UsefulConcept

Time is running out if you are still thinking about the cruise.  Last I looked we had 23 people booked and ready to go. When I first envisioned this I thought 10 people total would be most likely, however I had such great feedback and enthusiasm I thought maybe it would be more like 50.  I think the economy has had its toll on people, however, and for many it is prudent to watch their money for the time being. 

That said people can still sign up!  It looks like pricing is about the same as the original locked in prices, and in fact the fuel surcharges have been removed.  For $350 ish you can get a cabin for the whole cruise including food, which isn't too bad at all.  The cost of flights have also come down, at least from the Boston area.

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We (Savvy Software) just renewed our sponsorship for CFUnited this year.  We have sponsored for several years now and this year we opted for a Silver level sponsorship, so we will have a proper booth.  I always look forward to the conference and especially this year as it is a significant change in venue. The Four-Diamond Award-Winning Lansdowne Resort sounds pretty impressive and although it is upscale it should still be much less expensive then DC.

In related news I was selected to speak at this years conference.  It had nothing to do with the sponsorship (we just signed up as sponsor today, and I was selected to speak a few weeks ago).  I haven't actually spoke at a conference in a few years and I am pretty excited about it.  I did do the unconference at MAX this year, but it isn't quite the same (though I loved it).

RPM Challenge is an amazing music event that happens every February. It is a challenge for musicians of all talents to conceive, write, record and submit their album all in the month of February (28 days!).  For most it is a daunting task, and full of rewards.  Not money rewards, but personal growth, community building, and artistic expression.  You see this challenge is all about the music and the musician.  There is no winner, there are no judges.  Not even an entry fee.

Last year 8500+ original tracks of music were recorded.  There were simultaneous listening parties in 7 different cities (plus secondlife).  So much music was produced that it wasn't possible to listen to just one track from each album of just regional participants in many of the cities.

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Just put up a new design today. I was messing around with Adobe Illustrator (my first time) and learned the power of brushes.

I made a fun background image and decided it was time to mess with my old blog design. Basically I just made a big background, set it to be fixed, then added opacity to a few of my divs.

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My World Of Warcraft Wishlist for 2009

• First let me say I love WOW and my wife and I have played since beta. I love Northrend, best quests ever. Still I would like to see a few new things done. Since I don't know anyone at Blizzard and I don't know of any other way to submit ideas I am using my blog on New Years Eve. :-)
• Unlimited Ignores. The power to ignore people can't be understated. My standard rule after years of playing the game is to ignore racist/homophobe/asshole people instantly. It turns out there are not that many, they just chat a LOT. By ignoring them it helps the quality of the game so much. However, we are limited in the number of people we can ignore. If you start ignoring gold sellers as well that quickly gets met in a matter of a week. I wish wish wish we had an unlimited number to ignore. There is no good technical reason I can think of to NOT do so. Blizzard has done great tech feats with wow, certainly an ignore list more powerful can be one of them.
• On a related note, shared ignore lists. If I can share my list with my wife (and vice versa) that would be GREAT. Imagine the social change that would happen when people can share their known jerks list.
• Ability to ignore players that are not online. I know that sounds odd, but really it is often someone says something really really bad then logs out. I can't ignore them if they just left. But my ignore system is the ONLY way I can track people I don't want to do future business with.
• Ability to track pvp target names. Who killed me, and who have I killed? This would be a good add-on I suppose. A ganker tracker! Who killed me outside of battleground/arena where I did NO damage. That way I can identify them later for reprisal.
• Ability to filter craftable items to only those things I have mats for. Actually two filters. One filter for craftable things which I have some mats for. Another filter to only show items that I have all mats for. Cooking is a great example of where this would come in handy. Yes I can scroll, but frankly it is a pain.
• Build auctioneer into WOW. Seriously. If we all don't have to scan the AH then it would reduce load on the servers. Just build that functionality into wow. The add-on is great, but it takes 8-15 min of time to scan for my server and it sucks up all kinds of server resources for something I consider a requirement to play the game. Normally I say let an add-on stay an add-on, but in this regard it is special as it effects Blizzard CPU/Bandwidth. Much of that would be mitigated if built in and no longer requiring a scan.
• More world events. Not holidays mind you but some crazy boss invading Darnasus for one weekend only. Powered by a GM. How insanely great would that be. Ya that would be a lot of GM's for all your servers, but hey I still want it anyway. Onyxia just wakes up one day and takes off after Gadget. SWEEET!
• Add more report options. I can right click on chat item to report spam, but not report gold seller. I can't report offensive chat. I see gold selling ALL THE TIME. Let me report it!
• Have ONE gm per server just watching chat in trade channel. Not a big brother thing, but watching for accounts clearly hacked, people selling gold, etc. This has the potential for bad I realize and I suggest it with trepidation, but on the other side the anonymity of the chat now lends itself to people saying pretty horrible things with no accountability. Plus the scammers (selling spectral tiger codes, etc). Do we remember the gambling fad? I see it coming back now in different forms.
• Better scaling with raid pvp events. I have a great pc with a great graphics card. Yet I see lag in Dalaran sometimes, let alone Wintergrasp or raids on Horde towns. See next item for option 2.
• Video config per zone type. Identify zone types that are likely to have more people and let us configure a different video setting. For example in Dalaran I don't need my video settings as high as anywhere else. I get 50-60 fps everywhere except those places where my pc sometimes lags so bad I can't move. Changing our video settings per area may help.
• Guess thats it for now. Thanks for reading. Post your own requests or comments and Happy New Year!

Just got word today that the cruise ship is selling out, so if you have been holding off on booking your cruise for RIAdventure you should do so soon!  Now, what that really means I don't know.  Will it sell out by New Years?  No idea. 

I also learned that there is no longer a fuel surcharge, which makes sense.  Those that paid it already will have it credited to their on board credit to go against drinks and other stuff. 

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