In case you missed it, the big hullabaloo with Friday’s episode of JEOPARDY! was that all three contestants tied for first place with $16,000.

Now, it was traditional back in the Five Wins And You’re Out days that, when possible, the five time champ would bet enough to tie the second place person in their last game so that they could come back. But to manage a three way tie like this takes some special math. For starters, the second and third place contestants had to be in a tie. Otherwise, the one in the lead would have bet enough to beat the one in dead last. Or, you’d have required BOTH the first and second place contestants to aim for a tie, and what are the odds of that? This was only possible because the guy in the lead wanted it to happen and knew the other two wouldn’t be betting all but a dollar this time around.

As it happens, the guy who orchestrated it all has a blog:

squonk_npl - It’s been busy around here…

Oh, you want to know about the Final Jeopardy! wager? It was an intentional bet. I counted on Anders and Jamey betting rationally and wagering everything. I thought it would be really cool to be a part of Jeopardy history. I knew that meant I’d be playing seasoned opponents, but it didn’t matter to me. I had already won a couple of games myself, and I thought it would be neat to share the money. (See my post about Jennifer from a couple of days; that’s what the literary people call foreshadowing. :-)). Now there’ll be a notation next to one of my games in the J! Archive. How cool is that?

So he did it because it was cool, not because he thought he’d have an easy time against them both on the next show. Still, it’ll be hilarious if he loses to one of them on tonight’s show. Stay tuned. . .

• Nintendo continues to dominate games sales.
• The Wikipedia’s commercial arm creates a new gaming magazine. how long before carnage and chaos ensue?
• IBM continues its dominance over SCO. The latest numbers are in. SCO’s attempt at proving copyright infringement on the Linux kernel includes calls to header files and definitions. Now, on the other hand, if the court decides to invalidate the GPL, then IBM is prepared to sue SCO for 700,000 violations of copyright. BWAH HA HA

I wrote this piece of code recently. I don’t know why, but I’m terribly proud of it. Nobody here will understand it. That’s OK. I just need to show off for myself sometimes:

opendir(DIR, $backup_directory);
my @sorted_backups = sort {
($m{$a} ||= -M $a) <=>
($m{$b} ||= -M $b) }
map {$rep_directory . "\\" . $_ }
grep { /.ZP$/ } readdir(DIR);
closedir (DIR);

It was originally written as three distinct chunks of code, but I felt like obfuscating and combining things just a bit. And, yes, there are comments explaining this thing in the code, itself. In the end, it makes for a nifty subroutine, too. (A “subroutine” is what you Java folks like to incessantly call “methods.”)

I could also skip the whole “map” line if I just changed directories before that section of code started.

Now, maybe I’ll go work up a full-bore Schartzian Transformation for kicks. . .

Technology Review: The Incredible Shrinking Engine

. . .he shows off a turbocharger that could be bolted to the 2.4-liter engine; the engine, he adds, uses direct fuel injection rather than the port injection currently found in most cars. Both turbocharging and direct injection are preëxisting technologies, and neither looks particularly impressive. Indeed, used separately, they would lead to only marginal improvements in the performance of an internal-­combustion engine. But by combining them, and augmenting them with a novel way to use a small amount of ethanol, Cohn and his colleagues have created a design that they believe could triple the power of a test engine, an advance that could allow automakers to convert small engines designed for economy cars into muscular engines with more than enough power for SUVs or sports cars. By extracting better performance from smaller, more efficient engines, the technology could lead to vehicles whose fuel economy rivals that of hybrids, which use both an electric motor and a gasoline engine. And that fuel efficiency could come at a fraction of the cost.

