I've been researching awesome new bass guitars lately, and have been pretty disuaded by the price of quality... For anything decent, you're generally looking at $1500 to $2500. I had narrowed down my choices to 3, and then yesterday, on a whim, I just bought something totally different. Ignoring for a minute, the ESP and Warwick models I was interested in, there was this puppy: The Ibanez K5, Korn Kustom bass. It's shibby-sweet - and I could have had it ordered in for $1095 - not even a bad deal... but then as I tried to find out exactly what was so special about the K5, I realized the custom paduak and mahogany finish was just a $500 option of the Ibanez SR405 - and low and behold, Long and McQuade had a black 405 in stock for $650, so I snatched it up. Total impulse... I had gone in to buy piano strings to slap on my OTHER Ibanez bass, and saw the 405 sitting there, so I said "and I'll take that too... with a case."
So anyway, I gotta start learning how to play a 5 string now. It'll probably make it's stage debut on Friday the 5th when we play Pub 340. Now about those piano strings... I'll bet you're wondering "Who the hell winds piano strings on to their heavy metal bass guitar?" Well, at least that's what I said when the guy at the guitar shop told me that the only way I was going to get that chunky, throaty, growly sound I've been searching for, is if I use piano strings. I figured it would be worth a shot... I've tried everything from the $30 vacuum sealed alloy strings to the $65 precision flatwound softcore strings and hadn't ever found my perfect sound.
So he ordered me in a special set of Roto's - exposed core piano strings, with a funny little ball-and-wedge assembly unit so you can get 'em to stay on a bass guitar. My special order arrived yesterday, and that's why I was down at the shop when I picked up that new bass.
So anyway, you probably think I'm crazy being so excited about 4 new strings for my old bass, when I just bought a new bass, but DAMN! I had a rehearsal last night with the cover band, and I brought both bases. I used the old one most of the night because it now has the sweetst sound I've ever heard in my life - this is the sound that I've always wanted, and the way "I" think a bass guitar is supposed to sound. I seriously wanted to call that guitar guy up and thank him - those strings are the best buy I've ever made! One hitch... they're dicontinued... ahhhh!!!! Fortunately, there are still a lot of pianos in the world, so I don't think there will be a shortage of piano strings in general.
Well, there was more I wanted to talk about today, but I gotta getto work. Have a great 'rainy' day everybody.
Last night we went to the Comodore Crystal Ballroom, to see Skrape, my favorite band of 2003 SOIL, and Static-X. What can I say, other than they all gave awesome shows and kicked ass. Soil was flawless - they did their album proud... and Static-X has grown a lot of charisma since I saw them last... looks like they're doing really well.
So I'm not at work this morning because I've got to go see a surgeon about getting my gall bladder removed, so right now I'm just killing time until the appointment ... one more hour to go. Hey, wish me luck, eh?
Hey, if anybody had checked out www.ScarecrowBalcony.com lately, they'd have noticed that thanks fully to Sage, we're slowly getting some content back.
Today I added the journal section, and a couple of entries about our two upcoming shows. This site's a slow work in progress (by that I mean, Sage and I both 'work' full time and don't get to spend a lot of energy on this site, so progress will be slow) - but it's trickling away, and eventually it'll be like a real-life website again.
So check back often, peruse a bit, tell your friends, and most importantly, come to our shows!
BBC: Cannibal killer warns others not to eat people
"A German accused of killing and eating a man he met on a website for cannibals has expressed regret for his actions... [Armin Meiwes] says his victim was a willing participant who ate part of his own body before Mr Meiwes stabbed him to death and stored his remains in a freezer... Mr Meiwes told investigators he took Mr Brandes back to his home, where Mr Brandes agreed to have his penis cut off, which Mr Meiwes then flambeed and served up to eat together. Mr Meiwes says he then killed Mr Brandes with his consent - recording the two-hour event on video... Prosecutors are seeking a conviction of murder for 'sexual satisfaction,' as cannibalism is not technically illegal under German law."
