US Box Office Estimates August 27-29 2010

A close run weekend has meant that instead of the estimates, it's the actuals. Two new films have stormed to the top, while many of last weeks new releases have resorted themselves. With only $3M between 4th and twelfth places, it was a matter of taste and appeal.

SuperSeed Testing

I dabble in research, as some might have noticed. One of the things I'm testing at present is 'superseed' or 'initial seeding' feature of many clients. To do that, I'm going to need your help.

I need peers for the swarm.

Georgia Driving

Many people think of American cars, and see the General Lee, the the Mustang from the Gone in 60 Seconds or Knight Rider's KITT. Yet the real king of the US roads, certainly in this part of the US, is the pickup truck. If only people knew how to drive one...

US Box Office Estimates August 20-22 2010

A rash of new films coming out has put the table into a bit of a tizzy. Five new films all at once is a lot, especially when they're all semi-strong films that would ordinarally take 3rd or 4th spot on a typical weekend. As it is, fighting between themselves, they've all knocked each other down a bit, but they've given the consumer choice, which is a good thing.

How Anti-P2P lawsuit evidence is collected.

There are many people around the world that have received a letter, demanding money because of a bittorrent download. The question that is going through their heads is 'how did they track me', with perhaps "how can I prevent them?" To address this, I made a video that should explain these things.

US Pirate Parties in the News

Over the last week, the Pirate Party concept has had some nice airtime in the US, specifically in the states of Oklahoma and Oregon. The latter has even gone national, via CNN.

Look Rush, We Struck Oil!

Almost 2 weeks ago, I showed an excerpt from a Rush Limbaugh show where he talked about how they can't find any of the oil spilt. From a single source, he went on a tirade about how the spill was overblown.

At the the top of that show, he quotes from the New York times, and follows with a little commentary of his own.

"-- that three-quarters of the oil from the Deepwater Horizon leak has already evaporated, dispersed, been captured or otherwise eliminated -- and that much of the rest is so diluted that it does not seem to pose much additional risk of harm." I told you all this on day one and certainly the first week I pointed out this is light crude, it will evaporate quickly, that it will be dispersed.

Sorry Mr Expert, but it seems you were *shock horror* Wrong Again! Who woulda thunk it? Experts are saying that the oil is on the sea bed, and at toxic levels, clearly they're not dittoheads

US Box Office Estimates August 13-15 2010

A little late this week (apologies) but it means the actuals, instead of Sunday-lunchtime estimates (but the disclaimer on the bottom will still be the same).

Ensemble films have become somewhat popular again, thanks to the Ocean films, and so it was only a matter of time before an action ensemble film was made. The Expendables is that film, and it seems to have paid off somewhat - certainly it took the top spot, and has Stallone and Schwarzenegger together in a film for the first time, with Bruce Willis (Sly and Arnie have often referenced each other in their films; Arnie's The Last Action Hero(1993) showed Sly playing Arnie's role in Terminator 2, while Demolition Man (also 1993) made references to the Schwarzenegger Presidential Library, 10 years before he became Governor of California).

US Box Office Estimates August 6-8 2010

After 3 weeks on top, Will Ferrel's comedy cop film, The Other Guys, finally wakes enough people to move Inception from the top spot. The combination of a star cast, a proven lead team, and a lack of competiton meant it was inevitable, as Inception was going to relinquish the spot soon in any case. The other new film, Step Up 3D, just didn't have the wide appeal to do it, although it did have an impressive 3D ratio, undermining stories from a week or so ago, calling it s dead-end.

Rush Limbaugh - 3 Lies in 2 Minutes or Your Money Back!

I was stuck in the car yesterday, and decided to go flicking through the radio stations. One station (which I have preset as it's my local station for the Braves) had on the Rush Limbaugh show. I've heard a lot about him but never actually listened to his station raw. After 2 minutes, I had to turn it off, as I was tired of all the lies and basic errors he was passing off as 'fact'. The specific segment of the show was about the Deepwater Horizons incident, and oil. He's really living up to his (unofficial) sales patter, of Lies for Dumb People.

OFCOM Consultation Response

The consultation that is both open and closed did close for good 3 days ago, and as promised, I am posting my consultation response. If the applet doesn't work, you can also download it here.

There were many things wrong with the consultation, mostly the assumptions used were completely false. Then again, this consultation was because of the Digital Economy Act, which was based on a whole bunch of false claims and ludicrous assumptions, so it was only to be expected.

El Reg Welcomes Readers to 2007.

It's a hard life for many journalists in the tech world. An ever changing landscape, a rush to be first to report, and the need to be the first to break a story, to hit the social media, get the big hits and end up on Slashdot, can make finding stories that can draw the page-views hard. One of the weakest techniques is to take an old story, find a modern version, then just report on that modern version as if it's breaking news. If you can include some hot topics, you can clean up, Say Angelina Jolie, and Apple, and malware and P2P. Combining all four of these, The Reg has hit the bullseye.

US Box Office Estimates July 30 - August 1 2010

For a third week in a row Inception tops the charts, while Dinner for Schmucks comes in a close second, despite having led on the Friday charts. The dominance can partly be attributed to an original story told well, as it doesn't have the discountability of films based on other media, which can be discounted by those who disliked the original source. Jolie spy-flick Salt, another original film, slips behind schmucks to round out the top 3.