[Videos] Despicable Me and Minions Trivia

Good grief, there's a third Despicable Me movie. After the diversion with the Minions spinoff, we have another one of these movies and I guess this franchise is here to stay. It was kinda funny the first time around but I have mixed feelings about the first solo venture for the Minions so now we're back to Gru and the team.

ChannelFrederator has a lot of 107 facts videos that touch on the franchise and they've finally released a full one for the core Despicable Me series and here we are. And man, there's oddly a lot of work that went into these movies - far more than I had expected.


107 Despicable Me Facts You Should Know! - Cartoon Facts! (107 Facts S6 E22)


107 Minions Facts YOU Should Know! (ToonedUp #32) @ChannelFred

[Cameras] Mega Zoom Options

Image via Wikipedia

I've always had a pretty liberal approach to cameras and photography. I hate twiddling with too many settings and I have no ambitions of lugging around variable lenses and the like. I feel you just need a decent camera with a good amount of optical zoom and good photo editing skills.

I used to have a Sony CyberShot DSC-H50, which was an awesome camera for both still photography and the occasional video. But this got stolen and I've been hurting ever since. Not I'm thinking of getting a camera again and here are the main options I'm considering. I could just get the H50 again, although it's still retailing for at least Php 23k. Yikes.

The next logical choice would be to get the upgraded version of the H50, the Sony CyberShot DSC-HX1. It's another great camera with new options like panoramic shots and now a full 20x optical zoom. However it's retailing for up to Php 38k, which is definitely beyond my budget, even though I'm planning to pay for it on installment using my credit card.

So that got me thinking about scaling things down a bit and just going for a more compact mega zoom camera since (1) I'm just after increased optical zoom for close-up / macro shots and (2) both the H50 and the HX1 are pretty bulky cameras and I do appreciate a more compact option.

[Viral Video Chart] Sept. 30 - Oct. 6, 2007

It's been another interesting week in the world of viral video and while I've been featuring a few videos on and off throughout the week, there are still some left unposted that have performed surprisingly well on the Viral Video Chart.

This week we have more Paris Hilton, another great SNL Digital Short, a swarm of Play-Doh bunnies and everything your mom says in a day condensed into less than 3 minutes.


#1 - Paris Hilton on Late Show w/ David Letterman 9/28/2007


#3 - "Iran So Far": SNL Mocks Mahmoud With Gay-Themed Love Song!


#4 - Sony Bravia - Play Doh Ad


#5 - William Tell Overture

[Gaming] There's still hope, PS3 fanboys

PS3 fanboys, take heart.

In the August figures for consoles sold in Japan, the Nintendo Wii outsold the Sony PS3 - 245,653 to 81,541. Yes, the Wii still outsold the PS3, but this time, it is just 3-to-1. To put things in perspective, the ratio was 4-to-1 in July and 6-to-1 in June.

See, there's still hope. Sony's world domination plans are still on track. Now, if only quality games finally appear for PS3...

And, oh, Microsoft's Xbox 360 sold 11,288 units, if that's enough consolation to PS3 fanboys. Xbox 360 fanboys, well.... at least you'll have Halo 3. And the Red Ring of Death.

[Security] Sony caught using rootkit - again

Some people don't ever learn.

Sony came under fire in November 2005 when it was found to be using rootkit for its CD DRMs. Sony was mercilessly skewered by antivirus companies for such a stunt, and Sony had to issue an update to remove the rootkit.

Almost two years later, Sony is once again caught employing a questionable technology in one of its products, this time, a USB flash drive.

From F-Secure Weblog:

The Sony MicroVault USM-F fingerprint reader software that comes with the USB stick installs a driver that is hiding a directory under "c:\windows\". So, when enumerating files and subdirectories in the Windows directory, the directory and files inside it are not visible through Windows API. If you know the name of the directory, it is e.g. possible to enter the hidden directory using Command Prompt and it is possible to create new hidden files. There are also ways to run files from this directory. Files in this directory are also hidden from some antivirus scanners (as with the Sony BMG DRM case) — depending on the techniques employed by the antivirus software. It is therefore technically possible for malware to use the hidden directory as a hiding place.

In addition to the software that was packaged with the USB stick, we also tested the latest software version available from Sony at www.sony.net/Products/Media/Microvault/ and this version also contains the same hiding functionality.

It is our belief that the MicroVault software hides this folder to somehow protect the fingerprint authentication from tampering and bypass. It is obvious that user fingerprints cannot be in a world writable file on the disk when we are talking about secure authentication. However, we feel that rootkit-like cloaking techniques are not the right way to go here.

Sony was contacted, but no reply was given at the time the blog post was published.

Why is rootkit dangerous? Rootkit technology enables a software to hide its files from ordinary Window view. It is possible to view these hidden files via command prompt, but you have to know the exact location and the exact file names. Several malware employ this technology to hide their files, to prevent primitive antivirus products and non-technical users from ever finding and deleting malware files.