• AMERICAN IDOL wasn’t on last night. Just what am I supposed to talk about today? Ah, well, there are always link dumps!
• Simon Cowell is on 60 Minutes this weekend. (There, that feels better.)
• The programmer hierarchy. Which language programmers consider themselves superior to which other programmers?
• You should be warned: I’m on a programming kick lately. There might be some serious programming entries in the near future for this blog. On the other hand, I’m also planning a new blog to push that content off onto, so it won’t be here for long.
• When played correctly, Monopoly is a game that doesn’t take forever to play.
• Movies from Mars! Cool! (They may have gotten carried away with the lens flare, though.)
• The emoticon is 25.
• Why men are never published in Dear Abby. Hilarious!
• David Byrne goes all anti-DRM and pro-digital download at SxSW this week.

Orlando Sentinel - “Jeopardy!” teases you to watch Friday’s show by Hal Boedeker

“This Friday, March 16th, 2007 … and for the first time in 23 years, ‘Jeopardy!’ history will be made.”

That’s all we know.  Honestly, that’s all I want to know.  I’ve already set the TiVo up to record the show.  If you know what happened, please don’t tell me.  I’m just putting this up there so you don’t miss it in case you’re interested.

Has there ever been a three way tie?  Someone run an entire board?  Only one person make it to Final Jeopardy!?  None?  I’m not guessing here; just curious.

Follow-Ups:

• Why a computer science career doesn’t suck.
• Richard Jeni’s family wants you to know: It was suicide. And Jeni was clinically depressed and psychotically paranoid. Not a good combination, and yet the kind of affliction that informs most comedians’ humor, it seems.

Gaming:

• Specs on the upcoming Commodore gaming PC. You know, some of us used our Commodore 64s for more than just gaming. . .
• Sony is redesigning the PSP. Will it be able to compete with the DS Lite? Doubt it, but what do they have to lose? The PS3 has been such a clusterfudge that they need to try something. The screen will remain at the same size, but they hope to lighten it up a bit. Prepare for the PSP Lite for Christmas, I’m sure.

Computing:

• Spanning Sync is now 1.0. This is the program that allows you to sync up your Google calendar with your iCal. With multiple schedules and multiple computers now, this might be a very valuable little tool to keep track of life at all times from all places. On the other hand, the relatively high price seems to be driving a lot of people away. You have to ask yourself: Is it worth paying $65 for a lifetime license for a product which might very well become obsolete in the next upgrade to the Apple OS? It’s a wager. . .
• Is Twitter doomed to spectacular failure? Yeah, probably.
• On the off chance you’re considering a murder, let me give you a quick tip: Don’t Google for tips on how. They can track that kind of stuff now.

TV:

• Bravo buys Television Without Pity. Congrats to the fine folks at TWoP, who look to finally have their funding issues taken care of.
• In case you missed it on DVD, Mark Evanier found a YouTube version of The Picnic Panic from Garfield and Friends that you can all now watch. Get it befor Viacom takes it down. (Thanks to Mike for pointing it out to me.)
• Coming next to TV: BINGO!

Everything Else:

• The ultimate bird feeder? Twirl-a-squirrel. Yes, it includes video. I love squirrels, but I still laughed.

Now THAT’S how a results show should be run - snappy, quick, and mostly lean. Ryan didn’t need to read off the judges’ comments. We still had our drama. There were two musical performances. The losing contestant didn’t have to sing. (I imagine he did for the studio audience, but we didn’t have to deal with it at home.) The only fat on the show was the unnecessarily long recap of what had happened the previous night. It was only 24 hours ago — are our memories THAT fragile?

Diana Ross is, well, Diana Ross. She still thinks she’s 25, though, and perhaps that’s helped by her plastic surgeon. It was a spectacle of a performance. I particularly liked the part where she used Melinda Doolittle as her background singer. BWAH HA HA

The bottom three were Brandon, Phil, and Sanjaya. That last one shocked me. I thought for sure it would be Haley, though she’d be pulled out safe. Maybe I was more accurate than I thought with her. I think America did fall in love with her on Tuesday night, just to a much larger degree. I thought she’d get enough votes to merely be safe. Instead, she got enough to stay out of the bottom three. Impressive.

