Author Archives: Ray R.

Verizon Wireless and the Galaxy Nexus Saga

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I haven’t posted on this subject yet because it hadn’t been a big enough pain in the ass to make it worthwhile and I was too busy writing papers for the classes I took this semester… But things have changed. I’m now out of school for the rest of the year, and though I thought I’d have been the hell off of T-Mobile’s crappy network by now, Verizon Wireless has become a major pain in my ass.

I suppose I should back up a bit and give you a little background information.

Until January, 2009, I had been a Verizon Wireless customer, but since they hadn’t announced any plans to allow Android based phones on their network at the time and my contract had just expired, I went to the only company that was offering Android phones: T-Mobile. From day 1, I wasn’t happy with T-Mobile, but I had little choice. The main reason I was dissatisfied with them was that I could sit completely still in my house in Detroit, Michigan, and watch my signal come and go for both voice and data. While I was (and believe it or not still am) reasonably happy with the G1 hardware and software T-Mobile’s service was and still is shit.

Fast forward a year and a lot of developments and improvements on Android, a lot of new models were released, including the first long rumored “Google Phone”: the Nexus One. I tried to get T-Mobile to give me an early upgrade in exchange for extending my contract another two years, but being the shitheads I think they are, they refused. So, I canceled my G1 contract, paying the early termination fee, and ordered the Nexus One which I’m still in love with to this day. Sadly, in the three years that I’ve been a T-Mobile customer, their service hasn’t improved here in the slightest, so I’ve been planning to go back to Verizon or maybe even switch to Sprint pretty much all year. My destination depended on one thing: who would be carrying the next Nexus.

Back before the the Galaxy Nexus was officially announced, it was rumored to be exclusive to T-Mobile or Sprint and eventually, and accurately, Verizon, at least for a limited time. Given the service that I had gotten from Verizon in the past, I was really hoping for them to get it at just the right time to allow me to switch back when my T-Mobile contract expired, or perhaps even a month or two before. The only thing that was negative in my mind at all was that Verizon had just killed their unlimited data packages. In all honesty, I considered signing up with them in early July to get “grandfathered” into their unlimited data plans, but I decided to wait and see how things played out: after all, it was possible that Verizon wouldn’t get the new Nexus at all, let alone as any kind of exclusive. After all, if Sprint picked it up, I could probably get unlimited data for less than I could get 2 GB/month from Verizon. Don’t get me wrong, I really wanted Verizon, but I wanted to be smart about this…

October 18th rolled around, the Galaxy Nexus was officially announced, but was not confirmed for any U.S. carrier. Rumor held, however, and appeared to be verified shortly thereafter that the phone would have a limited time exclusivity deal with Verizon! This was great news for me! Better yet, rumor held that the release date was only a few weeks away, November 10th to be exact! Perfect! But Verizon never said anything.

In fact, they still haven’t said anything about it. While there’s an ad for the Galaxy Nexus running on the Verizon Wireless site whenever you search for “Galaxy Nexus”, there’s no official information, no announcement, barely any references to the phone at all.

The rumors started flying, of course, especially with release dates. For the last month, the release date was always just another few days away, and Verizon said nothing. People blamed Google, thought that there must be flaws in the software that prevented the release, but Google said nothing as well. I think my theory probably is the most valid for the delay for all of November: Google had just released the Motorola Droid Razr during the week that we suspected the GNex would come our way, so it seemed and seems probable to me that they delayed the GNex so that the Razr would have some reasonable chance at selling considering it’s coming with a older version of Android than the new Nexus. (Android 2.3.x versus 4.x on the Nexus.)

The Razr is a nice phone I’m sure, but without some of the key features in the Nexus line (NFC in particular since the Nexus S came out last year, and of course the new version of Android) it would’ve been buried by the Galaxy Nexus. As much as I hate bullshit like that, I accepted it because it made sense from an economic viewpoint for Verizon. Besides, if they had a 2 month exclusivity deal with Google, they could hold back the Galaxy Nexus a month to get sales of the Razr, then still sell the Galaxy Nexus as an exclusive for a month.

