Year: 2004

Renewed subscription to Linux Weekly News

I have renewed my subscription to Linux Weekly News today. 12 month at once at a professional hacker level was supposed to be $60 USD, but they gave me a discount of 10% which made it $54 USD. Hey, they rule! :)

LWN is the best open source journalism resource that I have ever seen. They do create actual content instead of stupidly copying all those boxes from other sites. They write software reviews. They report from different summits and exsibitions. They look into new Linux distributions. They explain kernel internals in such a way that simple people can understand. They provide an insight into court rooms where important legal battles are in progress. These guys are excellent. I wish there were more resources like this on the web. I would easily spend the money on subscription to support them.

The Nine Planets

There is an excellent overview of our solar system at The Nine Planets. Information about all nine planets and their moons is organized in a clean and convenient way. There is very little of theoretical boredom. Mostly, the site consists of small and interesting facts like why the planet or moon is called the way it is, how big it is and who discovered it.

This is a good reference point.

And Starring Pancho Villa as Himself

It doesn’t happen to me very often that I look at DVD box and cannot find the title of the movie. This time it was exactly like this though. I had this box in my hands and it said Antonio Banderas and “And Starring Pancho Villa as Himself“. Without quotes, of course. That was confusing. Hehe.

The film is good. I haven’t heard anything about it, I haven’t seen the trailers, I haven’t seen any posters or promotional materials. I haven’t even heard anyone mentioning it in any programs about movies. Strange.

I won’t go into describe it. It is original and atmospheric. And Banderas is good and unusual in it. I suggest you get it and watch it on a slow day.

I’ll rate is as a firm 7 out of 10. Very close to 8 though.

Media Masters DVD Club

Few days ago I’ve mentioned that a new DVD club was about to open right next door to my home. Well, they did indeed opened there doors and I finally managed to get in (not that it is too crowded, we just had different operating hours).

These guys are still finishing bits and pieces here and there, but they surely have a number of DVDs for rent. I didn’t have a lot of time to scan through, but I’ve noticed that they have both new (the ones which just passed in the cinema or are about to be shown) and old (the ones everyone have seen multiple times) films, shelves are sorted by genre (comedy, horror, action, animation, etc). They are still putting barcodes on the boxes. They do rent and sell DVDs. I haven’t checked the selling prices, but renting is 1.50 CYP per DVD, which you can have for three days, except for the new hot movies, which are 24 hours only. This is pretty much a standard set of conditions around here.

I’ve talked with these guys a bit and they said that their website is almost finished (by the end of the week it should be up) and that it will have an online catalog together with booking and ordering facilities. This beats the crap out of the DVD club I use now for renting films, so I will surely be changing it.

Another nice touch is that DVD boxes that you take home all have contact information with full address, phone, fax, and mobile (!) numbers, and an email address. It also has a URL written on it. By the way, their website will be at http://www.mmscy.com. Currently, there is a flash intro which says that the site is coming soon. But stay tuned.