Okay, so off the top of my mind:
1.) There are really 'cannibal' websites where actual cannibals can get together and arange to eat each other???
2.) In Germany it's completely legal to eat people, with their consent, as long as you don't eat enough to kill them?
3.) You gotta wonder, how often do these cannibal clubs get together to dine on each other's weenies, and then just shake hands, thank each other for the delicious meal, and then go home and have a good night sleep?
4.) This guy's really actually worried that other people might copy him? Seriously... I don't know what part of town you live in, but around here, I don't think we'd wory about that.
5.) Is flambee really the best way to prepare weenie? I mean, hey, I trust ya - but how many recipes did you try before deciding on the ol' dong flambee mit sourkrout.
6.) Buddy placed an ad that said "Wanted: young, well-built men aged 18 to 30 to slaughter"... and somebody ANSWERED THE AD? I wonder if there was an interview process - how many applicants did he turn down before he found one he wanted to eat?
I think tis line sums it all up though:
"Disturbingly, a number of websites dedicated to Mr Meiwes have appeared, with people advertising for willing victims." - um, yeah... "disturbingly"... good word.
I did so well and keeping up the blog entries for all of about 3 days... but then I relapsed I guess...
I suppose I'm still a little weary of investing a lot of time in this thing, after the crash the other month where I lost 6 months of my blood, sweat, tears, heart and soul... of all the websites I losr when that harddrive fried, by blog was definetly the most devastating blow.
So, what have I been up to? Well, Friday night we had a good Scarecrow Balcony rehearsal - Wayne had come over to my place on Wednesday to co-authour a new song over a few shots of absinthe, and we actually completed a song in two hours (you were right Sage, that stuff really IS 'liquid muse') - so Friday we attempted to get it down with drums, and complete the arrangement. We've got less that 3 weeks now until the big show at the Cobalt on the 13th, and I think we've finally got enough material... we just gotta get good at it.
Oh - heads up... almost forgot again..... Scarecrow Balcony will be playing at Pub 340 again, on Friday December 5th. They loved us so much they practically begged to have us back. They gave us first choice of any Friday in December.
So Saturday, Carole took off shopping at the mall with a friend, then the went off to some art show and ended up doing the Cultural Crawl in East Van... I went shopping for food-stuffs. I was back in the cooking/baking spirit and ended up making a huge batch of pumpkin pie tarts (with whip cream, yum!) and for dinner, which by the way was perfectly planned to be coming out of the oven the second that Carole walked in the door... for dinner was Calvin's super-yummy breaded veal parmigiana with tossed salad and a side of sauteed mushrooms and shallots in thick sour cream sauce. To die for. And it made a great breakfast, lunch and dinner on Sunday too.
Sunday was a lazy day - as Sundays tend to be... I id some work on my new computer, tweaking the printer privers, installing some free linux games that looked kewl, including 'FreeCiv' - a clone of my favorite game from a decade ago, Civilization. The nifty thing about FreeCiv though, is that it's got a game server, so all my friends (well, both of them) can connect to my server and play along in true multiplyer mode. The old Civilivation was not network aware...
I also learned a couple more covers for the cover band - the band still doesn't have a name, but when Ron suggested "how about the Pickled Livers" and everyone groaned, I was like "aw man, I can make up names till the cows come home...." I looked at evertone in the band and said How about "Splatty Matt and the Wasted Boyz?, or Macho Man Randy and his Dandy Banditos? Or Ron the Don, and his Mafia Five? Ravin' Dave and the Depraved Slaves? Salivatin' Calvin and the Galvanized Five?" (yeah, yeah, yeah - they all suck... I was just trying to be funny...) - everyone was pising themselves laughing after Splatty Matt... so who knows, unless Matt's totally livid about it, that may even be our new band name... sheesh.
So Carole and I ended Sunday with a couple of Pay-Per-View movies: Down with Love (very clever, and very funny), and The Italian Job, which was, well, just plain cool!