And this seemed to be exactly what Verizon was doing… As December 9th approached, there seemed to be more and more activity going on with the Galaxy Nexus at Verizon. The number of leaked emails and information started to skyrocket, there were even photos of the phones being stocked at Verizon Wireless and Best Buy stores in preparation for a launch today…  Most of us didn’t care a whole hell of a lot that Verizon got their way with the phone a bit to add some of their software. I prefer plain vanilla Android, but I can tolerate two unobtrusive apps being added to the phone’s image, but apparently Verizon decided to fuck around a bit more than that…

Despite the fact that Google Wallet has been around for months, and is installed by default on the Sprint version of the Nexus S, and also the fact that Verizon execs have had God knows how many builds of Android 4.0 on various Galaxy Nexus sample units, they decided in their infinite fucking wisdom to wait until the launch was imminent to tell Google to pull Wallet. Never mind that the firmware image was already updated to fix some bugs before the release here in the United States, at which point they could have told Google to pull Wallet, but they decided to wait until the proverbial last second to start causing some problems over Wallet.

So what’s the big deal? Well, Verizon is claiming that Google Wallet will require additional hardware in the phone as well as infrastructure changes that they aren’t prepared for in order to properly handle security and secure transactions with Google Wallet, and thus they want it pulled from the phone. The problem with that request is that it’s software based: data encryption is already being done between the app and Google’s servers where I’m sure the actual credit card information is being stored. There’s no need to have any additional hardware in the phone, but for the sake of argument, let’s say there was. Doesn’t Verizon think that Google and Samsung would’ve already thought of this considering the Samsung Nexus S on Sprint’s network has the very same NFC technology and the very same application? Does Verizon think that Google and Samsung missed something?

I seriously doubt it. You see, Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile are partners in a mobile payments software company called Isis, which will be making a product that pretty much competes directly with Google Wallet using NFC to initiate the transactions. The problem? Isis isn’t complete yet, and rumor has it they won’t have their software ready for nearly a year. So rather than give Google Wallet a full year to establish itself on the Galaxy Nexus on Verizon’s networks, Verizon is digging up technical mumbo jumbo bullshit to say that the phone isn’t properly secure for this purpose nor do they have the infrastructure. This is bullshit because if they can transmit and receive data to and from the phone, then they have the infrastructure; Google is already handling the encryption and security for the transactions.

Why am I saying this instead of Google? Well, they’re just too fucking polite to state the obvious, but I think I know a few engineers over there would be screaming “fuck yeah!” if they ever read this. Google has to maintain a cordial relationship with the carriers in order to get their phones on to their networks. If Google had already put out 20 different phones, that sold millions on the release date, Verizon wouldn’t be trying to push them around. The Nexus phones aren’t iPhones, even if me and half million other buyers think they’re better… Apple sure as hell wouldn’t be getting this kind of treatment from Verizon…

So what’s the logical answer given this hubbub? I say Verizon should NOT block Google Wallet in any way shape or form, and Google shouldn’t pre-install it either. Google should put Wallet in the Market and make it available for download for phones with NFC. Why? So that we the users, the people paying or will be paying Verizon a monthly bill have the choice. This should be our choice because we’re the ones that may or may not use Wallet or Isis. It should be up to us to decide who we trust and how we pay for goods, not Verizon.

