Does that cheesy music Eircom use in all their broadband ads drive you into an uncontrollable violent rage too?

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Not content with making europeans wait for months after Rock Band was released in the US, the game’s distributor, Electronic Arts has decided to give us all a good hard shafting too.

Rock Band retails for $169 in the US. This includes the game and all of the peripheral instruments. Here in europe you can have it for €240. Yes. Lets do some currency conversion, shall we? At today’s rates, $169 will get you €106.65. Even when you take the difference in VAT over here and US sales taxes over there into account we’re still getting ripped right the fuck off. We’ve accepted the dodgy $1 = €1 style european RRPs for a long time now, but this is taking the piss.

Fuck you, EA.

Unless you’re able to shit gold bricks you should join me in boycotting this game. Show them that we’re not a bunch of saps that will bend over and take it in the ass just because we don’t live in the US.

There’s loads of flames being thrown on various Eurogamer comment threads about Rock Band. Feel free to throw your tuppenceworth in there too.

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When your super special offer advertisement requires some electronically sped up voice to rattle off 60 seconds of terms and conditions, its not all that bloody special.
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RTE News (heh) tells us today to lube up and bend over in preparation for a shafting from a bunch of greedy television licence bastards:

Television is now much more than a ‘box in the corner’, and the concept of a television licence fee may have to be changed to include such developments as mobile phone streaming and websites such as YouTube, an Oireachtas committee has been told.

So they want to force people to get TV licences for things that have FUCK ALL to do with public service broadcasting? Fuck off. RTE shouldn’t get any TV licence income at all, unless they produce a service like the BBC does. RTE gets TV licence cash and advertising income, and most of its home-made output is still complete crap. Fair City anyone? Celebrity-jigs-and-complete-bollix? Please.

Here’s some more bullshit:

Technology expert Ronan Coy said television can include anything that is made visually available to the consumer, including developments such as Internet-based television stations and video blogging.

Update 15/01/2007: I had called Ronan a wanker for the above, but he informs me that RTE took his comments out of context. See his comment below. Sorry Ronan, I apologise for that.

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I was going to write a lengthy rant about what a load of bollix Big Brother is, and what a bunch of saps it viewers are, but I can’t be bothered expending the energy on such a big, steaming pile of shit.

In short - Celebrity Big Brother:

FUCK OFF.

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Please take your self-destructing-just-out-of-warranty-period Coolpix 5600 and shove it up your collective holes. Thanks.

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I found this thread over at boards.ie quite funny. People were complaining about the rip off prices being charged by Cantec computer stores, when a couple of posters obviously affiliated with the business joined in to the thread. Whilst he/they (hey, its probably 1 person behind multiple accounts) insisted they’re a “satisfied customer”, they continued to post real tow-the-company-line type crap.

Off with their heads!

Someone correct me if I’m wrong, but wouldn’t I be right in saying that “Cantec” shops used to all be Compustore franchises before Compustore went tits-up? Looks like nothing’s changed there then - still the preserve of customers who just don’t know any better.

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Unless you’ve been living in a cave for the last few weeks, you will have heard about the uproar and violence from the muslim world about a certain few cartoons first published in a Danish newspaper, and then later republished across europe in a show of solidarity by the press. Danish businesses and nationals have experienced violence, death threats and other forms of persecution over the last few weeks, along with other europeans living in the middle east.
The religious and political correctness brigades and other, more sinister groups are now trying to restrict your freedom of speech, using these cartoons and the subsequent events, ridiculously blown out of all proportion to do so.

Fuck those guys.

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I haven’t posted here in the last few days for several reasons, including in no particular order:

• UTV being skinflint tight-arses and charging me through the arse for breaking their stupidly low traffic cap.
• Being busy as fuck in work.
• Breaking my balls in the gym. Not literally, you filthy bastards.
• Spending too much of the little available free time playing games (Mostly Tie Fighter and emulated fun on the PSP, now that clever bastard Fanjita and pals have enabled such toys on later firmware versions)

Also, wrt the title of this post - I’ve been listening to the song of the same name a lot recently. One of the best songs ever written, in my opinion.

First off, I would like to say that I have no affiliation with any political party or other interest group in the subject below.

Fair play to the Fina Gaelers on having the balls to come forward and propose making Irish a non-compulsory subject at leaving cert level, and boo to the FFeckers for attacking the idea like rabid dogs. This is a touchy subject, and usually the side supporting removing the compulsory status of Irish get their “Irishness” called into question, and fall victim to other stupid, low down tactics like that.
As a victim of the compulsory Irish regime in my schooldays, I fully support removing the compulsory status of the subject. Having a subject rammed down your throat without any effort to endear students to it, or to explain what the hell is actually going on is no way to engender support and love of the language. After my 14-odd years spent learning Irish in school, I can hardly string a sentence together in the language.
Make it optional. At least then those who want to study it can do so, and those who don’t can spend their time studying something more useful. And, to those who trot out the tired old “but its part of your heritage!” line: Cram it up your arse. Potato famine and oppression under the rule of our neighbours are also part of my heritage, should I starve myself and give up my civil rights too? It is 2005. More people in Ireland speak Chinese on a daily basis than Irish. We are an English-speaking country, like it or not. I don’t know about you, but the only place I’ve heard people speaking Irish to each other on the street is in the Connemara Gaeltacht.

I wish the subject was optional when I was in school.