Random Access Memories

“If aliens were among us then it would be all over the papers and if it was being covered up by the Governments then they are doing a far better job of it than they have managed with anything else”

From our recent backpacking trip.

“The superior man understands what is right; the inferior man understands what will sell.” – Confucius

So AT&T will change it’s pricing plans and do away with “unlimited data”.

“AT&T defends its decision to eliminate the unlimited data plan, saying statistics show that 65% of their customers use less than 200MB of data per month, while 98% of their customers use less than 2GB of data on average each month.”

Yes, I agree those numbers are likely correct. However, they are making this change in conjunction with the rollout of the new Iphone 4G. Now who really thinks that someone with 4G is going to use less than 200MB.

I am rather certain we’re going to see customers screaming bloody murder over this one in the near future. Nothing like increasing profits in the short term while you make customers unhappy.

So my girlfriend got Pokemon Soul Silver for her DS. And I must admit i’m oddly attracted to the idea of how to cheat the little pokewalker pedometer that comes with the game.



Also, it takes around 2 million steps to unlock the highest things in the game so it seems most people think it’s not that bad to cheat.

It seems to gain it’s steps based on an accelerometer, once it hits a certain level of “shock” intensity a step is recorded, so a gentle motion doesn’t seem to work as well as a sharper one (I guess it reads the shock of the step).

I scrounged out the vibration motor from an old PS/2 rumble controller and used a paperclip to make a wire “hanger” on the back so it could be removed.

After that I added some foam so it wouldn’t rub against the motor. Then after a few wire connections, and a string to hang it from I plugged it in and checked the number of steps it recorded over 1 minute, 72.

Not that bad, but not awesome either. Then I slid the walker so it was not hanging off the motor, but rather directly in-line with it and checked again, 144 steps per minute!



I think that should be good enough, heh.

No, I will not make you one, but if you want detailed instructions end me a note.