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RockinRarity

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Everything posted by RockinRarity

  1. Apple has made some fail products too... my first Mac experience as an adult was having a desk job where my computer was a... *shudder* eMac...
  2. Iiiinteresting... http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/protect/forum/mse-protect_scanning/how-to-remove-win32beeinject/f95bc1c8-b5d6-4b74-aea5-203dd8787b60 More googling tells me that it's a trojan that can be removed with the right tools... and that it can get onto your computer via typical means (playing games on certain websites, watching porn, opening spam email attachments, etc). Oh and PS, I had a Vista computer for almost 7 years and that was kind of awful. I made sure my new laptop had Windows 7 - I'll be skipping Windows 8 thank you very much.
  3. Sorry, I didn't mean to directly insult you. I always use the general "you" in posts and everyone around here seems to think that it means that I'm talking to them directly. :/ Viruses don't just randomly appear on a computer though so something must have happened, a link was clicked on, a weird website popped up and started downloading something you didn't say it could... was it an actual virus or just a trojan?
  4. Can I just say that I really hate this argument for Apple/against Windows? Because, if you have a brain, PCs don't get viruses either. Microsoft just admits that Internet Explorer has a bug that causes a security leak? Well, if you're not an idiot, you weren't ever using Internet Explorer in the first place. You were using Firefox or Chrome. If you're not an idiot, you won't even have to pay for anti-virus software like McAfee or Norton (which don't really work anyways). You'd spend 2 minutes on Google and find out that you just need Microsoft Security Essentials, and just scan your computer once in a while. As for lasting longer... that's not a guarantee. My friend, who is a Mac lover, got her Macbook Pro in 2007, the same year that I got my Dell Inspiron. Her Macbook died a few months ago. My Dell never died. And it's funny, because my Dell ran Windows Vista and had some really loud hardware and tended to overheat, so it seemed like that was the one that was going to die first. But it never did. I got my new laptop and if I wanted to turn on my old laptop, I would. (but I really really don't want to) See, my SHITTY laptop lasted longer than her immaculate Macbook Pro. Also, honestly, why would I ever want a laptop where I couldn't even replace the battery, let alone upgrade the RAM or the processor? I'm not trying to say that Macbooks are shitty. They are NOT by any means shitty computers. They are great in some aspects. But "they don't get viruses and they last longer" is a really poor defense for Macs and it's a shame that a lot of the people who own them don't even know the proper reasons for getting a Mac...
  5. The only Apple product that doesn't have a good-enough competing product is the iPod. Not all iPods. Just the nano and up. The shuffle sucks ass - you can get the same kind of player from Samsung for 20 bucks instead of 50. I really wish that there was a competing product, though. I would love to own an MP3 player that could fit all of my music (I currently have at least 10GB of music on my current iPod) and I would like to be able to play certain songs whenever without actually owning the music - so it looks like an iPod Touch with a Spotify Premium account would be ideal for a music lover like me. I would really like something where I could at least replace the battery without feeling like I was performing open-heart surgery, but what can you do when Samsung's best player only holds 8GB of music? :/ At least I was able to get my new laptop to have Windows 7, and that Android isn't going away anytime soon. Android's interface is way better than the iPhone's IMO. I don't really see how Mac's OS is more "user-friendly" than Windows 7. A lot of both interfaces are similar IMO.
  6. Yesterday I was attended a con in Detroit called Midwest Media Expo. I was in the bathroom wearing my Equestria Girls t-shirt and my Team Fluttershy messenger bag. Three girls walk in and they compliment my shirt and bag. And they're all like, "We're Silly Filly Studios!" It was fantastic.

    1. Starlight Sky

      Starlight Sky

      That's awesome ^_^

       

      Hope the trip was full of great memories!