I didn't get the outdoor Christmas light up for the third weekend in a row, and I didn't really do much work around the house at all - but hey, it was a pretty nice weekend.
Yikes! This would suck...
I wonder if he still had to pay for the tail bobbs?
"John Marchisotto took his 12 squirming, adorable boxer puppies to the veterinarian Monday to have their tails bobbed. Ninety minutes later, one of the precious pups was dead. Two more would die before the night was out - scorched by a heating pad on the maximum setting. Marchisotto blames staff at the Animal Hospital of Staten Island for turning up the heating pad and letting his 3-day-old puppies burn to death."
Pups fatally scorched at S.I. vet's
...and then there's this guy...
"A LaGrange man accused of hacking his estranged wife's puppy to death with an ax as three children begged him to stop faces animal and child cruelty charges, police said. Stephen Jay Williams, 38, of LaGrange got into a fight with his 34-year-old wife at a home on Sunday, then killed her pet and threatened her with the ax, police said. Children ages 9, 10 and 13 witnessed the attack... Williams told investigators he was upset because the dog had bitten him two weeks ago."
Man Kills Puppy with Ax as children beg him to stop
Leave the damned puppies out of it, dude!
Maybe if the monkey-man actually got a little 'tweeter' every once in a while, he wouldn't be so preoccupied with 12 year old boys...
Yeah, brutal - I know... and here in Canada, people are actually innocent until proven guilty, so where am I getting all this pre-judgemental cynicism? It's not a black thing, that's for sure. Well, to be honest, I'm pretty neutral about it so far - nothing has been proven either way, so both sides deserve the benefit of the doubt.
...but...
It's just way too much fun to diss at Michael Jackson!!!!
As if anyone in the world hasn't heard the news yet:
Michael Jackson facing criminal charges of lewd contact with a child: Bail set at $3M
It was pretty surreal watching live on CNN yesterday as the 70+ cops swooped down on Neverland Ranch to collect evidence. I don't think that many police officers were involved in the Green River Killer investigation and the Beltway Sniper case combined! Ah, Wacko Jacko... what can ya say... you shoulda kept the glove on...
Boy did a get a shocker yesterday ... live and learn, I suppose...
Carole asked me a few days ago "You know that curried shrimp and snow pea salad you made once? I loved it - would you make it again sometime soon?"
"Sure," I said... "although it was a tiger prawn, sugar pea, and cauliflower with a light curry and garam masalla mayo dressing."
"Whatever..." she said, "so you're going to make that again soon? It was awesome."
"No prob," I said - "but it'll be expensive... probably ten bucks just for the prawns."
So anyway, I ran down to the grocery store yesterday after work and picked up the prawns ($9.88 +tax) and the sugar peas ($1.48 - great deal!) - but it wasn't until I got home that I remembered that the cauliflower head had slipped my mind, so I wizzed back down to the grocery store with a toonie in my pocket - expecting to get about a dollar six in change (I'm sure the last cauliflower hear I bought was .94c)...
So when the clerk says "That'll be $5.34 please" I choked out "What? Seriously? You're kidding right? This tiny head of cauliflower is worth as much as half a pound of tiger prawns?". "Yes" she says... "it's not in season right now. Sometimes it's really cheap and sometimes it's really expensive."
Geez - since when did brocolli and cauliflower become luxury food items???
So anyway, we had a nice $18 salad for dinner last night ... I couldn't afford a main course.
To add insult to injury, during our salad dinner Carole says "You know, I just love this - this is one of the most gournet tasting and looking salads I've ever had. I would totally pay nine or ten bucks for this salad in a high class restaurant."
I just laughed.... "Dear, you DID just pay $9 for that salad - and that's just the cost of the ingedients!"
