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Sony has the official PSP section of their iTunes-wannabe Connect music store up and running, its full of free video downloads, a tutorial for beginners on how to get content onto your PSP, and a help section to answer any questions you might have on making the most out of your PSP. They even have Speed Racer and its all for free! [Link]

From Engadget: Damn, it’s only been a week since the Sony dropped the PlayStation Portable on us and people already pieced together a ton of different hacks and how-tos for the new game console. We’ve thrown together this list of all the hacks and how-tos we could find, we’ve probably missed a couple, so let us know and we’ll add ‘em to the list:

How to use non-Duo Memory Sticks on your PSP
How to browse the web with your PSP
How to get TiVoToGo shows onto your PSP
How to get e-books on your PSP
How to read web comics on your PSP
How to get manga on your PSP
Creating Sony Thumbnail files
PSP dead pixel checker
How to use your Mac to play PSP games over the web
How to take apart your PSP
Reading RSS feeds on your PSP
How to get videos and DVDs onto your PSP

For those of you who follow my Miskan posts, here are the pictures I promised of the paper pack samples. [Link]

Today I found a spelling error in a CNN.com article. The first time nataly found a spelling mistake she posted about it so I decided to post this to. CNN wrote stable instead of label in the following paragraph:

Knight founded the label now known as Tha Row Inc. in 1992, signing some of the world’s biggest rap artists, including Tupac Shakur, Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg. His stable dominated rap music for much of the 1990s.

[Link]

Update: My mistake, one of the definitions of stable is “A group, as of athletes or entertainers, under common management: a stable of prizefighters”

Just found the best PSP bundle so far online, here is what it includes:

– Included in this bundle is the PSP system value pack, Tony Hawk Underground: Remix, WipeOut: Pure, Need for Speed: Underground Rivals and a Starter Kit

– The PSP Value Pak includes all the extras you need – memory stick, soft case, headphones, battery pack, an AC adapter, plus a movie/music/video sampler disc

– The PSP Starter Kit comes complete with an all-in-one case, car charger, USB data cable (for transferring movies and pictures), high quality earbuds, four UMD disc jackets, screen guard, and a system polishing cloth

Here is the [Link]

I have been trying to call them since 8:30 in the morning. I was calling them on 812000 and when it asks if I was a customer or not, I would choose No I am not. Then I would get the corny message that they would like it if I would join them, then the phone rings and no one picks up. So finally I got fed up after trying for over 2 hours to get a hold of someone. Now when I called I pressed 1 which is the option for if you are a BKME customer. Right away someone picked up. I asked them what the circle in the logo was, the lady answered a pearl. I said thank you and closed the phone.

So the sphere turned out to be a pearl like we all assumed in the first place.

Since my post the other day on the new BKME logo I have heard two definitions for the sphere. The first is that its not a pearl its the moon. The second definition is that its a crystal ball. Both sources for these answers were BKME employees. So I decided I will contact BKME myself and find out. I sent them an email 2 days ago and I didn’t get a reply. I called them up last night and believe it or not their customer support line works only during regular working hours! So since today morning I have been trying to contact them on 812000 but no one is picking up. If I was planning on being a new customer I would have moved on and looked elsewhere by now. I will keep trying to call and will post when I find out anything.

Update: turns out its a pearl

You might be a syrian in lebanon if

10. you spent the last two months hiding in ‘jall mowz ‘ on the outskirts of saida

9. you hang out at the termoss unemployment line with 5000 other guys like you

8. the market for skekeen matbakh in dbayyeh burst like the internet bubble in 2001

7. the syrian you were watching who was watching a lebnese was sent back home

6. you’ve spent the last couple of months training to say “keefak “and “mish heyk?”

5. the last time you remember being so scared, you were still in syria

4. you painted your yellow chevrolet 1956 taxi “cedar green”

3. you get free bus rides from homs to beirut if you agree to carry a lebanese flag

2. the big wasta you had from your sisters husband from korda7a who is a colonel in the syrian airforce is only good to get you a seat on a bus back to sham

1. the last time you earned money was when you showed up at Hizballahs PROSYRIA demonstration in beirut

By Naycola

Have you guys seen the knew BKME logo? Its depressing. How can a bank like BKME be so stupid I don’t know. I don’t blame the designer. The designer is crap, I am sure he knows that already. I blame the people at BKME who accepted such tragic work. My god, its a disaster! Firstly, before I start talking about the logo, lets talk about the 4×3 Mega’s on the road where the logo is on. You DO NOT use yellow type on a white background. Its very unreadable. They not only used yellow type on a white background, they used it on their outdoor ads!! If you are driving up to the ad on the street you will not see “Al Awsat” written in yellow until you slam into the ad. Its impossible to read when its in a newspaper yet alone an ad on the street 50 meters away while you are zooming buy in you car at 100km/h. Thats their first mistake. Lets talk about the logo. Is that a pearl? Come on, who was the genius who thought of that? Very creative. I am sure no one ever thought about it before (Note: I am being sarcastic here). Even Gulf Bank uses the pearl for their Dana account. Anyway, whatever, fine, go with the pearl, but at-least be a bit more creative about it. It looks like a shop that sells marbles for kids. Their logo really pisses me off.