So another rumored release date has come and gone, this time with the phones in stock at retailers… They’re not allowed to sell the phones yet because Verizon is apparently waiting for Google to pull Wallet… Well, Google, I hope one of your managers reads this blog entry… Pull Wallet exactly as the fuckers at Verizon want you to do… Then release it in Android Market once the phone has gone on sale exactly as I suggested above… You’re the application developer, and Verizon claims that they don’t block any app… So, do what you want to do… Grow some balls, and do what’s right for your customers… If Verizon wants to be a whiny baby and decide not to carry the next Nexus after this one, fine… fuck them. You’ve got Sprint, AT&T, and T-Mobile customers drooling over your phones already, and I’m sure that if necessary, I’ll find a happy home with Sprint after my Verizon contract ends…

Update 12/14/2011: Verizon’s finally gotten around to announcing that the Galaxy Nexus will be released tomorrow… About time…! I’m not saying all is forgiven, but at least we can start getting this mess behind us…

DC Universe Online, Now Free to Play

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I haven’t talked about DC Universe Online before because I wasn’t willing to pay a monthly fee for it. I pay a monthly fee play World of Warcraft as is, and I’m a lifetime member of Star Trek Online, as I’ve mentioned before, so I just couldn’t see myself paying another monthly fee just to play a game in a comic universe I don’t know a whole lot about. Still the game looked interesting…

On Tuesday, DC Universe Online became free to play, which means that basically they’re giving it away in the hopes that people will buy DLC and that they’ll retain a few monthly subscribers. I don’t know how well the model works, but personally I’d bet that this game will be killed off in under a year. Nonetheless, I decided that I would download the software and give it a shot.

If I remember correctly the basic client download is almost 2 GB, not too bad considering the typical PS3 game download or demo is in that neighborhood. I got the download going last night and was going to check it out today. A few minutes ago in fact…

The problem is, that there’s apparently a 14 GB content download that occurs when you launch the game…! 14 GB!! I don’t know about you but when I go to play a game, I want to play then, not several hours later…! Even Blizzard learned that a few years ago and made the WoW client capable of downloading data as it needed it! Sheesh… this is not going to be positive influence on my opinion of the game…

 

Update: 6:53 pm: [Unofficial] Strike 2! So, sometime over the last 4 hours, DC Universe Online finished downloading its data, so that in theory I could play. I just spent the last 15 minutes or so trying to log in to actually take a look at the game, but I couldn’t. Maybe it’s system maintenance. Maybe it’s the PSN maintenance that should have wrapped up by now. Maybe there’s an unexpected outage. Maybe my router’s firewall is interfering though all other games seem to work. I don’t know. But I do know that I can’t connect at all to the game, and it says that I need to be logged into PSN (which I am) in order to play. I’m going to give DCUO the benefit of the doubt on this one, but this is not a good way to impress a potential customer…

“The Look” or Another Fine Episode of Castle!

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I think we already established the fact that I’m a Castle fan. I watch the show religiously. I follow both Nathan Fillion and Stana Katic on Twitter. I’ve gotten friends hooked on the show! I’ll confess that my heart has a special place for television shows and movies that make writers look far more interesting than I think we probably really are: that means I love Castle, and I love Californication. (Yeah, Duchovny, if you’re listening, I’m still a fan of yours after all these years!) So, it’s not unexpected that I saw tonight’s episode.

Out of respect for the West Coast, I’ll invalidate my normal truth, the whole truth, and damn the spoiler warnings and actually not reveal anything about the episode. Except one detail.

There was a moment, one single intensified moment when everything that needed to be said by Beckett and Castle was said, and neither of them uttered a word. It was as plain as day on Beckett’s face, and while their lover’s dance has not yet reached its end, Castle would be a fool indeed if he didn’t get the message.

Westies… You’ll know the moment when you see it… Trust me…!

Conan the Barbarian

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If you’re anything like me, you might have seen the old Schwarzenegger Conan movies and enjoyed them immensely. But in all honesty, did you know that Conan existed before those films? I had no idea until this past week that there was more to Conan than what Schwarzenegger portrayed and that had been developed into comics since then! No idea at all that Conan stretched back to the 1930s!

