Author Archives: Stirling Matheson

Idiots Are Still Making “123456” and “Password” the Most Popular Passwords

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What’s the first thing any article about web safety or well-meaning but overbearing authority figure tells you? It’s usually that you shouldn’t use “123456” or “password” as your password. That said, the most popular passwords are still “123456” and “password.” Yes, people are still really, really stupid and unimaginative.

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Guess what the third most popular password is: “12345,” followed by “12345678” and “qwerty.” The rest of the list is rounded out by more sequential combinations of numbers and the names of people’s favorites superheroes, sports, and animals. Exceptions to that rule are “letmein,” “michael,” “trustno1,” and “shadow.” The questions is: do people named “Michael” just have awful security, or a large number of people weirdly obsessed with people named Michael?

Rather than using “password” on 87 different accounts, I recommend using a password manager like LastPass to randomize each password and then remember the combinations for you.

[via Independent]

2K Games Announces “Sid Meyer’s Starships”

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Beyond Earth has been met with much critical fanfare, because it’s Civilization in spaaaaaaaace, and that’s cool. It also took advantage of the fantasy setting and introduced things like the non-linear tech tree and other tangents to classic Civ gameplay that made Beyond Earth feel like more than just a mod.

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Now this storyline is being expanded upon with a game called “Starships.” It’s the store of what appears to have been a civilization which peacefully won a game of BE, and has now gotten a distress signal from another world that was settled by other humans in an age gone bye. Being a boss, peaceful society, they grab their guns and start heading towards the long lost brothers.

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Gameplay will consist of lots of exploration, because Sid loves that crap; diplomacy, because ditto; and some ship-to-ship combat, because fighting sells games, and customizable ships, because everybody loves that crap.

Part of what should make Starships interesting is that some mission must be completed on separate maps, and the actual combat will “dynamically generated” which should certainly help keep the game engaging. I’ve always wanted to play a delicious hybrid of Civilization and Total War, and this sounds pretty close. I’m excited.

[via Gamespot]

The Conan Board Game Destroyed Its Kickstarter Goal

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The Conan board game’s funding target on Kickstarter was $80,000. It has 27 days to go and the game has already crushed that $80k, driven the gamers before it, and heard the lamentations of their wallets by cruising on up to over $525,000.

The game in its most basic form comes with a ton of nicely deailed minis, but the lamentations of those wallets have added a ton more, and another game board to everybody’s games. From mummies and pirates to Natohk, these players are getting a lot. As it stands, only a couple of stretch goal bonuses remain, and it’s only a matter of time before those are exceeded.

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Gameplay wise, Conan looks like it could be a good romp. One to four players take on the roles of Conan and his followers, and they are opposed by another player who is playing as overlord. The overlord controls hordes of evil minions that the heroes will have to smash. Hit up the Kickstarter page for more information than you probably want.

Endangered Whale Testicle Beer: WTF?

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So, next week I’m headed to Iceland for a few days. I plan to have some fun and drink some beer, but I don’t plan to drink this new Icelandic beer, because it has endangered Fin whale testicle in it. I like to try as many unusual beer styles as I can and I often like to joke that I plan to be the anti-Noah, meaning that I plan to eat two of every animal. Of course, I couldn’t actually do this; I think conservation is too important and I just fucking love cheetahs too much (Hint, my birthday is in August).

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That’s why I won’t be drinking this new Icelandic beer. It’s brewed by Stedji for the upcoming Thorri festival. Many Icelanders claim that their whaling operations are done sustainably, and therefore do not abide by the IWC’s commercial whaling moratorium. Regardless of the political maneuvering, I don’t plan to partake of any whale ball juice.

[via IFL Science]

The Motorola Scout 5000 Lets You Track Your Dog Like The Canine NSA

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What’s your dog’s name? “Viktor Erstmann von Drakenhoff IV?” That’s a bit much… oh, you call him “Vicky” for short. Still weird, but whatever. Has Vicky ever escaped from your yard? Have you ever wanted to spy on him from the comfort of your computer? Have you ever wanted to know how many steps he’s taking per day? Or perhaps you just want text message alerts when he tries to flee from your overbearing presence?

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If you answered yes to all of those questions, Motorola is making a device that you will love. The Scout 5000 affixes firmly around your dog’s neck (always a favorite strategy for evil overlords), and uses its integral GPS, Wi-Fi, and 3G cellular connections to let the master check where the dog is, send alerts when said dog leaves his “virtual fence,” stream live, wide-angle video from a camera, let you know when Vicky is barking, send and receive audio (so you can issue your directives), and act as a pedometer, because why the hell not.