Sanjaya’s appearance in the Bottom 3 was shocking because I thought he had a lock on things. Normally, I’d say this is a good sign that his tenure as an IDOL contestant will be shorter, but we all know how these things work. His fanbase is now energized for next week. He could sing like Kermit the Frog with a bad case of hiccups next week and his fans will still crash the phone lines to keep him in the top ten. He’s safe next week, though it’s the following week I’d be worried about, if I were him. Perhaps, though, this Bottom 3 appearance will bring down on him the realization that he isn’t God’s Gift To Singing, just because he made it this far. I think he’s overconfident and a bit snotty with the judges. Let’s see if that settles down next week.

Phil’s appearance in the bottom three is perplexing. The military vote is usually good for more than this. On the other hand, they haven’t played up his military background as much as they did with, say, Josh Gracin. Even though he seemed to salute everyone he could last night to remind them that he’s a good soldier, I just don’t think America thinks of him as a soldier just yet. For purely strategic reasons, he’d do well to start emphasizing that more. The sadder thing is that he had a relatively great performance on the night and wound up in the bottom three.

And then Brandon left. I felt a little bad for him. Sure, he hasn’t performed as well as he needs to to win this thing, but he seems like a nice guy. He held up well in the spotlight last night. He has a winning smile. He just seems like a nice guy. But he went first on Tuesday (traditionally a death slot), wasn’t memorable, and blew the lyrics. He was toast.

While I only picked one of the bottom three right last night, I still picked the right one to go home. My overall prediction for the year is also 1 for 1, as I had Brandon leaving us in the first three weeks. I think I’ll start running off those tracks next week. Stephanie has much more voter support than I previously thought. And I think Haley is the new Idol Sweetheart.

Let the good times roll!

De Blieck Out!

Last night’s episode of AMERICAN IDOL was an embarrassment of riches for any blogging recapper. It was a smorgasborg of discussion topics. It was two hours of painful hand-cramping note-taking. It was everything a humble blogger could ask for, and then some.

I barely know where to begin.

Well, we can start with the awkwardness of celebrating Jennifer Hudson’s Oscar win for DREAMGIRLS and then following it up with an introduction to Diana Ross, who comes off as the real villain in DREAMGIRLS. That made me chuckle.

Diana Ross’ hair made me chuckle, but she wasn’t alone in the Big Hair department. She’s practically a twin for Chris Sligh, and Sanjaya clearly has a hair crush on Diana, doing his best to curl it and let it flow, baby.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Brandon Rogers started off with “Can’t Hurry Love.” Surprisingly enough, that is NOT a Phil Collins original. Who knew? Sorry, that’s a little Child of the 80s humor there. . . It’s a fun upbeat song, but he managed to make it boring, though he did try to act it out a bit. The problem was that he was pitchy from the very first notes, the band overpowered him, and he sounded flat. When he forgot the lyrics after the break in the song near the end, you could begin to hear the nails being pounded into his coffin. He knew it, though, but he recovered nicely. He smiled, listened for the music, and picked up the song right at the next lyric. It was not a complete meltdown.

Shockingly, he was only the first to blow the lyrics.

In any case, he’s in real danger. He was completely forgettable. Others screwed up more. Others had stronger personalities. And others came later in the show when they’d be better remembered.

Melinda Doolittle came next, which is what officially eliminated Brandon from 99% of the memories of the AI viewers. By contrast to Brandon, she was in control of the stage, of her song, and of her pitch. She was pitch perfect again this week. She made a generally blah song — “Home” from The Wiz — into something interesting, as Simon rightfully pointed out. And she made Paula cry, which broke Simon up. That didn’t take long last night. . .

Ryan and Simon continued their delightful on-air fake feud, too. It even went so far as to prompt Simon to tell Ryan to come out of the closet. Ah, there’s no line left to cross on this show, is there? Seacrest (not) out!

