Simon Rules!

What’s wrong with this picture?

Notice the banner ad at the bottom? I am currently paying around $150 for Cable TV and high speed Internet, and this week they decided to put adverts on the electronic programme guide (EPG). Not only that, but the EPG used to have five lines of programming, and now there is only space for four! On top of that, when pressing the down arrow to move down the list, it highlights the advert every fifth press!

They tried this back in November last year, and I swiftly complained. The banner ads were removed within a few hours. This time when I complained, I was told that they are unobtrusive and they will not remove them. So, I told them to cancel my entire service. They even went so far to say they couldn’t believe I was cancelling over a banner ad!

Some channels have already started advertise during shows. Fox and NBC have been doing this for a while with banners on the bottom. This is extremely annoying, especially when they squash the programme to make the advert fit, ruining the aspect ratio. One channel (I forget the name, but they are showing reruns of Star Trek: The Next Generation) even has adverts with sound during programmes! Un-be-freaking-lievable.

What really shocked me though is that they accepted my cancellation without putting up a fight. My friend Eric recently tried to cancel and they took him to hell and back whilst trying to get rid of it. Where’s my free three months of service?

Last night Scott and I completed Resistance: Fall of Man on the Playstation 3. It was a monumental achievement, and we’d like to thank three Friday nights with no work the day after, Dr Pepper and Pringles.

I have really been enjoying the Playstation 3 since I picked one up in mid December, thanks to Scott’s help! I also bought Ridge Racer 7, and my friend Gavin who works at Neversoft sent me his game, Tony Hawk’s Project 8. All are excellent and really show off the console. I have also been getting better with first person shooters, although I think that keeping up with a veteran Halo player (Amber’s sister) was more down to me knowing exactly what to do with the weapons in Resistance. Lobbing an air-fuel grenade over to my opponent, whilst standing behind an invisible shield and seeing their bullets apparently bounce off me is very satisfying!