So, as you might guess, I was afraid of this new Conan film. I was afraid that it would be a parody or an attempt to continue in the tradition of the Schwarzenegger films, but I made up my mind to see it when I discovered Jason Momoa was playing the title role. I’m something of a late comer; I didn’t know Momoa existed before his portrayal of Ronon Dex on Stargate: Atlantis. I loved that character! I loved Momoa’s performance so much that I only started watching Game of Thrones (which I now love) to see him as Khal Drogo. (Thanks to Jewel Staite for mentioning that on Twitter at just the right time!)

Earlier this week I read a preview article on some site that made me more comfortable about the film, and especially when I saw the preview clip that was attached to the article. That convinced me that this was no attempt to recreate what Schwarzenegger did, and that this was no re-imagining or reboot of the franchise. In fact, the article pointed out that this, if anything, is a re-adaptation of the original stories. “Original stories?” I thought, and did some digging. Yes. Conan goes back to 1932 to Robert E. Howard’s original stories. Perhaps even older still when you factor in that the first Conan story was a retelling of one of Howard’s Kull the Conqueror stories. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, there is more to Conan than most of us ever knew!

So I was prepared to accept this alternate Conan, even though friends of mine were complaining that he speaks too much. (When did that become a bad thing?!?!) After watching this film today, what do I think? In all honesty, I like this vision of Conan better than Schwarzenegger’s! I love the intelligent, calculating brutality of Momoa’s Conan better than the brute strength of Schwarzenegger’s. In my opinion it fits the character better, and even makes better sense of the endings of Schwarzenegger’s where the voice over proclaims that this is but one of the stories of how Conan got to be king, then implying that there were others. This “new” Conan was proclaimed as being kingly by another character in the film, and I think it was completely accurate and that it felt better.

Of course, that brings me to the only two things I think were flaws in this film. First and foremost, this Conan was far too likable. He had no bad habits per se, and was likable from the first moments of the film. At no point did I feel that he had any character flaws or issues that needed to be resolved in order to triumph in the end. As much as we might want perfect characters in our stories, it’s these flaws that bond the audience to them. Did I dislike Conan? No. I just think he was too perfect, too heroic through out the film. Give him some self-doubt, or perhaps make him too reckless resulting in the death of a friend, or make him a drunkard… Give him something significant to overcome to make me want to root for him rather than making him perfect because he’s the hero we always knew him to be! Throughout the film, I kept seeing Conan as a middle ground between Momoa’s Ronon and Drogo; he had the apparent moral code of Ronon yet was able to get down and dirty like Drogo when it came to combat and sex. While there were definitely some things that were clearly Conan, I kept seeing these other characters, and it wasn’t because of Momoa’s acting. It was the script, which I think was tailored to capture fans of those other performances. I didn’t dislike the script and story, mind you, I just think that Conan was written too much like Momoa’s other characters.

Unfortunately, that ties into my second point: there isn’t a single enemy in this film that really compares to or challenges Conan. Yes, the chief antagonist does pose some trivial challenge to him, but in truth I felt like it was just a matter of time before and a question of how Conan killed him. Throughout the story, it was obvious that Conan was superior to every opponent in the film. There was no obstacle Conan couldn’t surmount, and so, again, another character development and audience bonding opportunity was passed up. It’s like watching the favored team steamroll an up and coming challenger: you know who’s going to win and there’s not much in the way of thrills as a result.

The movie was good, and I liked it, but it wasn’t epic like it should have been. Much as I despise Schwarzenegger these days, his version of Conan felt epic. Momoa’s was far more realistic, brutal, bloody, and intelligent, but it lacked that epic feel despite the fact that the overarching story takes place over decades if not centuries. I would love to see that corrected in a sequel but I seriously doubt there will be one. Part of the reason is that despite the presence of Momoa, Rose McGowan, Ron Perlman, and narration by Morgan Freeman, there weren’t very many stars or even recognizable faces in this film. It seems to me that the studio committed to the film only as far as honoring a contract rather than being really invested in the success of this film. I may be wrong, there may be a dozen sequels planned for all I know, but felt that the studio really wasn’t interested in this film.

