Byron's 2 Cents

Mana Energy Potion

byronlo — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 03:53:47 +0000

I don?t know about you guys, but I?m going to be getting myself some Mana Energy Potions!

http://www.manapotions.com/index.html

http://www.thinkgeek.com/caffeine/drinks/a273/

Posted in Uncategorized

Apple iPhone Dev NDA Removed!

byronlo — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 19:02:23 +0000

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-10055509-37.html?tag=newsLeadStoriesArea.0

Yay, now I can start writing about this stuff

Posted in Tech Talk

Microsoft Dumping Gates and Seinfeld

byronlo — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 00:39:46 +0000

If you haven?t already heard the buzz from last thursday, Microsoft is moving away from the Gates and Seinfeld duo commercials and is now pushing the ?I?m a PC? campaign… an obvious play off of the Apple commercials.

Microsoft says moving away from the Gates and Seinfeld commercials were planned from the start and that it was not because the commercials simply sucked ass………. YEA RIGHT!! Their new commercials are a bit better tho. You can at least see the message they?re trying to convey. I still have a hard time understanding the whole point of having the original two commercials; by hey, i?m blogging about them so I guess MS got the buzz they were trying to shoot for.

Posted in Tech Talk

Wow, another bailout!!

byronlo — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 02:06:03 +0000

Yup, put the burden on the Tax Payers… The Fed has officially lending as much as $85 billion to rescue the insurer, AIG. Hopefully AIG will be able to repay the loan. Things really aren?t looking too good out there.

All Hell Broke Loose

byronlo — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 05:58:59 +0000

So today Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy AND Merrill Lynch had to get bought out by BoA. AIG also went down because they just can?t seem to raise any cash.

Looks like the party is over for all those mortgage brokers and investment companies who put just a lil too much money into mortgage investments. Now with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac both taken over by the government, it doesn?t seem likely that these investment firms and banks are going to draw any more help from the government.

What does this mean? We are in a financial crisis!! Good news is, if you?re in the market for a home, you?ll probably be able to get a good deal in comparison to what you would have been able to get the past couple years.

Now, a lot of Housing Bubble preachers (including myself) have been saying that housing prices have grown way out of proportion the past several years and that housing prices were outpacing income growth by way to much to be sustainable.

So now, we have this:

That?s a headshot right there!

This was the prediction from Jan 2007.

What does this char tell us? Well all the problems we?ve had this year were with SUBPRIME loans as seen in the gray before the ?we are here? arrow. What we have coming up next are all the ARMs resetting.

So here?s what an efficient market looks like:

But what happens if buyers ?believe? prices will keep rising no matter what?

So what does this look like for us RIGHT NOW?

Headshot.

So lets put in some real numbers/Data:

The DARK BLACK line is how much houses have to depreciate in order to get back to normal.

Other interesting charts and figures for ORANGE COUNTY and IRVINE:

So according to the last two charts, home prices at the peak of the current bubble will not be reached again till at least 2019 if you use historical price-to-rent ratios. But if you use Price-to-Income Ratios (which i think is more accurate), peak prices will not be reached until 2029!!! And in the short term, houses will have to decline 43% from their peeks!!! Boom headshot!

Mortgage investors are dying for a reason… and now they?re taking everyone else down with them.

What I Would Like to See In New Macs

byronlo — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 23:04:46 +0000

Two things i would like to see in the next line of macs are:

Core 2 Quad CPUs (no more Core 2 Duos).
GeForce GTX 260/280 graphics chips in the higher end models (i.e. 24? iMacs/MBP/MP).

Jody’s Going Away Dinner

byronlo — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 08:41:53 +0000

Today we took the opportunity to see Jody off before she leaves tomorrow on your exchange student program! We went to go eat at Zipangu at the Lab in Costa Mesa. The restaurant was pretty nice. I?ve been to The Lab many times but I had never been to the restaurant.

It was great time, we had a good group of people out there and had a great time chatting I hope Jody has a safe trip and has a safe time out there. And at the same time, i hope she has a lot of fun as well!!

Glad to have been able to see everyone there!! I wish we could all get together more often!

Second Installment of the Microsoft Ad

byronlo — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 19:29:35 +0000

There really isn?t much to say about the second installment. Very much like the first one… hmm… i mean, parts of it was a bit humorous but i still don?t see the point of the ads. If you haven?t seen it already, you can find the new ad at http://www.microsoft.com/windows.

Of course, if i had to give a recommendation as to what kind of computer you should get, it would be a Mac Cuz seriously, even tho i?m forced to use Windows at work, everything I do at home (including software development) I do on a Mac because it?s just better .

US Deficit Increasing to $407 billion a year!!! New iPods… but no new Macs :-/

byronlo — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 03:35:52 +0000

In other news, the US Budget Deficit this year will increase by $246 billion to $407 billion!!! Wow, the US is spending like freakin hell. But that?s not the scary part–the scariest part is that these figures DO NOT INCLUDE THE TREASURY ANNOUNCEMENT THAT THE GOVERNMENT WOULD TAKE OVER FANNY MAE AND FREDDIE MAC!!! With Fannie and Freddie factored in, this will increase the deficit even more. We?re all screwed!!

We need to get the government to stop spending so much!!

http://money.cnn.com/2008/09/09/news/economy/cbo_budget_update/index.htm?postversion=2008090915

If you are interested in how much the government owes to creditors in full… it?s a wooping

when i wrote this post and increasing every second… ($1.91 billion per day to be exact).
http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/

How?s that for a deep hole?

————————————————–
On to more fun stuff….

Today Apple announced new iPod Nanos and iPod Touches. They also consolidated the iPod Classics by offering only one model now–the 120GB version. I wonder if this will make my 160GB version worth more money?! hahah anyone wanna buy it for $500?

I was hoping that Apple would announce some new Mac products but i guess they?ll have to wait till later.

—————————————–

Jody’s Going Away

byronlo — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 18:59:59 +0000

Went to JLounge to see Jody off to her exchange student program!! She?s going to have so much fun out there… but we made sure she had a ton of fun before she left so that she will not forget us

Future cover of Fortune Magazine haha

Damn those Hot dog carts outside of clubs… they probably made a few grand in less than an hour haha.

Have a safe trip Jody!