    2. RockinRarity

      RockinRarity

      It was pretty good. I only drove about 40 minutes to get there, and I only spend about 8 hours at the con, but it was nice. ^^

  7. Have you not read this response yet? Also, Equestria Girls only exists BECAUSE of bronies. Hasbro saw some of the creative side of the fandom, and saw many many anthropomorphizations of the MLP characters. They decided that because the market for MLP was growing significantly and was becoming successful, they made a spin-off of that successful franchise so that they could better compete with Mattel. Just yesterday, Washington Post talked about the statistics of growth in girl products for this year. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/style-blog/wp/2014/04/23/dont-laugh-but-bronies-may-be-propping-up-one-of-americas-favorite-companies/?Post+generic=%3Ftid%3Dsm_twitter_washingtonpost Let me tell you something. 10 years ago I was part of the Teen Titans fandom. I LOVE that show, and so did thousands of other people. I spent most of my time during the early days of the show on fanfiction.net and Teen Titans was competing with Avatar: The Last Airbender in the number of fics written about them. But the show only lasted for 65 episodes. And if you have seen the last episode of the show, you do NOT feel satisfied with the ending (thank goodness for the movie, though, even if it was polarizing for fans - at least that gave us a somewhat satisfying ending for some of us). Fans begged and begged for the show to be renewed for another season, but execs said no. But why? I think that after all these years, I may have an idea. Teen Titans may have had a huge fanbase outside of the target demographic of 6-12 year old boys, but that outside demographic was, at least from my experience, mostly comprised of teenage girls. Recently Young Justice was canceled, which also had a large female fanbase, and their execs basically said that they don't want their superhero cartoons to have large female fanbases. But why? Because women are FAR less likely to collect merchandise. Yes, women DO collect merchandise, and I'm not saying that they don't. I collect MLP stuff - brushables, trading cards, the CCGs, the comics, etc. The issue is that teenage girls in particular don't have a LOT of money, and whatever money they do have, they are more likely to spend it on clothes and beauty products. Guys don't typically buy much more beyond the basics in regards to clothing and toiletries, so they have a little bit more extra money. So they can spend their money on merchandise without breaking the bank. My point is that, I don't think very many people were buying the toys. Not that Teen Titans' financial success completely depended on toy purchases since Warner Bros. and Hasbro have different priorities, but I'm guessing that merchandise matters more than we think for just about any cartoon aimed at children. I do admit that this isn't coming from any particular study or analysis, but it's something that I have been thinking about for a very long time, and I don't think that I'm pulling any of this out of my ass. As grateful as I am that MLP is continuing for at least another 5 years, something that I would have LOVED to see Teen Titans do, it still bothers me that the show didn't continue for as long as I think that it could have. True they did reboot it, using the same characters and the same voice actors for the characters, but they lowered their animation budget and the show is pretty much completely slap-stick - which tells me that they didn't think that it was worth the financial investment to pick up where the show left off. The truth is, I really wish that the Teen Titans fandom was as public and talked with their money as much as the brony fandom today does for MLP. Because I know that it is making a difference.
  8. FiM would have still been a good show if the bronies had not gotten into it. However, it most certainly would NOT exist the way that it does now if the show did not gain an adult following. Take the following into consideration: 1. The majority of cartoons these days only have 65 episodes, and that's if the show is successful to children. If the show were a success to children, but the girl toy purchases had not continued to increase, the show would have remained at 65 episodes and our final episode would have been Twilight Sparkle becoming a princess. However, because MLP toy purchases were continuing to increase and the market has expanded and begun to include other kinds of merchandise, they felt it financially worthwhile to continue creating the show. 2. Just because Hasbro may not recognize bronies as being the main reason for their increase of MLP purchases, it doesn't mean that it's not the case. Because truth-be-told, is there really a way to know who exactly is purchasing the $5 brushables without looking up everyone's credit card information and doing background checks and Internet searches of every individual buying the toys? All Hasbro really knows is that there has been an increase in MLP purchases, and that girl toys are bigger than ever in their market, so they figure that if they continue down the same path that they have been going down, they will continue to be successful. Besides, they do not want to market the girls' toys specifically to bronies if it means that girls' parents will not buy them anymore, thus losing a fair share of their market/fanbase. 3. MLP toys have IMPROVED IN QUALITY ever since the bronies started complaining about stuff like Pinklestia and nightmare-inducing plushies. Girls like it when toys are show-accurate and they look good, believe it or not. But they don't have the voices to complain about that sort of thing. Parents do complain about stuff like that, but their voices don't tend to leave the Amazon review section - they are unlikely to complain about the toys on social media or write emails to Hasbro. And the toys' quality improvement is part of the reason for their growing success. Because of these realities, I think that it's foolish to believe that bronies don't at least play a large part in the show's current success.
