August 2006 Archives

It seems that Microsoft have accidentally released the pricing schemes for the all new XP replacement, Vista, through their Canadian website and if want to join the "computing revolution" there's a heavy price to pay.

The top flight version (named Ultimate) which includes all the groovy stuff like Media Centre Tools and the Aero GUI will retail for approximately $450USD - an extortionate price for an operating system when you consider you can buy an entire dual-core PC with monitor and printer for the same price which hsa XP installed (or you could take the sensible option and ditch XP in favour of a decent Operating System ... like Ubuntu Linux for example *grin*.

It makes you wonder what's going on when the OS costs more then the damned PC, even Apple, who are not known for their low pricing, have priced Tiger at $130.

There's been talk for a long, long time of the wheels coming off Microsoft's chariot but you have to wonder if there isn't something in it this time. Given the high price of ownership (even the basic user version of Vista is $250) will the "minority" OSes finally get a chance to shine?
I know I won't be going down the Vista path and for the first time in way too long I won't be queuing up for a new games console at the end of the year. Sony are set to release the PS3 worldwide but as a result of ludicrous pricing - £500 (UK) - it doesn't make any sense whatsoever to own one. The technology is on a par with the XBox 360 and it seem the major selling point at the moment i the BluRay DVD drive. Now, I can't speak for the rest of the world, but I don't own a HD TV and I've no plans to buy one yet (the cost of ownership of children is apparently quite high!!). Additionally, I've seen the list of BluRay DVDs available in the US and it's laughable, so what's the point in buyin Sony's new baby?

I've always had new consoles (with the exception of the original XBox) on launch day and my games room is stuffed with them but I cannot get excited about the PS3 - it's too little, too late, too expensive.

At the end of the day I want a games machine to play games - I already have more DVD players then is reasonable, MP3 players and standard PCs and laptops or ordinary stuff, so please don't tell me the PS3 is the answer to everything - I just want GTA !!!!!

Having "solved" the issues of terrorism, racism and loonism it's nice to see the government are finally turning their attentions to fat people. In an astonishing piece of fact gathering it turns out that the rotund among us now outnumber the starving which means one of two things:

1. Starvation levels are on the wane so we might get some more interesting adverts on the History Channel during the day

2. The world is full of lazy lardys.

I thought about this for all of three seconds and I reckon the answer is number two - don't you just love modern society??

Anyways, in an effort to look like they give a damn about anything, Mr Bliar and the fat bloke who pretends to be Deputy PM have appointed a Minister of Fitness - a move of pure genius!! Now we have someone who we can pay a ridiculous amount of money to who can tell us all we should look after ourselves and stop eating so many pies ... excellent work Mr B, what's in the pipeline next - a Minister for Stating the Bloody Obvious?? Actually, we seem to have a whole load of them ... but I digress.

In addition we're told we shouldn't treat the overweight with anything other then sympathy - after all it's not their fault is it poor dears? While I'm sure there is a percentage of the overweight who suffer from genuine ailments which cause their condition there are a lot of people who are fat because they eat too much and it IS their fault they take up two seats on the train and can't reach their smelley bits when they get washed, but as per usual Nanny Britain can't help but give us a tap on the wrists for pointing this out. We're also supposed to feel sorry for drug addicts - poor dears - who can't help being the way they are. All together now ... ahhhhhhhhh !!!!!

However if you drink or smoke you are obviously an Agent of Satan and have deviant fantasies involving strings of pork sausages. Smokers in particular are just a drain on Britain's resources and will lead to the economic downfall of our once sceptred isle leading to a state of anarchy and free communism for everyone.

You have to ask why this is the case don't you?

Actually, I've just had an idea ... if the government was to slice off 10% of the flesh of everyone declared overweight we should ship the result to areas of the world which are starving and kill two birds with one stone - thinner Brits and fatter starving folks. As I'm watching the History Channel there's bound to an endless string of Oxfam ads on - think I'll give them a call ...

You've obviously never tried to use regular expressions to replace the contents of a div tag :)

$temp =  preg_replace('/(]*>)[^<]*(<\/span>)/i', '\\1'.'replacement text here'.'\\2', $stringToModify);