So anyway, like y'all care about my salad. My point is that I guess most people have learned by now that there are certain foods you just don't by out of season... well, now I know that too. Carole, research project for ya: When is cauliflower in season? Cause that's the next time you get yer gourmet shrimp 'n' pea salad. ;-)
Last night was more fun that a big ol' barrell 'o' monkeys. This Pub 340 place really surprised me - I had no idea that this unassuming little hole in the wall had such a cool bar behind it's doors. And being right next to the Cambie mean that the drop-in rate was huge... there was no cover charge, so if people are on their way to or from the Cambie, and they hear live music they like, they can just walk on in. It's a brilliant idea, and it totally worked for the bar - they said that this weekend was their best two days of sales all year, and they owe it all to their brand new "live local bands" idea. I suppose the key is to have GOOD bands that people want to hear more of... when they tried cover bands earlier in the year, the results were apparently disasterous. So, being the first heavy band to play Pub 340, there were a few growing pains, but it was definetely all good. The manager just kept bringing us jugs of beer all night, I lost count after my 3rd pitcher, but managed to keep pretty clear headed... that's the one good/bad thing about pub draft ... not a lot of alcohol in it.
Anyway, back to the growing pains - the sound techs were just finishing the installation of the new PA system as we were loading in, so sound check was a little long as they figured out which cables went to which mikes and which amp channels went to which mixer channels, but all in all they got a pretty good sound going in short order. Rain Spider played first, and lots of people streamed into the bar to dance to the funky stylin's of Danny, Wayne and stand-in drummer Ron. After the set, their set the place cleared out a bit as the patrons continued on to wherever they were headed (of course, after enjoying some tasty pints and funky jamz) - but as soon as Scarecrow Balcony started playing, the place started filling up again - did I mention that I think this 'no cover, share the bar profit with the band' idea is brilliant? If we had charge $3 or $5 or $8 all we'd get in the place would be our friends and steady fans... it's hard to convince somone to shell out money to see a band they've never heard of... but last night (actually, the same was true of the Marine Club) we got so many new people cheering and dancing and complimenting us that going home with thirty-five bucks and three pitchers of beer, knowing that another 50 - 100 people really enjoyed us and will now be keeping their eyes out for Scaarecrow Balcony, was by far more rewarding than even our most profitable gigs have ever been.
Um, back to the growing pains. I guess, being the first heavy band to play there, the sound guy wanted to find out how hot he could get the PA before hitting it's limits... as it turns out, the old building's fuse panel has a lower threshold than the mixing board. We blew out half the bar. Our guitar and bass amp still had power, and a light over the bar was still on, but everything else fried - it was awesome. Seriously. We jammed and made shit up for about ten minutes which the pub staff and sound guys frantically ran around with flashlights replacing those big old 'stick' fuses that look like a sausage with metal sticking out of both ends.... eventually they got all the power back, and we did our last three songs.
The crowd wanted more, and it was only 12:30 so the bar wanted more too - but Ron and Wayne were pretty spent from doing back to back shows, so we ended on a kinda lame note by doing something that Wayne swore (and we all agreed) that we'd never, ever do again... Paranoid. It took 3 false starts, and didn't end very well, but was still a lot of fun, as people I didn't know were coming up on stage to scream the lyrics into the mics. I think if I had my druthers, I would have like to leave the crowd with one of our best songs fresh in their memory, but you just can't plan a night like this - and besides, it was a totally awesome night - no complaints, just RAWKINROLL!!!
Okay - so last week I gave everyone about 1/2 a days notice that Scarecrow Balcony would be playing a gig - this week it's more like 7 hours notice....
I got a call from Wayne at 2:30AM this morning asking if I wanted to play a gig tonight - I said "sure!" - my bass is in the shop getting a tuneup, so I'll have to beg borrow or steal a replacement, but what the hey... this is what Rock'n'Roll's all about - Am I right?
So, tonight - Scarecrow Balcony and the Rain Spider (Wayne's doing a double bill) at Pub 340, in Vancouver. I've never been there, but it's supposed to be on Cambie, mid-block between The Cambie and the Moneymart. Apparently we'll get paid, so it's already in my good books!
