Presence Presents

For Sandy's birthday I decided to do something about her internet presence. She had been using my hotmail account for mail and steck trading signups and didn't really see the need to get her own account.

The trouble is that there is more then just an email to build an online presence. Many sites require an email as a 'starting point' and frown on using the same address for more than one account. This rules out any chance of me and sandy using the same forum or social networking technology unless I used another email account when signing up. Since I usually jump on to test things first I'm used to using my hotmail account as a throwaway rego and spam account rather than thinking to the future.

The real solution was to get Sandy her own email account, and from there expand to MSN messenger, Facebook and of course, a blog.

While I was in the mood for setting things up I also took the time to get a couple of website names locked down.
- bowesclan.net (and bowesclan.com) will hopefully be a blog for all of the family to contribute to since no-one else has a blog.
- VRBones.com will be the new name for this blog so I can move it if need be. Hopefully I can syndicate this feed onto bowesclan too.
- vrworlds.net will be for the PhD stuff, but probably pointing back to this site until I get it in place.
- tonybowes.com is locked away for a rainy day, but I doubt I'll need it as vrbones.com should suffice as I've used VRBones everywhere, not Tony Bowes.
- cameronbowes.com is also locked away in anticipation for Cameron's online emergence.

GoDaddy offered additional privacy for bulk purchases, so that got a couple more bucks out of me to get the last couple. Should be worth it in the end.

Steaming pile of ... (pt.2)

on Thursday I finally get into a clan match. Hop on 1/2 hour early to play a couple of warmups and get Ventrilo set up. Inside the server itself it's fine until a minute before it goes live when there's wierd lag issues. Teh game starts and I'm seeing almost everyone running around as scouts or heavies. Obviously they aren't because 1/2 of them are shooting rockets at me. The doors on Well are also stuffed, showing a seethrough backface of the door model instead of a shut door. I log out and relog and it's still stuffed so I play 1/2 the game like that. We're down 0-4 so I relog again, this time fixing the model and lag issues. We stop the rot at 0-5, but the damage is done.

After the game I kill TF2 only to find a happy Steam update screen telling me that there's a new update that it happily downloaded while I was playing, as well as a new game coming out that you're sure to want me telling you about. AAAAAARRRRRGH!!!!!

Steam, get the hell off my computer. Just leave it alone. I don't want your popups, I don't want your automatic downloads, especially for games I'm not playing anymore, and ESPECIALLY WHEN I AM PLAYING A GAME! You are supposed to make my gaming time enjoyable, not ruin it. This hasn't been the only time either. I have had it update 3 times when I'm playing other non-steam games. I could have excused it for not knowing that I'd be wanting to use MY computer outside of its little steam world, but an update in the middle of a TF2 session, for TF2 (that couldn't possibly be applied until I finished anyway). Whatever happened to the common courtesy of asking if I would like to download it before you kill my bandwidth and processor.

I had a dig around the settings (3rd time doing so) and finally found an option to turn the auto updates off. Or so I hope. There was also an option to turn off the daily ads they keep ramming down my connection, but it doesn't work. I swear I'm gonna throttle some valve developers if the autoupdate removal option dosn't stick.

There are still issues with the friends system not giving up-to-date status information (If you're telling me they are in the game, they should be in a game, not offline 1 hour ago) and the join friend's server option just doesn't fit well with TF2's full server problems.

If there was ANY way to play TF2 without steam I'd uninstalll it in a flash, even forgoing Half life2 if need be. Just .. please .... go away.

[QGL] forum

Mongie made up a forum for us all to .. err .. discuss stuff.

Old TCM review

More vanity googling led to an old AusGamers review of Total Club Manager. Looks like it was the height of comma trade where every sentence wouldn't be complete without a comma or 4.

Facebook

TWiT made me join Facebook to see what it's about.

GameLog 13

TF2 (17h) 42 points with soldier. [QGL] played and won a tense game over McOhnd.
Football Manager 08 (15h) Barrow, 8th ECN, Season 1. Still in 8th, but have played nothing but cups for a month so I'm 3 games in arrears. 1 win away from 4th, so I'm not too fussed. Picked up a neat purchase in the form of a moroccan international happy to play at my level. We made it through Shrewsbury with a 2-1 win away from home to book a 3rd round spot in the FA cup. We're still in the other 2 cups too, so it looks like another month of cup matches coming up.
Puzzle Quest (8h) 26 Druid. Pushing forward on the quest line now that I have the combos working
Brain Age 2 (2h) Morning wake up and when Cameron demands it.
FIFA 07 (1h) Competitive Computer Games @ St Luke's.

Ventrilo

Need ventrilomix for [QGL]

GameLog 12

Bi-weekly doesn't really feel right for a gamelog. There's a lot that happens in a week, let alone 2 weeks. Might have to knock it back to once a week again.

TF2 (45h) I'm starting to get top 3 positions pretty regularly now. GameArena has a league set up for TF2 and is the biggest league in the world so far. Hoping I'll find an oldskool team to join up wif. Playing for 5 hours straight also leads to gamerStink(tm). It's been away for a while, probably since QGL days, but it's certainly shower time after a good sesh of TF2.
Football Manager 08 (35h) Barrow, 8th ECN, Season 1. Even though the savegame says I've been playing for 2 days, I think it's counting times when I've left it running in the background while surfing the net or doing stuff around the house. 35 seems more likely. A bit suprising even at that count. I'm only getting into the first season now, probably 1/3 the way through. Even though there was a lot of work starting up the team and reorganising training / staff / loaners / tactics, it's looking like 70hours for a season.
Brain Age 2 (6h) Morning wake up and a couple of times when visitors are over.
Puzzle Quest (5h) 21 Druid. Kinda guessing at the usage as PQ pops out in the mornings or over at youth for a couple of spare minutes.
World of Warcraft (4h) Past level 70 it's feeling a different game. I'll play if Sandy is in the game, but TF2 keeps me more entertained at the moment.
FIFA 07 (2h) Competitive Computer Games @ St Luke's.

I'm a razer boi now!

Greig decided to pick up a new quad core box from the local supplier on his trip back from Noosa. he needed a spare keyboard too, so that was enough reason to finally swap over to the Tarantula and DeathAdder from last WCG's goodie bag. That and the new headset is making the area pulse blue light all over the place. Several firmware and driver patches later and it's back to TF2

Tf2 review

GameArena have reviewed TF2 and have struck on a really good point, you can't stay mad at the game. Ties in nicely to what I was trying to get at in my criticism of steam. Steam still blows. It even wiped my stats! I have popups for games I don't want, and it's forever updating itself spontaneously, even if I'm playing another game. FFS valve, if you're going to invade my machine at least you could let me know beforehand. TF2 still owns all tho, and I really hope it's the Next Big Thing(tm) in competitive eSport.