DirectConnect is the shit if you have a fast internet connection and you want to fill up your new 80 gig hard drive. It's a P2P app that's kind of like Hotline but it hasn't been overrun by 14 year old assholes trying to get you to click on their stupid banners. The network is fairly pristine. It's tricky software to use. You have to connect to "hubs" and then you can search everybody who's connected to your hub. It's filled with porn movies, mp3's, pirated applications and games. To get onto the big hubs you have to share more than 20 gigs of stuff. (there are ways to fill your HD with crap of course, and DirectConnect is one of them!)

The thing I like most about it, other than the fact that people behave, is that it was written by a local kid named Jon Hess and he's got the same altruistic hacker mentality that made the internet what it is.

News from gamespot.com (yes, I read computer gaming websites) is that SNK, the company that made all those NeoGeo arcade games has just gone out of business. They were shitty look-alike games, yes, but it's still sad to see them go.

If you like old video games you should check out MAME the multiple arcade machine emulator. You can play the actual ROMs of your old favorites on your computer. From the FAQ:

MAME can currently emulate over 1500 classic arcade video games from the '70s and '80s.

The ROM images that MAME utilizes are "dumped" from arcade games' original circuit-board ROM chips. MAME becomes the "hardware" for the games, taking the place of their original CPUs and support chips. Therefore, these games are NOT simulations, but the actual, original games that appeared in arcades.

I'm proud of this one -- not in a patriotic sorta way -- just that it looks like one of those nifty "photojournalism" shots that people get paid a lot of money for. Maybe I'll get some money for it someday.

I didn't go see them this weekend but I want to salute Built to Spill right now. I'm eating toast with melty butter and listening to "Carry the Zero" now. It's my favorite BTS song and a damn fine justification for the existence of music, no matter how bad it can get. It's soooo beautiful, 'specially when he says, "count your blem-i-shes", it makes me shake my hair.

One bhang'd out Varanasi street dude.

I'm posting two more shots from Varanasi. Both taken the day after Holi.

One beat-to-hell Varanasi street dog.