Chris Sligh decided to reinterpret “Endless Love.” He rearranged the song, which is always a dangerous proposition on a television show whose title doesn’t being with “ROCKSTAR:”. It was a valiant effort, but he lost the song. First of all, the background music was a dead straight copy of ColdPlay. I don’t even like that song, but I recognized it right away. It was bad. Secondly, he lost the melody. He was so worried about making the song his own that he forgot to keep the original. I was lost for most of the song, and I don’t know how he kept up with it. Sadly, it was a mess. I hope he gets credit from the voters at home for the attempt, but even the studio audience found it tough to boo Simon when he pointed out that the song was a “complete utter drone.” Ouch.

Gina Glocksen went with “Love Child,” which was a perfect choice for her Rawk Chick persona. It was, well, good karaoke. She looked and acted like Ryan Starr at times, which startled me, but did a decent enough job with the song. She isn’t going to wow anyone with the performance, but she should be memorable enough to stick around. She’s the only rocker this season, so she doesn’t have to worry about the Diva vote-splitting. She did smart in getting out of that race. You can’t out-sing them, so do an end-around.

My biggest problem with the song is that she didn’t really go for it. She kept up with the music, but never powered through enough when she should have. It could have been more, but it wasn’t. Still, there were many worse last night.

Speaking of which, Sanjaya was next.

Tons more after the break, starting with the worst finalist in Idol history:

(more…)

It’s my least favorite time of the IDOL season right now. It’s a full two hour episode tonight. I have 12 singers to write up tomorrow. And this is the point at which I embarrass myself completely with predictions as to who will win and the order the contestants will fall, only to be proven absolutely wrong by the third week.

As in previous seasons, I’m not going to give exact exit dates. I’ll do groups of three. And this is all predicated on things not changing drastically, which never happens. While I don’t think we’ll see any scandals rocking the IDOL world at this stage in the season (oh, Mario Vosquez, you alleged perv), there’s bound to be at least one brilliant contestant who will fall flat on his or her face in the first couple of weeks, and one or two who rise from mediocrity to capture America’s imagination and heart. But, hey, it’s all a horse race, and maybe — just maybe — I can look brilliant if I pull something off here.

Let’s start with the easy predictions. The first three contestants to go will be Haley Scarnato, Brandon Rogers, and Stephanie Edwards. That last one might be a little controversial, but I don’t think Sanjaya is going to leave us this soon. He’s got the votes, no matter how horribly he sings from week to week. I don’t think Haley or Brandon have developed that kind of loyal fanbase, and that will prove to be their undoing. In the early rounds of the season, the vote is split far too many ways to rely on talent alone. You need a strong base to start with. I don’t think any of these three singers have energized a base strongly enough to keep them around. Plus, I think Stephanie will still be the first of the divas to go.

The next three to go will Jordin Sparks, Gina Glocksen, and Sanjaya Malakar. Yes, I think we’re going to lose Sanjaya before the halfway point of the season. As American has fewer choices, people will vote more for the talent than the fan favorites. I also think Jordin will be the first of this group to go.

Phil Stacey will go out in sixth place, as the military vote is overwhelmed by sheer numbers for the others. Chris Richardson follows him out, as the Justin Timberlake act doesn’t age well and a mix of song styles does him in.

Then things get very difficult. We’re down to Chris Sligh, Melinda Doolittle, Lakisha Jones, and Blake Lewis.

Blake goes out in fourth place, Sligh falls in third, and Melinda and Lakisha battle it out for a Diva Duel unlike anything you’ve ever seen in IDOL history. Melinda wins for personality alone. America loves the underdog.

Am I playing this too safe? I haven’t called for any huge upsets, really. I’m ignoring the fact that the diva vote will get split, and that the odds of Melinda and Lakisha being the final two are probably much more remote than people give them credit for today. I have a gut feeling that Lakisha will probably fall much sooner. We know she can do BIG songs where she gets to blow the roof off the joint, but is that act going to get old? Aren’t we going to get bored of the same old, same old?