  9. But I like going full sass on people. (it gets me lots of brohoofs) I don't have an argument against that on my own that is better than this video:
  10. Lamest excuse I've ever heard for not properly explaining an argument. I'll just assume that you don't have a real reason to believe that she is sexist, and you're just saying that she is because it justifies an unfounded dislike towards her character.
  11. If bronies end up hating gen 5, it will just create a subdivision of the fandom... of course there might be bronies who love gen 5 and bronies who hate gen 5... ... ...this sounds worse than Twilacorn.
  12. White as a sheet. There is some Native American lineage that can be traced on my dad's side of the family, but it's not enough to count for anything. I am 50% Polish and aside from the tiny bit of Native American the rest of me is an English/Scotch/Irish mix. Pretty much your typical mutt from southeastern Michigan.
  13. Not only that, but I think that the fandom will still be strong even after the show is over. It'll take a long, long time for it to die down, if it ever will.
  14. See, it would need an explanation like that for me, too. Or probably better than a demon taking over her mind. If the story was about an evil force taking over her mind and it was up to Twilight and co. to turn her back to normal so that Equestria doesn't get destroyed, I would like to read a well-written story like that. But making Celestia evil just because you don't like her? Uh, no. I can't enjoy something that just randomly decides that she is evil, because she is not by nature evil at all. Like what was said earlier: wtf indeed
  15. I'm from southeastern Michigan and I'm pretty content with where I live currently. I have been here my whole life and most of my family is in the area as well. Moving to a different location in southeastern Michigan would be a nice change of scenery, though. Honestly I'm a fan of the Metro Detroit area, and actually downtown Detroit isn't the crime-ridden hellhole that people make it out to be (that's some of the suburbs... stay away from those). I dunno if I would live there, but I have several friends who do plus a little bit of family, so it wouldn't surprise me if I did end up moving near the area at some point in my life. I have been to both Chicago and New York City, and I love both places, but I'm not sure if I would want to live in either place. I would like to visit both places more often than I currently do, though. I have also been to the east coast and it is beautiful out there (and some places on the east coast have direct access to the ocean, which is awesome) but again not sure if I would like to live there. Florida, however... I am from Michigan so I can take the humidity (our summers can get very hot and very humid) and this past winter was just awful up here. I honestly wouldn't mind a milder winter. So, if I had to move to some faraway state, it'd be Florida. Humidity is my friend. I also have a horrible ragweed allergy that clogs my sinuses and apparently in Florida there isn't a whole lot of ragweed... seriously last summer I was driving up to northern Michigan and I rolled down the window of my car and immediately my sinuses swelled to the point where I couldn't breathe at all. It would be nice to not live off Sudafed for the rest of my life.
  16. Commercials may be cheaper to produce, but Hasbro hasn't had a greater commercial than FiM. Their profits will shrink incredibly if they don't keep the bar raised high so that bronies and little girls alike can keep buying their products. I am not sure myself if the quality of the show will decrease because the show will last another 5 years. It might. But it also might not. The writers I think surprised us this season with many of the ideas that they introduced. There are so many things that the series could still do that the writers haven't explored yet. Proof of that is founded by the fact that there's so much friggin fanfiction out there for MLP. Sure a lot of it may be crap (as is the case for pretty much every fandom with fanfiction b/c the writers are amateur and probably haven't written anything besides a short essay or book report before writing fanfics) but there are gems, and even some of the crappy fanfics have at least decent premises - they were just poorly executed. My point is that it's just hard to say at this point where the show is heading for the next 5 years. I will say, however, that I am looking forward to 5 more years of pony despite being unsure. It is rare for one of my favorite shows to get this much attention and care from the creators. When I was in the Teen Titans fandom we BEGGED for more episodes past the 65-syndication mark. It never happened. Granted, several years later we got Teen Titans Go, buuuuut it's not the same. I've rewatched the Teen Titans from 10 years ago recently (I have them all on DVD) and I had forgotten just how good of a show it was. It still disappoints me that they didn't create more episodes of that particular franchise, even though I have mostly let go of any dreams of there being a legitimate reboot. So I am grateful for the guaranteed 5 more years.
