The saying goes if it aint broke dont fix it. And yes, that makes sense. But what if the saying was if its fucked, then get a new one? I am guessing my little brother is from the second school of thought. You see we had tv like the one on the right *cough* that wasn’t broken, but it was, well, fucked. Can’t go having a 68cm CRT in 2010. Can’t expect to be able to play X-Box, enjoy hi-def on one of those. So Griff changed all that.

In the space of an hour, a quick drive to a JB Hi Fi netted us with our latest and greatest technological investment. The funny thing was the box was so massive for this thing that we had to cut about 20cm of the end of the box, take out the stand, and tape it up just to fit in the back of the car. Can’t be buying a new fuckin’ TV and NOT bring the bastard home. The dudes at JB tried their darnedest to convince us that we ‘needed’ the ultra-expensive HDMI cables from the ‘best brand’. Pfft. Internet has taught me many things like how many fingers a midget can-actually I did read an article about HDMI and it said “dont get fooled” get something mid-range. So we did.

And there it is right there. 55 inches of LCD glory. It has more cables plugged into it right now than New Zealand. Its the best. It even sings to us when we turn it on. Thanks Sony! X-Box looks fucking amazing. Blu-Rays are mind-blowing. Foxtel HD is the bomb (we only watch the HD channels now). Watching a tv so big you have to move your eyes is the best and hooked up the the home theatre its even betterer.

The only problems with having such a kickass TV is that it exposes the errors, problems and failings of Australia’s HDTV broadcasts. The free-to-air networks are on the most part just scraping in with the quality. I cannot understand or fathom why the regulator (ACMA) decided to not license broadcast signals big enough for 1080p from these channels. That has left us with 1080i broadcasts. And you can only notice the difference between 1080i and 1080p on screens 50 inches and above. Thing is, this puppy is 55 inches, and the 1080i still looks good. Except Channel 7.

Channel 7 is a joke of a station. Their broadcasts of my beloved AFL are third-world standard. Honestly, they should be ashamed of themselves. The AFL would want to ensure that the next rights demand the highest quality possible. You just have to compare Fox Sports HD to Channel 7. At least Fox (on the most part) has good quality HD for us. Channel 7 has let Australia down with is sub-standard (even though our standard is already low and my standards are unreachably high) broadcasts. One is better, thankfully. But still, not good enough.

Another impact this has had is the acquiring of downloaded movies and TV shows. No longer is a DVD rip sufficient. No, it must be 720p or more. Hooray for hi-def. Boo Channel 7. Hooray for little brother having heaps of money. Boo me having to buy blu-ray. Speaking of which, HD METALLICA is by far the greatest thing ever. Oh and expect some Metallica news here shortly.

ancient
graffiti

modern
graffiti

the future
of graffiti

Humans have forever wanted to be creative, from the first time a caveman decided to wear animal teeth on a necklace to the creative idea of letting women vote. A constant movement within the evolution of creativity is art – same say it has evolved, others say it has gone backwards into a realm of unescapable self-indulgence (I said that). An area in discussion today is that of graffiti, and how it has evolved through the years.

Indiana Jones types have found many cave paintings, scribbles of clay within walls hidden for thousands of years and now we see some poor sods having to clean up after the modern day caveman (in intellect). Where once cave paintings, or graffiti in this context, was confined to that representing animals, carts and women with oddly shaped but still quite erotic breasts, the modern graffiti ‘artist’ (or vandal, knucklehead, wanker, you choose) decides to create intricately colorful and sometimes beautiful works.

Nowadays its a different story. Gone is the need to actually get your hands dirty, covered in mud or paint. If you have a PC with a pirated version of Photoshop (who pays for that?) you can create what has become the future of graffiti – in game spray paint. Check out the exemplary work done for me by elroy. He made this for me to use in the best game ever, Left4Dead. Fucking rocks, and is splattered all over that game. Hours of fun for the whole horde.