Maybe this is the season of the huge upset, where a beatboxer can win it all? Blake has been strong enough so far that it’s not unreasonable to predict a Top Two finish for him, either. Chris Sligh is Mr. Popular. He’s got a committed fanbase, and that’s only going to grow, assuming he doesn’t make too many singing missteps along the way. LaKisha doesn’t have the personality to match the voice, and this is as much a popularity contest as a singing one. I think that will be her ultimate undoing, whether it’s at the Kodak Theater on Finals night, or some weeks before.

But what the heck. I’ll stick with what I predicted, but I’m happy to include those cavaets.

Wow, lotsa stuff to talk about in this episode. I’m sure there are plenty of people who will point to the final scenes in this episode as another shark-jumping moment for the series, but I buy into the soap operatics and craziness completely. It makes the show just that much more enjoyable.

Jack’s in pretty bad shape, which is why it make sense to offer him a little rest while that Silver Spoons kid comes in to act all tough and macho.

And while I knew that one of the characters was coming back this season, I wasn’t so sure about the other. I figured he’d show up eventually, but it was really weird to see him in this new context. You could see it coming at the end of last season, but still — weird. And the funny thing is, we were just talking about him in the comments thread a couple of episodes back.

Spoilers after the cut:

(And remember — no discussions of the coming attractions!)

(Also - my American Idol Season Six predictions are coming this afternoon.)

(more…)

• Richard Jeni shot himself this weekend. The Platypus Man is gone.
• Comedians pilfer each others jokes all the time. It’s sad, really.
• Who breaks new music? iTunes staffers!
• Behind the scenes at the Babylon 5 DVD movie.
• Didja know that Google has its own bus system? Pretty funky. I wonder if they use Google Maps to plot out routes?
• Why a career in computer programming sucks. Boy, that sure made me feel better about my life.
• Now THIS is a sinkhole.
• Don’t look for any one theme to connect these links. There is none today.

Tech:

• Go green: Choose Linux. As it turns out, the average Linux box lasts two years longer than the average Windows box. Think of the landfill savings!
• 42 reasons you can switch to the Mac.
• Here’s the movie trailer for the PS3 Home on-line system. Nope, still not caring.
• Steven Spielberg is working on a Wii game.
• And, now, a word from the internet.
• Nine programming theorems from one blogger’s perspective.  Too many of them are too true.

Movies and TV:

• Seven movies will never see, including a Marx Bros. reunion movie that never got made.
• Jason Lee to play David Seville - yes, Alvin’s Dad - in new Chipmunks movie.
• Louis Van Amstel: Short? Or Diva? Neither would surprise me. (Via TV Tattle.)
• Big Matt Groening interview. Talks about the SIMPSONS movies, SIMPSONS trivia, FAMILY GUY, his comic strip, and more.

Miscellaneous:

• Teenagers are reading?

Geneva Motor Show: Toyota Hybrid-X concept - AutoblogGreen

Toyota unveiled the Hybrid-X concept, which is supposed to give the world a hint at the new design language for future Toyota hybrid vehicles. Presumably that means that what we see here will be reflected in the next generation Prius when it comes out next year along with other future vehicles. The concept has a low-slung one-box shape stretched over twenty inch wheels.

The show opened with a group singalong to Steve Miller Band’s “The Joker.” Stealers Wheel’s “Stuck in the Middle With You.” The contestants sang most often in groups of three. The producers put together LaKisha, Sabrina, and Sanjaya in one grouplet. Even the producers know that their best bet is to drown out Sanjaya as much as possible.

