Friday, January 25, 2013

Gatecrash Prerelease Haiku


The Simic Evolve
The Gruul are Aggressive
I had no mana.

- Gatecrash Prerelease Haiku

Friday, January 4, 2013

Re: Google Haters.


I was just reading a thread on Reddit, the Google hate was strong today. The TL;DR of this is, if you don't like Google, fuck you. Google has enriched my life and changed it for the better. If you don't like that they sell your information, don't use them. Nothing is free.

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Here is why I love Google. They made my life easier.

Before Gmail, email was an issue. Hotmail/Yahoo and other free providers sucked and still do. ISP email addresses could easily disappear if I moved or changed providers. Email was a fucking nightmare. Then came gmail. I've been using it for 8 years, it hasn't changed, my emails are still there. I no longer worry about losing important information because I moved, or lost a hard drive.

Then came Google Docs. Allowing me to store important documents forever. Another major improvement to my life. Now I don't have to rebuild my, for example, Resume every time. I can just load up an old one, anywhere, anytime on any device. This one feature just got me an interview recently. I was talking to someone about work/IT and he asked me for my Resume. Of course I don't carry paper resumes with me at all times so I loaded it up on my phone and showed it to him, then emailed it to him right there.

Next major improvement: Android. Fuck I love Android. Smart Phones are the way of the future. We now have the entire sum of human intelligence and knowledge at our finger tips, and now it fits into your pocket. Android paves the way for this, and Google gives it out for free.

Before all this was the search engine. Say what you will, but prior to Google, searching for a topic in Yahoo/Altavista/etc was a bitch. First time I used Google, I got my answer in one go. Done. No random searching, no going through linkfarms that looked right on the search page, etc. Fucking done. I haven't looked back since.

What else has Google given us?
* Chrome - Great Browser, saves Bookmarks (omg, this is a beautiful feature. This alone made me switch. The speed of the browser made me stay)
* Google Earth/Maps - Best Mapping software out there. I doubt many people remember GPS without Google Maps. Lets just say ending up on a dead end road wasn't a rare event, or a road that goes into a river.
* Google Music - I personally don't use it much (Spotify fits my needs right now) But its a great music delivery system. Also uploading your own MP3s? WHO DOES THAT?
* Google Voice - Hmm, generating a phone number on the fly and forwarding it to my cell? For Free? This has been a Boon in many ways, most notably for me Craigslist. (You get more replies if you have a phone number) This is just the tip of the iceberg
* Youtube - Cats in Socks? Ok. Anything else I want to see? Its there. Nothing has ever existed quite like Youtube.
* Google Calendar - Professional level Calendar available on almost any device? This one thing has been a great improvement in my life as well. "Where was I on the night of Dec. 12th 2008? Well let me check and see officer." (exaggeration sure, but knowing where I was years ago come up more than one, Google Calendar saved my ass every time)

I'm sorry. No single company has improved more of my Life more than Google has in the past 10 years. To risk sounding like a iTard, It just works. I never have to worry when a piece of hardware dies if I can save my Bookmarks, or my Emails, or my Documents. Just reinstalled Windows, SHIT forgot to back up X. It hasn't happened since Google came into my life.

People want to bitch about Google's privacy and they sell your data, well guess what. Every fucking company does it. You think they give this stuff out for free? Everything costs money in this world, even if we don't believe it should. Don't like it, use something else.

So thank you Google. You have made my life easier, you have enriched my life by providing great services, entertainment and a worry-free computer using existence. Thank you.