. I haven't cooked my own dinner in a week, and any left over food is going off.

I've got 3 games to review, 6 CDs (mind you, 3 are singles) and I've only played one game and listened to the albums maybe twice each. Haven't even copied the singles to my ipod yet...

I paid for 3 months for Age of Conan and have played in once in the last month. I got Spore and have played it for maybe 2 hours.

I haven't been to a club in months, nor taken any pictures at any events.

AND

It's 7:30 on a Friday night and I'm still at work, waiting for a build... It takes about an hour to play through all the modes, once. And I'm working on one day of the weekend again.

Yes, I'm aware it's close to ZBR (zero bugs recorded) and that means it's crunchtime, but I've been working 12-14 hour days for the last 2 weeks now... still getting bugs!

And no doubt fuckhead reviewers and internet chat room cunts are going to diss our game because it introduces Avatars and tries to make the xbox more friendlier to a wider audience.

To all my friends in the Labor party...

To all my friends in the Labor party:

Lee Stevens, Mike Stevens, Nick Champion, Brigid Mahoney, Lee Odenwalder, Lisa Johnstone, Simon Lees, Brear Adams, Simon Flower, and others...

(Yes, I'm calling you all out!)

Please, please, please tell your fucked up leader Kevin Rudd to pull his stupid head out of his arse and stop acting like an opposition politician.

His antics over the green paper are the height of stupidity and foolishness.

He wants Australians to take Climate Change seriously, be willing to accept the pain it will bring, but when he releases what will be the most significant document of his career surrounding the most important issue of the decade, he goes and locks the Liberals and Greens out of the meeting, meaning they will have less time to respond.

How fucking childish, ignorant and selfish can someone be?

As you know, I don't have the greatest understanding of Australian Politics, but I thought that Krudd would have at least wanted to get the outcome of the paper through the Senate.

By locking the Greens and Liberals out of this very important decision making process, he's given them a reason to block the passage of the legislation through the Senate.

So, how is this being serious about Climate Change?

It's obvious Krudd has a half cocked plan that he knows won't get anywhere, so he's just decided to play politics to keep his newspoll results above 70%.

Can someone please inform him THE ELECTION IS OVER? And no one except politicians and journalists even care about those bullshit meters anyway!

He's acting exactly like John Howard, the person you all worked so damned hard to get out of power.

Krudd is not leading on these issues, he's being a politician playing the game, and it's simply not good enough.

I voted for Labor because I wanted change. I wanted a leader who would LEAD. Someone who would take the high road, and make hard decisions. Someone who would work with others to achieve the goals and objectives needed to steer Australia in the right direction, including other political parties.

And come on guys - I've grown up with you. I've talked and raved and ranted and marched and protested with you. I know who you are and what you believe in and what is important to you.

So why are you letting Krudd act like this? Don't you go to countless conferences and party room meetings and dinners and talkfests where these things are planned and discussed? Don't you point out how backwards this kind of mentality is?

Or is the Labor party so entrenched in 20th century thinking that it is as useless as the Liberal Party into leading Australia into the 21st Century?



and I won't even bother to tell you what I think about his pathetic, dickless stance on naked children in photography and art...

R18+ in videogames and why we will never see it.

A lot of people blame Michael Atkinson's stance on videogames, and he is the only AG who went against the popular vote, and claims that he will again.

But something else I discovered about the process of ratings.

Here is the Classifications and Community Standards report from 2007

This is compiled by Galaxy research to determine if people believe ratings are working and are fair.

Here you can see exactly how many people are polled to see if Australia's classifications are up to community Standards.

I'll spell it out to you - 1,516

1,516 people determine the position of the 7 Attorney Generals when it comes to things like what should be rated, how it should be rated, what kind of ratings should be included, and those 7 AGs then go and make laws based on these findings.

1,516.

There are over 21 MILLION people in Australia.

1,516 is not even 1% of the population!

And to top it all off, these bastards have the nerve to go and say it's only "a vocal minority" want an R18+ rating for games.

Last time I counted, 3,708 (the amount polled for the widely quoted statistic that 88% of people want and R18+ rating for games) was greater than 1,516.

In Sydney? Look for me in Time Out!

If anyone reading this is in Sydney, be sure to pick up Time Out magazine as I'm now writing game reviews for them.