Sounds like it'll be fun! And at least I get to do something new - I've never played with such short notice before, I've never played with a borrowed/rented bass before, and I've never played that bar before - so I'm lookin' forward to it!
See y'all there!
Now this is some strange-ass stuff....
A 52-year-old woman demanded an explanation from doctors after tests showed that two of her three grown-up sons were biologically unrelated to her. Although the woman, conceived them naturally with her husband, tests to see if she could donate a kidney suggested that somehow she had given birth to somebody else's children...
The explaination is totally unreal - yet completely true.
...unless of course, you're actually white... then it's just weird.
Make no sense, does it. Well, 3 weeks ago my mom brought me a couple gallons of grape juice that she had painstakenly obtained from a few cases of donated vinyard grapes via a labourious process of mashing, pulping and straining through cheesecloth. My intend of course, was to make some primo wine out of this viscous crimson liquid.
Did I mention a few weeks back about how a friend of my moms gave her a few crates of grapes that weren't ripe enough at the vinyards harvest time, and by time they were ripe, it was too far through the wine making process to use them? Well, anyway, at the time I said hey mom, crush them into jiuce, bring me the juice, and I'll make some wine out of it! She did, she brought it too me, and for the last three weeks I've been fermenting the stuff.
What I probably didn't mention was that this thick purple goo with a specific gravity of 1.075 and a potential alcohol of 11% by volume started losing it's colour the first day I pitched the yeast. I had never seen anything like it... day after day, the purple turned to brown, then orange to yellow as the yeast ate away at the sugars and produced alcohol... I thought for sure the batch must have been infected. After about 10 days the ifermentation was done, so I racked it into a clean carbouy (removing the sediment and yeast) and left it to settle and clear for another couple of weeks. Last night I bottled it. So far, it looks like fairly yellowish white wine. In a wine glass, it's clear, has pretty good legs, but still tastes pretty imature - like alcoholic welches white grape juice, but with a nice wine aftertaste ;-)
So this is the thing that has freaked me out - there's no trace of purple any more... I though for sure this was going to make red wine! How did this happen? It's totally strange. Stranger still, is that it's actually palletable. I think that after a few (or more) months to mature, it's not going to be a bad white wine at all - it'll probably clear a lot more by then too. So bottom line, I got 9 bottles for a dollars worth of yeast and about 30 cents worth of sugar (I topped it up a bit to bring the potential alcohol up from 9.5 to 11%).
Still... it's the damnedest thing how purple grapes make purple grape juice, which makes white wine. What exactly do they make RED wine out of then??? Actually, now that I think of it, I think they crush the grapes but fermet the skins with the juice to make red wine...
Unfortunately no midnight sun or blowing hotsprings.... well, I take that back, I saw the wickedest northern lights I've ever seen... they were all green - no flashy colours like in the duracel ads, but still pretty damn kewl.
Twenty-three hours from the time I leave my house to the time I re-enter my house, and in that time I fly 1,100 km, sleep for 8 hours, attend a 5 hour meeting, then fly 1,100 km back. Fun, fun, fun - I miss those days... have I ever mentioned how often I used to do trips like this way back when I was installing software at resorts all around north america? Yeah, that was definetely a job for a single person... I remember this one trip... 48 hours in total - I flew from Vancouver to Honalulu, then to Maui - did my 12 hour job in Maui then got on a plane back to Honalulu, then boarded another for L.A.., and transfered to a little hopper to La Jolla (San Diego) to do another 12 hour stint before hopping back to L.A., and boarding a plane that stopped in Reno before landing in Seattle, where I got on another plane that took me back to Vancouver. It was pretty amazing timing, but I somehow managed to miss every single inflight mealtime... so I basically survived on coke and peanuts for two days. In 48 hours I spend 24 working and 24 flying (or waiting around airports)... I finally got in about 3AM and was awoken by the phone ringing at 10AM - it was my boss - wondering why I didn't show up for work at 8. Ah, those were the days. I just hope they're not coming back any time soon.