You know what the problem is? People think being a designer is easy. People think anyone can be a designer. People think that if they take a course in Adobe Photoshop at some trashy institute in Salmiya they automatically are designers. Thats bullshit. If thats true then what did I do for 4 years at university? Why do designers go get their masters then their PhDs? Taking a course in Photoshop at an institute just means you now know how to use 5% of Photoshops capabilities. Thats all. We spend the first two years of university not being allowed to use any computers in our design work. They teach us that the computer is just a tool, its just a means to get what you have in your head onto paper. Thats all. So they spend the first 2 years teaching us about other tools like drawing, painting, silk screen printing, sculpturing, stencils and tons more stuff. Not only that but as a designer you need to be creative, and have taste, both things which many people lack. Why is GianFranco Ferre designing clothes and you aren’t? Why is Philip Starck designing everything from hotel rooms to sneakers and you aren’t? They got it you don’t, its that simple.

Anyway it doesn’t matter. BKME is the one losing here. The new Osoul logo even has a readability problem. Osoul in arabic can be read as Osoul or Osoud. The reason for that is the L in the end is not shaped correctly. The L could look like an L or a D. It goes both ways. Fine the majority will read it as an L but the fact that it might be read as a D is a problem. Now the logo is out and I am sure Osoul is getting comments about it. It could have been so easy to fix but it wasn’t. Below is just a mockup I did in 2 minutes of what could have been done to avoid this Osoul/Osoud mix up.

Osoul Logo

Osoul Logo Fixed

But anyway this post has become to long so I will stop. Its just very frustrating for me because these bad designers give us all a bad reputation and image. The client needs to be able to trust us and bad designers make this trust harder to form.

Just checking on the status of the of the PSP vs DS vote on cnet. Sony is currently winning with 73.5%. [Link]

Today my brother did something very cool. He took an Apple iPod Shuffle, plugged it into the USB port on the front of his Sony PS2, copied pictures he took in Grand Turismo 4 onto the shuffle, then plugged the shuffle back into the Mac and copied the images onto his desktop. I think this is the coolest thing I have heard about the PS2. [IMG 1] [IMG 2]

I was at my favorite flag site trying to get the exact colors of the Kuwaiti flag when I noticed something funny. The site lists the Kuwaiti flags from the begining till now. Check out Kuwait’s current flag! [Link]

I don’t know why I hadn’t heard of this until today but I just found out about the coolest fucking thing ever, the Sinclair C5. It was released back in 1985 and it was supposed to be the Segway of that era. The C5 worked on rechargeable battery that would last up to 30KM, if the battery finished you could pedal your way back home. Best of all it cost only 150KD. But, the Sinclair C5 was a commercial disaster. It got very negative media coverage and in the end only 12,000 C5s were produced and the project was killed off.

I really want one now, I checked eBay and they are selling for like 100KD only. Imagine me driving one down to Sultan Center or something. Its amazing!! Now I just need to find someone who would be willing to ship one from England to Kuwait.

Here are some links:
Sinclair C5 Enthusiasts
Sinclair C5 on eBay

I actually started 2:48AM so I can post pictures that didn’t make the cut on Miskan.com. This picture is from yesterday but I decided to go with the visually more attractive Caution sign. This fire is from near my house. A garbadge bin was set on fire and there were 2 cops standing near it waiting for the fire trucks to come. One of the cops saw me take a picture and called me over. When I went to him he asked me if I was a journalist. I told him no. He was like why are you taking a picture? I told him because its something interesting. I asked him if fire trucks were gonna come, he replied saying they were. Then he asked me if I want to take a picture of them. I told him I couldn’t since I had to leave. I said thank you and left. [large pic link]

From the Dept. of We Tried to Warn You, Sony user forums are already starting to fill up with laments about PlayStation Portables with dead pixels and other screen defects.

The PSP’s Japanese launch was accompanied by scattered reports of glitchy screens and Sony indifference to the defects. U.S. consumers can pretty much intuit the same from reading Page 13 of the instruction manual:

“Red, blue or green spots (bright spots) or black spots (dark spots) may appear in certain locations of the LCD screen. The appearance of such spots is a normal occurrence associated with LCD screens and is not a sign of a malfunction.”

Translated, that means Sony and its retail friends get to decide when a PSP screen is defective enough to merit replacement. Clerks at Sony’s PlayStation store in San Francisco, for example, appeared to be fairly generous with replacement requests Thursday, but results may vary with other retailers and Sony’s customer support phone line. [via]