My first review will be of Enemy Territory: Quake Wars.

More trouble for Myki?

It appears researchers in London have cracked the Tube's new ticketing system.

At the heart of [the] card is the Mifare chip, made by Philips spin-off NXP.

Designed in the 1990s before processors of that size could handle strong encryption, Mifare has suffered at least three published cracks, according to security experts who have urged TfL to upgrade the system. (link)

Given that Melbourne's Myki is probably a very similar technology, could that mean all the money they've already spent on Myki is a waste?

RIP George Carlin

RIP George Carlin

Very funny man and a great comedian

Here he is at his finest!

Portishead Interview!

For those who don't know, I managed to score an exclusive interview with Portishead.

I chatted to Adrian Utley about a range of things and I'm really happy with the way it turned out.

No, unfortunately I didn't get to speak to Beth, she still doesn't speak to the media.

But you're welcome to read it on inthemix.com.au and I may even put the audio up online soon, which contains Adrian discussing Public Enemy and a whole lot more besides.

Science sucks!

The current trend of media reporting on science experiments as fact about the entire population is really starting to annoy me.

What I want to know is why 14,000 out of 21 Million people is an OK sample size to determine that Australia is a nation of fatties? (source)

Why 13 people out of 6 Billion is an OK sample size to see that brain patterns are different when playing games? (source)

Why 21 people out of 6 billion is an OK sample size to determine that marijuana shrinks brains? (source)

It's ridiculous! The sample sizes are so small that it makes the reports questionable, if not thoroughly erroneous.

It's like looking at the moon and determining all moons are like that. Yes, we used to think that when we could only see our moon, but now we've got the technology we look at more moons and find that a lot of what we used to think about moons is wrong.

When looking at humans, we've got every opportunity to look at millions more than we do now.

So why are we looking at a mere handful and saying "they're representative of the 6 billion of us here", and worse still, bringing in policies and laws to restrict those 6 billion based on not even 1% of that population?

CD reviews coming!

I've been doing a fair bit of CD reviewing for inthemix lately, so thought I may as well start updating my website with them.

I'll start with some of the newer ones, and hopefully will work backwards and get them all up by June.

If you visit FunkyJ.com and click on Music Reviews you can read all the 2008 reviews.

First Melbourne gig Thursday 15 May

I've got my first gig as a Melbourne DJ!

I'm part of Beat Off, with 11 other DJs all dropping 15 minute laid back sets of tunes!

It's being held at the Horse Bazaar, 397 Little Lonsdale St

Other DJs include, BLAXTER, Brain, Dboy, Funky J, Huge, Lephrenic, Myst, RK, SAME'O, Sea, Timmy G and Zero Hour.

It marks the return of Off Beat to a monthly format.

As it's a kind of funky competition , there are rules...

- we must play a 15 minute chill set
- we must include at least one mix, with no maximum
- we bring a team of two or three people for a scavenger hunt
- and we need to invite everybody we know to cheer us all along

DJ times will be drawn from a hat during a glitzy Draw Gala, complete with ring girls!


The flyer is fantastic!


So come for pizza, beer, warm vibes, and the enjoyment as you see how chill music and chaos can so terrifically go together.

DJ Shadow & Cut Chemist

I've been going out to see bands and DJs for 20 years now, and, without sounding like a total fuckhead, I like to think I've pretty much heard and seen everything.

I've been to that many shows, seen so many awesome acts, and quite a few awful ones too, but honestly, I'm sick of the same old shit, week in, week out. I really feel old sometimes when I go out, especially in Melbourne because I don't know anybody, so I really am there just for the music.

And I've got to say, DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist certainly wasn't what I was expecting, and if I was brutally honest I would have preferred to see brainfreeze, but that was pretty fucking good in my opinion.

I like to see and hear original stuff and that was some of the most entertaining and original music and mixing I've ever seen and heard.

The novelty of the music added to the novelty of mixing on 8 decks with all 45s was really special. I loved that they dropped Space Invaders by Player 1 and the Pacman theme. I loved the old 50s swing and rock and roll. I even loved the song they claimed was the worst song ever recorded. I had a smile on my face the entire time.

Yes, it was incredibly indulgent, but I loved the fact that they are masters of their craft and were willing to share their expansive and extensive collection with us.