The first website I saw today when I started my iMac was the Apple homepage with a simple yet effective message: Steve Jobs 1955-2011.

I’m not a great Apple aficionado or a Steve Jobs fan, but one can’t ignore the impact Jobs and his company’s products has had on society.

Condolences goes out to friends and family.

Beer + Lego + a camera results in below tribute to beer.

Today professional wrestling lost an icon with the death of Macho Man Randy Savage.

According to TMZ Randy Savage was killed in a car accident.

As a kid I was a big wrestling fan. And though I was more of a Hulk Hogan fan, I also consider Macho Man Randy Savage to be one of the most recognizable and important wrestling figures of the WWF/WWE.

R.I.P. Macho Man Randy Savage 1952-2011

The Macho Man theme:

After a few weekends of clouds and rain today finally saw some sunshine in the weekend in Rotterdam. An excellent moment to take a wake outside in the morning.

Read the rest of this entry

It seems Transformers 3 Dark of the Moon is only a few months away from release (expected release July 2011) and the first trailer popped up this week.

Transformers Dark of the Moon trailer
Geüpload door teasertrailer. – Zeer recente afleveringen en TV shows, online.

Not much is revealed about the plot or Transformers included in the movie but more trailers will come out soon I guess.

I just hope Transformers 3 won’t suck as much as 2.

I’m one of the few consumers who actually wants to buy his music, dvd and software and have a legal version.

But companies really make it hard to buy their products legally and I can fully understand that people resort to illegal downloads because I’m sometimes also driven to that even though I want to buy it legally. Stupid retail stores don’t help either.

Today I went shopping for some music software and actually went to a store to buy a legal version. And guess what happened.

The stupid store didn’t have the damn software in stock! They only had one copy left but that was reserved for someone else.

Here I am, a consumer with the intention to buy something from your friggin’  store and you don’t have the damn thing in stock! Having products in stock so that consumers can immediately purchase and take their new purchase home is one of the few advantages brick and mortar stores have over online stores.

But this store even managed to fuck up one of the few advantages a physical retail store can have. And it made me wonder, do some companies even want to make money? I mean, if you want to sell it’s not that hard to imagine that you actually need to have stuff in tock to sell.

Because I really wanted and needed the software I eventually bought it online. Guess my money didn’t go to that retail store. Online stores are not a threat to brick and mortar stores but incompetent employees and organizations are.

End of rant.

Life is all about change and companies also change in order to cope with different situations. One of the biggest changes for a company is the rebranding of the company name or logo itself.

There have been numerous rebrands in the last decade, some good, but also very bad resulting in the reaction ‘what the fuck were they thinking?’.

Last month Big 4 accountant company PricewaterhouseCoopers changed its name and logo and this rebranding definitely is one of the stupidiest rebranding I’ve seen in quite a while.

Accountants are boring, and accountant firms are a collection of boring and serious people in suits all collected in a very strict hierarchal organisation who overcharge their services because no sane person would want to work as an accountant.

But regardless if you like the accountants profession, PricewaterhouseCoopers has a classy sounding name also made visual by its very recognisable and stylish logo and working there is careerwise very good.

This is what the old logo looked like:

Image via designmeans.com

Then why in godsname would PricewaterhouseCoopers decide to change its classy logo to an ugly, unappealing, boring, non-distinctive logo like they currently have?

The new logo:

Image via Adformatie.nl

Changing the name from PricewaterhouseCoopers to the abbrevation (which was also commonly used BTW) PwC is understable. But what idiot approved this garbage? The colored crap above the name PwC seems like the logo is a very bad resolution image. And the colors used are faux-pas for web usage. The font is itself is as generic as can be and anything but classy.

Perhaps PwC should just stick to their boring job of offering assurance and tax services instead of trying to redesign their logo.

EPIC FAIL!

Hollywoodreporter posted some news about all 6 Star Wars movies being redone in 3D and to be released in theaters in 2012 starting with The Phantom Menace.

I first all am already sick and tired of the 3D hype. Has Hollywood forgotten the main reason people go out to see a movie is because of the content of the movie and not for a gimmick?

Any movie shown in 3D is another reason for me not to waste my money on a ticket. I’ve already seen the 3D thing and it’s not something I have to continue seeing.

Secondly, how often can George Lucas milk out his Star Wars saga?

Blu-ray versions are already in the make. And no doubt the saga will also be re-re-released on DVD as 3D. You’d think at a certain point he’d have enough money.

Last night the 27th MTV Video Music Awards were held and apparently it’s so serious that it’s even a news item on the ‘serious’ news programs.

The national news here even spend almost 2 whole minutes on Lady Gaga winning 8 awards. Good for the VMAs that it’s getting more recognition or is Lady Gaga’s just being hyped beyond any reason?

I seriously don’t get the hype around Gaga. I don’t mind a slim girl wearing skimpy clothes, but Lady Gaga isn’t even hot. She definitely has some nice tunes, but nothing world shocking. 

So, what’s the deal? Has the world really become so superficial and void of taste?

Just watch it