  17. If you personally want to watch for your own spelling online, you should use a web browser that has spell check on it already. I use Google Chrome and I misspelled a couple of words here by accident while typing this, and spell check caught the mistakes.
  18. Isn't it great??? I'm so looking forward to this game. Here's a low quality version of what we saw of the Villager during Nintendo Direct! (I pretty much play New Leaf non-stop so this is very exciting for me) My husband was super dooper excited about Greninja. He looks awesome.
  19. Nobody else mentioned the quote I kept saying to my husband after the episode was over. http://youtu.be/GN5r71dGCS8?t=13m45s Maybe it's because I married an Applejack lover, but she's been getting more love from me. I just think that it's so funny that her only solution to Rainbow Dash's problem was apples. Well, not literally. But you know what I mean. Great episode. Laughed the whole way through. Twilight and Rainbow Dash both needed a good episode this season and this worked really well. I didn't like Daring Don't at all, and Rainbow Falls was... interesting - although Rainbow Dash has been a pretty good supporting character. I liked Three's A Crowd and the premiere, but Twilight's been a pretty bad/bland supporting character throughout this season. So, so good to see both of them in a good light.
  20. I think that the writers just aren't sure what to do with Pinkie all the time whenever she is not in the spotlight of an episode. Pinkie's best moments this season have been in Pinkie Pride. One of my favorite songs this season is Pinkie's Lament. I think that some of the time the writers have made her too eccentric, but at least she gets down-to-earth moments at all. Those tend to be her best moments, I think because it's such a good contrast to her eccentricities.
  21. Hey there - not shitting on people who buy Apple products. As I have said in the post: "I understand wanting a Mac if you need special software only available on a Mac, or even if you prefer Mac and you feel like throwing your money at Apple - because it's not my business who you decide to support." "You are allowed to prefer Apple based on your own personal taste, and you are definitely allowed to prefer Apple based on your software needs." If those quotes come off as a bit snarky, I do apologize - but I really do genuinely mean what I say here. My irritation about Apple is not targeted toward the people who know what they are looking for in a computer. You obviously do know, based on the fact that you know a fair bit about computer hardware and what kind of processor runs well, and the fact that you don't game makes Mac a good fit for you. To be fair, my friend's new Macbook Pro also has an i5 processor whereas mine is only an i3, so she did pay more money for a product that is technically better. My irritation is with people who think that they're better than the rest of us because they own Apple products, and people who think that Apple products are immune from anything bad happening to them. I do think that some of that attitude has died down since I was in college - or maybe because I've graduated I've been able to escape the attitude instead. Whatever the case may be, the Mac vs. PC argument for some reason still exists in some form, and it's a pretty petty argument if you ask me. I can't say that I blame you for liking the Mac OS better than Windows, though. I personally love Windows 7, but the fact that Windows keeps changing everything good about their OS and literally makes every other OS horrible (XP = good, Vista = bad, 7 = good, 8 = bad) doesn't sit well with me. Apple keeps their OS pretty consistent in quality, which I appreciate and I really really wish that Microsoft would take a hint. I knew that I wanted to get a Windows 7 computer but the average consumer isn't going to know what they are looking for and they'll just buy a brand new computer without knowing anything about it. So, really, I could make a similar rant about Microsoft too - but for them it's more that they take their long-standing user base for-granted and also take advantage of them because there are a lot of people who will just get a new computer with the latest version of Windows no matter what. It's not so much that people buy Apple products "on a whim" without thinking at all, but rather I'm not sure if many people spend a lot of time evaluating their needs in a computer (or a phone) and just pay for whatever is the fanciest. My processor may not be the very best, but so far it's been good to me. I've not had any problems with lag or general slowness. I have just experienced too much from people who tell me about their Apple products, and some of them make it sound like people who don't buy Apple products are making the wrong decision, or that PCs are bad and you should feel bad that you have one. The truth is that there aren't enough differences between a Mac and a PC for one to be objectively "better" than the other. Whether you choose one brand or the other should be based solely on your preferences and needs. But if somebody wants a computer that just turns out to be a $2000 Facebook machine, that's their business. I just don't want anyone telling me that I should get one, too. As a writer, I could be justified in getting a Macbook based on my needs, but I found a tool for writing that is available on PC. But if my needs ever change to the point where a PC won't really cut it anymore, or there will never be a good Windows OS after Windows 7 after all, I'll probably invest in a Macbook one day. I do like them (and honestly, the fact that your Macbook Air is made of aluminum and it disperses heat generated from the computer is so friggin cool), but I don't see any reason to spend the money on one at this point in my life.