PS - yes, I'm going to work tomorrow.
Imagine making me work on Rememberance Day! I've only had to miss the moment of silence once before in my life and I felt so bad - I brought it up at the meeting today at about 10:50, and everyone shrugged it off... that kinda sucks... If we can't give one minute of respect a year, then what the f*ck did they even fight for.
Anyway, enough o' that - I gotta run. See y'all tomorrow!
No, I'm not sleepy - I'm just lazy. Or more acurately, I just think I'm probably doing y'all a favour by NOT telliing you about the wonderful crepes I made this morning, or the movie I watched yesterday.
But occasionally, I realize that maybe my life's not really as blase as I think it is. For instance, I feel like I've had a pretty laid back weekend with not much to write about - well, we visited David in the hospital yesterday, and we went to Carole's step brother Chris' engagement party last night, but other than that I've either been drunk, hungover, sleepiing, watching movies, or cooking crepes.
Of course, there WAS the Scarecrow Balcony gig at the Marine club Friday night... now THAT was fun! I honestly did not have very high expections of the gig... I know it's a small venue, we got really late notice and didn't tell many people that we were playing, plus the other two bands were accoustic, and I really didn't think that our style of music would go over well with their crowds. I envisioned us getting through a song or two, before the whole place cleared out.
Well, I learned something new about people that night... because we got the best reception, the most compliments, and the most amount of people up in front of the stage bouncing around than I have seen in a long time.
Anyway, since I was so sure that the gig would likely turn out to be a glorified rehearsal in front of an empty room. I had kinda started drinking at lunch time annd didn't really stop or slow down until we went on stage about midnight-ish. I honestly never drink much before going on stage, but this time I thought aw, there's nothing to lose - let's just see how I do... so by time I stepped up, I had about a case of beer in me. We played the whole first song with Wayne and I in two different tunings, and so the gig started off exactly as disasterous as I had imagined. I must confess, by the end of the 2nd song, I really didn't even want to be there. There were a lot more people in the crowd that I thought there'd be, and I was convinced that I was making a fool out of myself - but then something strange happened - we played a new song that we haven't really ever been able to get down smoothly - in fact, in rehersal, more time than not, we can't even finish it - I said we should do it anyway because I figured fuckit, nothing to lose now - but we actually pulled it off, and really well too! A couple of people came up to the front of the stage to 'dance' (if yo u can call it that) and all the people hanging back were boppin' their heads and pumping their hands - it looked like we were actually entertaining them!
Collin from OmegaCrom brought a round of beers to the stage for us - I always love it when someone from the audience buys the band drinks, though I was already kinda spinning... we just played harder and faster, and though we had some pretty good mistakes in the first half of the set, we miraculously made them all sound like they were supposed to be part of the songs. By the second half of the set, we definetely had a vibe going.
We had planned a surprise ending a few nights earlier when we were rehearsing. A guy who works with Ron dropped by for a quick beer, and he said "Hey, you know any Sabbath?" - Well, we all know lots of Sabbath, and we've agreed never ever to play Paranoid again, and while we all know a bunch, we'd never tried to play anything other than Paranoid before. I started playing a riff that I remember ed was Sabbath, but I didn't even remember what song it was - in fact, I didn't even really know the song - I only knew the riff... Wayne instantly came in with the guitar part, and Ron was right there with the drums. We pulled it off near flawlessly, and when we were done, and the guy was all "woo hoo, that rawked! that was great!" - we had a good laugh at the fact that not a one of us had ever played that song before - it's just one of those songs that we've all heard so many times that every change, every note, and every word was ingrained deep in our brains. I had to asks though, "Okay - what was that song called?" I think everybody put me in my place in unison: "N.I.B., dude!" ... hey, wouldn't it be kewl to close a a show with that song?