The Scout 5000 will cost $200 when it goes on sale in June.

[via CNet]

This Seven-Year-Old Gets a Clonetrooper Prosthetic Arm

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The E-NABLE network is very cool: it uses 3D printing to make basic, low-cost prosthetics for children who are growing too quickly to qualify for regular ones. Their latest recipient is Liam Porter from Augusta, Georgia, who was given the limb by John Peterson, who built himself a 3D printer for the purposes of working with E-NABLE. That alone would be awesome and article worthy, but it gets better.

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Peterson ran in to a group of Star Wars cosplayers at a Maker Faire, who inspired him to design Porter’s arm to look like a clonetrooper’s. Better still, the cosplayers themselves were in attendance at the giving of the prosthetic, giving the whole ordeal a strong dose of geekiness. What seven-year-old wouldn’t love this? He looks absolutely blown away.

[via 3D Printing Industry]

What Games Are People Playing? The Orr Group Shows off Roll20 Stats

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Roll20 is an interesting game platform. It’s designed for you and your distant friends to get together, just like the good old days, for a session of a tabletop RPG. The difference is that you’re using a virtual tabletop that comes with a ton of digital apps and assistance. The Orr Group, which is the company behind Roll20, has released some stats on what its players are playing. Where is your game of choice?

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One of the things that the Orr Group mentioned in the report was that 10% of players identify as Warhammer 40K gamers, but less than 2% are actually playing the game on Roll20. The report says that this is puzzling to the group, based on the fact that 40k is usually played 1v1, but if you look at what is actually listed under “Warhammer 40k” on the website, it’s all RPGs that aren’t Dark Heresey, which has its own heading.

It seems that nobody is playing 40k, but that the Orr Group thinks that’s what this heading refers to. Notice anything else interesting in here?

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[via The Orr Group]

 

One Guy’s Take on What’s Happening in His Kid’s Imagination

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Kids are weird. They run around screaming at nothing, haphazardly waving sticks at things, and have emotional responses to doorknobs and pavement. They’re like tiny lunatics with poor hand-eye coordination. What’s going on with the way they interact with the world is a product of very active imaginations that haven’t yet been hampered by societal expectations and pragmatism. That said, if you’re screaming at the bubble dragon, you might not get out of the way of that biker coming up behind you unless a parent moves you first.

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This guy filmed his kid being a kid, and then promptly added in some CGI that makes all of these actions make sense to the average viewer. Who wouldn’t want to collect giant, shiny, gold coins, and shoot things with a magic fire stick? The narrative is there.

The Belfie Is a Sign That The Apocalypse is Nigh

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Okay… so you have a selfie stick, I’ll forgive you. You’re ridiculous, but I’ll accept a lot of ridiculous. If you have a selfie stick designed solely for taking photos of your own ass we all want to hit you with a crowbar. You might think it’s still worth it, so I’ll put it in your terms: crowbar wounds look awful.

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Yeah, this device, the Belfie Stick, is designed to assist you in taking photos of your own butt, in the hopes that you can amass enough Instagram followers to attain a powerless and dubious form of fame. The device was inspired by the ultimate first world problem: Kim Kardashian took tons of pictures of her own ass before getting one that pleased her, and this sort of device would help solve that horrible ail in her life.

Those of you who want the Belfie Stick will have to shell out $79.99 for it, because the manufacturers know that people this vain are suckers.

“Wazer Wifle!”: A Fallout 3 Rap That’s Actually Pretty Good

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Normally, when you see a YouTube rap based on a piece of geek culture, you know it’s going to be awful. Probably better than a local Mitsubishi dealer rap, but not by much. There’s usually no flow, the most boring and predictable rhymes in the world, a beat that sounds like it was rejected from a MC Hammer album in the ’80s, and that awful breathlessness that comes with attempting to rap without having any practice at all. It’s shameful.

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This isn’t. Wazer Wifle! takes one of the game’s many amusing side characters and some of that retro brass band music, mixes it up in a funky blender, and then rattles off a billion game references with some actual skill. It will get stuck in your head, and you’ll be sorely tempted to boot up Fallout 3 once more, just so you can turn some baddies to ash with your WAZER WIFLE!

[via YouTube]