So, what do I have to say about this film…? I’m not sure. If you’re a Conan fan, give it a shot; I think you’ll be surprised at how much you like it even if you don’t like the fact that he talks more in this film. If you want to watch an entertaining film, you have one here, and I can think of far worse ways to spend $10-12 than on this film. If you are critical of films, expecting to have certain emotional triggers set off, then I’d recommend you pass on this. I found it enjoyable, but it wasn’t exciting. I liked this interpretation of Conan, but I didn’t establish an emotional bond with him like I normally would with a film’s hero. There’s nothing technically wrong with the film, it’s just not what it should have been.

Warehouse 13 Returns!

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As much as I hate Siffie, I have to respect some of their choices over the last few years. One of those choices was to kill Stargate Universe. The other was to bring Warehouse 13 into existence and to continue to renew it year after year. If you’ve never heard of Warehouse 13, I strongly suggest you take a look at it; I’ll even give you an idea of what it’s like by comparing it to a probably much more popular show: J. J. Abram’s Fringe.

The first thing you need to know is that WH13 is the funny twin of Fringe. Both shows debuted in the same season, focus on weird occurrences in a X-Files sort of way, and seem to possess nearly identical character hierarchies: the main characters (a white male and female) are employed by a major government law enforcement agency, supervised by a mysterious black character (Broyles in Fringe, Mrs. Frederic in WH13), coupled with a cranky and weird older white guy (Walter Bishop on Fringe, Artie Nielsen on WH13) who is assisted by a young woman (Astrid Farnsworth in Fringe, Leena) of questionable ethnicity. WH13 adds a few more characters, but as you can see there are really strong parallels between the two series, and the key difference is that while Fringe is generally a very serious show, following in the footsteps of Fox’s X-Files franchise and Abrams’ Lost, Warehouse 13 goes the other direction, refusing to take itself seriously at all.

In fact, last night’s season premier made me laugh harder than I have all year, with lines from main character Pete Lattimer such as “I once put on Abe Lincoln’s hat and had an uncontrollable urge to free Mrs. Fredrics.” The chemistry between characters and actors on the show make WH13 one of the best acted and alluring shows I’ve seen on Siffie or many other channels all year, and they should be proud of the work they do.

Over the last three years, WH13 has even snagged some fairly big names as guest stars. Among those are Tia Carrere and Lindsay Wagner. Mark Sheppard, whom you know as Romo Lampkin on Battlestar Galactica and as Crowley on Supernatural, was a regular on the show as Benedict Valda until his character’s self-sacrifice in last year’s season finale.

Warehouse 13 combines science fiction with humor in a way that hasn’t been seen since Firefly, and I, for one, am glad that it’s on the air and pray that it will be for a long time to come. It doing the one thing that so much of television is failing to do these days, and that is entertain me. I enjoy watching a lot of my favorite shows because I’m curious how the plot points are going to work out, or I’m trying to solve the puzzles that the characters are confronted with as they are, but so often I’m not actually entertained by the show so much as fascinated by it. Warehouse 13 does both, and I’m thankful to the writers, producers, cast and crew, and even Siffie for this show.

In short, go watch Warehouse 13 on Monday nights on Siffie. Oh, and this doesn’t change my view point that Siffie needs to stop dissing me and all the rest of the geeks and nerds that got it to where it is.