And so now we have it. The final 12. And it’s not without its controversies. Let’s start with the biggest one of all:

Antonella didn’t make it?!? How did that happen? The horny teenage boy demographic was not voting this week, I guess. I was shocked. Never let it be said that she didn’t maintain a sense of humor,though. Did you see the funny faces she made every time she missed a note? For the first time this season, I actually came to like her last night. Not that she deserved to make the final cut, mind you, but I liked the cut of her jib.

Sanjaya did make it! OK, but that was predictable. He was the lead vote getter a couple of weeks ago, and the confused female teenage demo votes huge for this show. It also brings up a great question: Is Sanjaya the weakest contestant ever to make the Final 12 in IDOL history? Is he worse than Kevin Covais? Camile Velasco? Ejay Day?

Jarrod got cut. At least I predicted one right. It was the only one, as it turned out, but that wasn’t all bad. After all, I predicted Jordin would get tossed, and she didn’t.

Sabrina got cut?!? That’s the biggest shock of the night, I think, and the first example of vote splitting we’re going to see this season. Fairly or not, she got lumped in with the other divas. And the others were just a little more over-the-top and memorable. Sabrina is a great singer, but she didn’t do quite enough to stick out from a very crowded field of like-sounding singers this year.

I also wonder if she didn’t get sunk by the judges’ comments. Contestants who are merely OK don’t get votes. Those that stink get the votes from their fans who want to save them. Those who do extremely well are remembered and get the votes for their amazing performances. Those in the middle — which is where Sabrina landed — don’t get enough votes. There is no such thing as “safe” on this show. And the judges liked her, but offered some constructive criticism without wildly singing her praises.

The way the show was put together, it appeared that Haley took Sabrina’s spot in the Final 12. I don’t think that’s at all fair. Ditto for the way Sanjaya appeared to take Sundance’s spot. That’s just the way they designed the show. Contestants were not eliminated in any particular order, remember, save for the highest possible melodrama.

If anything, Haley stole Antonella’s spot, and I’m fine with that. She’s a slightly better singer. (And I think she’s cuter, anyway. She’s a wannabe Child of the 80s.) And since her style is so different from the rest of the women in the Final 12, I think she benefited. If she was a weak diva, she’d have been done. Instead, she’s a slightly harmless middle-of-the-road not-quite-sure-what-she-wants-to-be singer. Is she country? Pop? Balladeer? I hope she figures that out quickly. Diana Ross might just eat her up next week, otherwise. But the point is, she stood out. She wasn’t LaKisha/Melinda/Stephanie/Sabrina. She was up against Antonella and, if you stretched it out a little bit, Gina. Gina got through because there were no other rock chicks this year. Haley got through because she’s a slightly better singer than Antonella.

It’s all about standing out.

Carrie sang last night. She has not, thankfully, undergone a Kellie Pickler-style transformation. Thank heaven for little favors.

Simon got the funniest line of night. At the end of the show when Ryan asked him why IDOL has the Top 12 that it has this year, Simon quipped, “The volume was turned down?”

Sundance’s “Somebody please give me a job!” plea gets the vote for second funniest line of the night.

Last night’s show was the 200th IDOL episode, and they’re celebrating this year by giving themselves the warm and fuzzies and donating lots of money to starving children in Africa and New Orleans (oh, and maybe someplace else in America, in case it gets trendy there, too.) There followed a long and painful Ryan and Simon feel good about themselves for going to Africa video. Everyone feels good, the audience tepidly applauds a really fun series deciding that it needs to be Important all of a sudden, and then Ryan announces the special episodes that will follow. The week of April 24th and 25th will be special. The final six contestants will sing inspirational songs. (LaKisha will blow the roof off the place with something, I’m sure.) Quincy Jones is writing a song for the results show. And there will be a whole host of special guests that night including Pink, Gwen Stefani, Michael Buble, Il Divo (Simon’s group), Bono (where there’s African charities, there’s Bono), and –

Borat.

Why do I even want to watch the train wreck now?

I’ll be back on Monday or Tuesday with my annual awful predictions for who will win, and in which order the contestants will fall.