So anyway, back to the stage... I surprised everyone by pulling a wah pedal out of my kit bag and slapping it inline just for the last song - I think I did it surreptitiously enough that nobody noticed... in fact, Carole told me later that when I started, a friend of ours, Dr. K. leaned over and said to her "Calvin's playing a Wah?" and she said - No, he must be doing something with his fingers... he doesn't play bass with a wah" - aha, even fooled my wife :-)
So for those of you that know the song, you know N.I.B. starts off with a bass solo called 'Basically' - I didn't know it any more than I knew NIB, but I think I had the gist, and while we hadn't rehearsed it, it only took about 4 notes with the Wah before someone in the audience shouted "Oh Yeah!!" and jumped up hootin. By time it kicked in to the actual NIB riff (even before guitar and drums start) about a half a dozen more people had figured out what I was doing and started cheering their approval, and by time everyone kicked in to the song, half the crowd had moved forward and was dancing in front of the stage - IT FELT GOOOOOD !!!!!
It was one hell of a way to end a night. It's what being a musician is ALL about, And it just goes to show you that a drunk pessimist can still be taught a thing or two about people. And we even got paid - how cool is that?
So Sage - this entry long enough for ya? LOL - I'm just kinda rambling right now - but I must admit, it's pretty fun to remember that show, even though a half an hour ago, I was thinking that the weekend has been pretty boring.
Oh, gotta run - we're catching the Matrix matinee in an hour. Talk to everyone soon!
Sage, you're totally right - I'm neglecting this blog like I'm George Dub'ya, and it's a starving third world nation...
You wanna know how badly I'm neglecting it? Geez, you'd think that if I'd've (whoah! I think that's the first double contraction in history! 'I would have' = I'd've!!!) written ANYTHING this week, it would have been the fact that in about 3 hours my band Scarecrow Balcony is playing at the Marine Club. Well, we're actually headlining, so that mean we play in 7 hours.... but the show starts in 3!!!
I guess it's too late to ask people to show up, eh?
This really chafs my hide....
Not that I think catching hackers is a bad thing, but that once again Micro$oft is throwing their money at a problem instead of throwing their brains at it. Why don't you just make SECURE software, then you won't need to pay bounties on hacker scalps, because they won't be able to hack you!
Microsoft to offer bounty on hackers
Microsoft will announce on Wednesday that it will offer two $250,000 bounties for information that leads to the arrest of the people who released the MSBlast worm and the SoBig virus, CNET News.com has learned.
The two programs attacked computers that run Microsoft's Windows operating system, causing havoc among companies and home users in August and September. The reward, confirmed by sources in both the security industry and in law enforcement, will be announced in a joint press conference with the FBI, the U.S. Secret Service and Interpol that's scheduled for 10 a.m. EST Wednesday.
The rewards are the first time a company has offered money for information about the identity of the cybercriminals.
On Friday I bought a new computer - an Athelon-xp 2100, and the O/S I decided to use on it was Gentoo Linux. For those of you unfamiliar with Gentoo, here's their "Gentoo in a paragraph" description:
"We produce Gentoo Linux, a special flavor of Linux that can be automatically optimized and customized for just about any application or need. Extreme performance, configurability and a top-notch user and developer community are all hallmarks of the Gentoo experience. "
Now, from an installation standpoint, this means that every single program you want to use is compiled JUST for your computer, with only the support your computer requires. When that program runs, it'll be the leanest, quickest, most stable and secure version possible - customized just for you. The drawback here, is that this si a VERY, VERY time consuming process. I had the basic O/S and kernel installed in about 4 or 5 hours, but then when it came to installing the X-Windows system and gnome desktop, I had about another 9 hour wait. The worst three apps for speed of compilations were mozilla, gimp, and openoffice.... between the three of them, about twenty hours... (Mozilla is Netscape, Gimp is PhotoShop for linux, and OpenOffice is a Microsoft Office clone).
After two full (ENTIRE) days, I now have a 'ready to use' system with an audio system, cd burner, email, etc,etc - and DAMN is it fast!
I'm pretty psyched, but now Carole says there's an 8-computer-per-household limit, so now I have to pick an old one to throw out / give away...