Jewel Staite and her References to Firefly and Stargate: Atlantis

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A recent visitor to this site got here courtesy of a search for “what firefly reference does jewel staite get to drop atlantis.” I’m not sure what exactly they were looking to find, but Jewel Staite gets to make just about whatever Firefly and Stargate: Atlantis references she wants… She was on both shows, and I think fans of both franchises really wish that both were still on the air…

That’s all, just wanted to respond to that…

MTV’s Skins Canceled

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So, uh, it took a little longer than I expected, but I think I called this months ago? Again, is anyone really surprised? I never watched a single episode, but I can draw two possible conclusions on the reasons behind the cancellation: first, in usual MTV fashion, they pushed the line of decency a little too far and the television watching masses just weren’t buying it; and/or secondly, American audiences simply are too prudish to handle a television series based around teen sex and drug use. I’m going to skip the first candidate because it’s fairly obvious: if it’s not extreme, MTV doesn’t give a shit about it these days. However, with the second one, I’m sad to say that the United States has reverted to being prudish about sex and drugs even though we claim to be a free country, with free media, and free speech. We allow drugs in our television shows as long as it shows the negative connotations, and we frown on teen sex though we glorify sex in every way shape and form in every medium where there’s the possibility of making money from it. Still, do you know how prudish we seem about sex?

Let me put it this way, when Janet Jackson went and exposed one of her breasts on television at the Superbowl (yeah, admit it, you know the “incident”), millions of Americans freaked out and had the FCC clamp down on nudity and sex in a harsh way on television. Hell, incidental profanity on television and radio now days can cost the broadcaster hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines! Yet you know what’s on British television just about every night? For lack of a better description, topless phone sex infomercials. That’s right, women baring their breasts — and displaying them uncensored! — on public television while wearing either nothing at all or skimpy panties, soliciting customers for phone sex lines. Just about every night. Public television. Oh, did I mention that British television doesn’t censor half of the profanity that we do?

When did the stiff, prudish Brits become more liberal and free than Americans? Why is it that we hide from sex and profanity in some ways while the rest of the world acknowledge them? You know why teen pregnancy is so damned high in this country? Because we want our kids to think that sex doesn’t exist until they’re eighteen… For thousands of years, right up until we really got to be “civilized” in the early 20th century, children were either in the same room — separated by a flimsy curtain perhaps — or even the same damned bed as their parents when their parents were having sex. They knew about sex. They were probably disgusted by it. They certainly didn’t want to have it until after they hit puberty and hormones started to demand it. But over the last hundred years or so, we want to deny them the education and exposure, to prevent them from knowing about it, and guess what! They’re trying it younger and younger as a result…

Grrr…..

That’s not to say I support what MTV probably did with Skins, but this country has some fucking issues to work out…

The End is Near!

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Ok, maybe that was a bit overly dramatic, but I think it’s relevant and true for the topic I’m addressing today. After ten years of teasing, inside jokes, and epic moments, Smallville’s final episode airs next week. In this season, we’ve seen Clark go through some significant and important changes as he continues along the path to being Superman, and I just want to thank the past and present cast and crew for ten long and enjoyable years of television. Thank you all from the very bottom of my heart!

Right and Wrong

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I am not going to claim that I am a great writer, but I think I’m pretty good. I’m not going to pretend that I’m a genius at marketing, otherwise I’d be quite rich. But one thing I am going to do is throw a bit of my self-respect out the window and pimp my short story “Right and Wrong”, now available for Barnes & Noble’s Nook and Amazon’s Kindle!

As usual, I can’t and won’t claim to be unbiased, and no self-respecting journalist would do a review or critique of his or her own work. So I won’t claim those things, nor will I do those things. What I will do is tell you a small bit about the story so you can make up your mind if you might be interested in purchasing it through either of the above sources.

The story centers around a private detective named Reginald Washington in 1946, a little more than a year after World War II officially ended. A former fighter pilot that lead bomber escort missions into Germany, and a cop before that, Washington is tasked to find a missing young woman in southern Illinois. The catch? He’s black, she’s not, and the town of Green Prairie is deep in Klan country.

If that piques your interest, and you have a Nook, Kindle, or their apps on an Android, iPhone, computer, or other device, why don’t you pop on over to the appropriate store and purchase a copy now!

Freelance Screenwriter

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As of this moment, I’m making myself available as a freelance screenwriter. I’m not limiting myself, at this time, to any genre, medium, or topic. You want a script, drop me an email and we’ll talk terms.