  22. So I was going to put in a long post in the iOS vs. Android thread, but I decided to cut that post short and post my musings here instead. Since, well, it was beginning to get really off topic. I really like ranting about this topic because I feel like not enough people do it. My knowledge of technology is above-average so I feel that saying my opinions on this matter may do the general public some good, as well as give insight to why people like me could even bear to think this way. I'll just start by saying that "Apple Culture" just really, really irritates me. It irritates me to the point of getting defensive and posting long Internet rants. This is because there are Apple fans who think that their products are invincible and therefore it makes themselves look smarter or whatever. It's complete arrogance because while claiming to have the best product, you are looking down on other people over something as trivial as what company you decide to throw your money at. And that arrogance is based off what you heard from other people without doing your own research, and you follow those people like sheep. Why should sheep be arrogant? This is the most common (and stupidest) reason to get arrogant about Apple products. "I got a Macbook because it's superior because it doesn't get viruses!!!" Yeah, and neither do most PCs because there are free anti-virus programs that can protect you on top of the fact that only people who don't know shit about computers get viruses on their computers in the first place. I understand wanting a Mac if you need special software only available on a Mac, or even if you prefer Mac and you feel like throwing your money at Apple - because it's not my business who you decide to support. But don't try to tell me that my computer (or phone) is inadequate, because that's stupid. My friend got a Macbook Pro in 2007, the same year that I got a Dell Inspiron. Her Macbook Pro was going to the shitter just as much as my Dell was (perhaps more so? I remember her Macbook freezing a lot; at least my Dell didn't do that, it was just loud and would overheat so I had to blow a fan on it, haha). Her Macbook eventually bit the dust and wouldn't even turn on anymore. My old Dell can still function, with its only "repair" being a battery replacement. I just bought a new Dell a month and a half ago and already it's miles better than my old Dell was when it was new - and I paid just under $500 for it. My friend got a new Macbook Pro with Retina Display (because it's cool?) with Apple Care (Apple's 3-year support plan) for... $1500? She got a discount which is great, but dang, if that thing is going to be used the same way that I'm using my new Dell and it's expected to live as long as my Dell... why bother paying the extra $1000? The fact that you have to go to Apple to fix your computer is kind of bullshit too. If my Dell breaks, I can take it to a local computer repair place and they'll have it fixed for less than an arm and a leg. Can't say the same thing about Apple. Anyone who says that Apple is majestically better than Google or Microsoft knows next to nothing about technology and probably shouldn't have such an uninformed opinion. You are allowed to prefer Apple based on your own personal taste, and you are definitely allowed to prefer Apple based on your software needs. But if your Macbook and iPhone are primarily used as Facebook machines, then you're probably wasting your money. More so for a Macbook than an iPhone, though - at least the iPhone is only $100 more with a contract than your average Android device, and the only major difference is where you can buy your apps from. I will say that we should be grateful to Apple for being so innovative in technology. Without Steve Jobs, we wouldn't have smartphones or tablets, I am sure. We also wouldn't have had a decent competitor for Microsoft so that they can stay humble and on their toes and actually try to make good products (doesn't always work though... I'm looking at you, Windows 8). But ever since he died, Apple themselves hasn't been contributing a whole lot of anything brand new to the market. The last big thing to come out was the iPad. While Apple has come out with new technology, competitors have come out with products that compare. These products are basically just as good as whatever Apple has come out with. The ONLY exception to this, I think, is the iPod. I have looked and looked and looked for an alternative to an iPod that would suit my needs as a music lover, but I don't think that such a device exists. I mean, if all you need is a 2GB device for some of your music, then you can get an alternative to the iPod Shuffle (which is a piece of shit, by the way - if you're gonna get an iPod, get a nano or higher, jeez). But I've read a lot of reviews for other devices that have a larger capacity for music and if I need to upgrade to a 32 GB device, the iPod Touch is an obvious choice... if the Samsung Galaxy Player had a higher GB capacity and was more up-to-date by a smart device's standards, I would buy that in a heartbeat. I really want something that can hold a ton of songs but I can also use a Spotify premium plan to play Spotify playlists offline so that I don't have to buy (or pirate) music every time I want to listen to a bunch of different songs on my own time. I own an Android device, and while it definitely works for my needs, it only has an 8GB capacity so I can barely put any apps on there, and for some reason its performance has been dragging. This doesn't turn me off from Android as a whole, though, because my husband has the exact same phone as I do and his runs a lot more smoothly than mine. I think his needs are just lesser than mine (as that is usually the case when it comes to technology, except when it comes to gaming). But now that I've had experience with a smartphone, I am more in-tune to what my needs are in that area. So unless a better Android phone comes out by the time my 2-year contract is up, I would love a Moto X. I'm also a pretty big Google fan, so that contributes to me being an Android girl. But what really set me off was a couple of summers ago, I was on a vacation to the east coast with a friend of mine. We were in Boston on the 4th of July to watch the fireworks and some of her friends from New Hampshire were with us. I knew that they all had parents who had money, but I don't think anything really prepared me for realizing this, but every. single. person had an iPhone. All of them. And it creeped me out. It creeped me out because I realized just what mass marketing can do to people. These people, who are all individuals, all of a sudden were glued to the same piece of technology as everyone else. That just didn't sit right with me. I'm all for people sharing something in common to the point where it brings people together (like MLP, for example), in fact that brings me a lot of joy. That's not what the iPhone was doing in this particular instance, though. Sure it is a communication device and it helps people communicate with others from pretty much anywhere, but in this particular situation, everyone was isolating themselves from the people directly with them with the exact same tool. I didn't want that for myself. I wanted to stay up-to-date with technology, but not at the cost of looking like a drone. So I went with Android, which I knew was reputable and functions much like an iPhone. I have been decently happy with it, but I look forward to getting a newer piece of technology when my contract is up later this year. To wrap this up, all I wanted to say was that technology is not magic. All companies and their products have pros and cons to them. What marketing can do is convince you to buy a product without really understanding your own needs or understanding what else is out there. It bothers me that people just do what their told because a shiny advertisement said something. This is our hard-earned money - or our credit scores - that are at stake here. Not that money should be idolized, but throwing money at companies that display shiny ads is why many of us in our country have such huge debt. Apple has high-quality products. I'm not trying to say otherwise. But I am all for quality - and buying what you need - at a price that people can afford. And for people to know that technology is simply a tool for bettering our lives. It doesn't have to be a competition or a religion.
  23. Unless a cooler phone comes out this year, when my contract is up later this year, I really really want this phone: http://www.motorola.com/us/FLEXR1-1/Moto-X/FLEXR1.html I think Verizon will have customizable options by that point... because I want to design my own with its own colors and whatnot. Aaaaand this phone is assembled in the USA whereas many Apple products are assembled in an infamously dangerous sweatshop in China. Now I know that lots of things are made in China in sweatshops that would never be up to code in the US so Apple is far from being the only guilty party here, but it makes me wonder how humanist hipster liberal arts types justify themselves in buying Apple products?
  24. When I was first in the market for looking for my first smart phone, I thought that I wanted an iPhone. Then I went on a trip with my friend to the east coast, and we were hanging out with some of her old friends. I noticed that every single one of them had an iPhone. I felt pretty disconcerted. I didn't like the idea of everyone having the exact same phone. So I decided that I was going to get an Android and not feel like I'm just doing what everyone else is doing. iOS recently had some updates that needed to be done for security purposes and I know that the update to the iOS 7 was not a pleasant one for many people. Granted, it's because people hate change and change confuses those who aren't tech-savvy. But still. Also Android is less expensive. You get pretty much the same phone for half the price of an iPhone.
  25. The Ballad of Celestia made me cry too. I'd say that was the most feelsy. The scenes that have already been posted come pretty close too, though.
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