Author: Dan

I think this will be a mini-review, but often times, I start as a mini-review, but end up with more than enough for a full-on, double-quarter-pounder with cheese regular review. (Finished writing it: Well, so much for the mini-review…)

Let me pre-apologize for the computer-centric nature of this, but the “product” was a big enough let-down that being that I write reviews for a reviews website, I might as well weigh-in. Also, the official name of the “product” isn’t “Dyne:bolic Media Studio LiveCD, it’s just Dyne:bolic, but that’s stupid so I’m including the rest of the name I assigned to it.

First, for those that probably stopped reading when I said “computer-centric:” a LiveCD is a CD you put in your computer as it starts up. Instead of Windows or Apple OS X loading from the hard drive, an operating system loads from the CD drive. This might not mean much to the non-computer people out there, but it allows for a completely different operating system to run on the same computer without anything being deleted (you just eject the CD when you’re done), overwritten, copied, or modified (unless that was your goal). With a LiveCD, you can start a computer whose Windows installation has gone the way of the buffalo and have practically full access to the files. If Windows needs to be re-installed, you can copy the relevant files to a USB key or (in some of the fancier liveCDs) even burn them to a CD-R. People who use computers for more abstract purposes (i.e. Linux users) use LiveCDs to sample new flavors of Linux before installing them. Windows has to no official LiveCD version as few people would be compelled to buy the program if they could just copy it and take it to whichever computer they (or a friend of family member) would use. (Not that this isn’t rampant with regular Windows install CDs as it is).

Yeah, I can make up words too, Mr. “Hacktive.” KOFTOFTIC!! Take that dyne:bolic people.

In terms of troubleshooting, LiveCDs most useful aspect is that one can figure out if a problem is with the computer’s hardware or Windows. In fact, I troubleshooted the hell out of Adam’s computer when he was having network problems using a LiveCD version of Puppy Linux.

Anyway, Dyne:bolic is a linux-based LiveCD that portrays itself as a completely free, complete multimedia solution on a CD. You don’t install anything; you just put the CD in, start the computer, then you’re in a dreamworld of magic desktop filled with free software for internet broadcasting, audio and video editing, print editing, vector graphics (think Adobe Illustrator), raster graphics (think Adobe Photoshop), and more. It’s sounds great in theory. In fact, it sounds revolutionary in theory. In theory. The user interface is simple enough to figure out (it’s probably simpler to use than Windows, especially because it’s so specialized).

BUT, like a lot of the Linux theories, it’s better as just that, a theory. As you turn the computer on, you’re greeted with a prompt that says “boot:” and has instructions for choosing video modes or entering debug mode. Well, I guess I’d consider myself a power user, so I want to set the resolution to the optimum setting for the LCD screen in front of me. Skipping the intermediate step, you choose your resolution and the screen says “Could not find kernel” then it boots into the desktop, running at 800×600. This isn’t enough for power users, and video editing at 800×600 is practically useless as video from a full-resolution DV source will fill most of the space. Aside from the fact that a non-linux user would be dumbfounded by that “kernel error,” as a reasonably experienced (unfortunately, even with Linux) computer user, it’s bad user interface design if you display a serious-looking error, then have the computer seemingly do something unrelated (such as boot into the desktop). Does this mean that the kernel error wasn’t very serious? That I’ll be able to change resolutions once it’s booted?(you can’t) Who knows.

I’d give a a more thorough review, but trying it on various hardware,- I couldn’t get it to run higher than 800×600 and beyond that, the support for the CD was (dis)organized into a “cute” page with very little content, most focused on the individual included programs (which I could already find on the homepages of the included programs), but the not the actual CD itself.

I’m not sure if Dyne:bolic is a one man project, but if it is, it’s quite the accomplishment (in theory) for one person, but as the Linux community is so often to say, “Use this! Windows would never be this good, and you’re stupid if you don’t use flavor of the week. If it doesn’t work for you, then fix it yourself. It’s open source!” I know enough about Linux to say that the kernel error when choosing a resolution probably has something to do with the detection of the video card’s applicable settings (or settings in general), but that doesn’t mean I have the means to fix it. If other Linux-based LiveCD’s can work, this one should too, especially if it’s supposed to be so “ultimate.” I tried it with both ATi and nVidia videocards and had the same error. Linux etiquette says that I’m supposed to go to the forums or wiki if I have a problem, but I’d prefer my “amazing” solution to just work.If it’s a one man project, it’ll probably work fine on his hardware, so he probably has an Intel video card/onboard chip. But, of course, lots of people don’t have his exact setup, so maybe it’s the ultimate setup on his computer. But that’s about it.

The Dyne:bolic Media Studio LiveCD receives one-and-a-half stars due to it setting high expectations but failing to deliver on them. The concept (a standalone CD that turns any computer into a fully-featured media studio) is rock solid, but it’s unfortunately brought down by two of the pillars of Microsoft’s supposed FUD anti-Linux marketing: “questionable hardware support” and “lack of documentation”. Sure, it’s free, but that doesn’t make it better than commercial alternatives, even if they don’t come bundled on one standalone CD (that doesn’t completely work). Oh yeah, and the name stinks.

hmm, I didn’t have a solid plan when I started this review. I simultaneously wanted to do a running list of “‘the internet’ thinks this, ‘the internet’ thinks that” and a traditional intro, body, rating, conclusion review. Unfortunately I had neither enough entries for that running list or a fully fleshed out concept for the traditional review, so we get a questionably coherent mishmash of both.

hmm #2…I scrapped the list I had when I realized how long the traditional part was. The list wasn’t very good anyway. Anyway, enough meta.

Notice those quotes up there? The ones around The Internet? Those signify that we’re not talking about the actual internet. Nope, we’re not discussing millions of computers, countless low-level hardware thingies that are probably made by Cisco, nor little understood software and protocols that link all of it together. In fact, we’re not even talking about the 750ish million people that use the internet. We’re talking about those people, the one’s that both provide and fuel almost every stereotype about the modern “geek.”

The most famous parody/stereotype of “the internet.” It’s funny because it’s true.

“The Internet” is almost a collective consciousness; the phrase “all your base are belong to us” means less than nothing to those not part of “the internet.” But those in that club thinks (or at least thought at one point in time) that it is hilarious. “The Internet” loves being first to know about something that’s become “pop-culture,” and isn’t afraid to hold that against you. In fact, here’s a disturbingly complete list of pieces of internet culture. Some of them never caught on with the general public, but some will look quite familiar.

The anonymous nature of participation on the internet (no quotes) allows for those who care too much about something that is inconsequential to spend time (hours, days….years?) and defend their work because there’s someone else on “The Internet” that probably is working on something just like it. These two people will hate each other and will develop fanboys, the official animal of “The Internet.”

Because the internet is so unfathomably large, there’s stuff about everything. Without going into history, the type of people who were first using the civilian internet, were (standby as I stereotype and generalize)…well, let’s call them the type of people who had the technical background or interest to have the means and abilities to connect to the internet. Stereotypically (and accurately), these aren’t the people to have “mainstream” interests. I’m not necessarily judging what those interests might be, but needless to say, the population at large doesn’t share those interests. Being that college campuses were some of the first places people could experience what would become “the internet,” students with the interest and ability to participate in the internet made some of the first “home pages,” sites dedicated to whatever their left of mainstream interest happened to be. Combine that with the fact that much of the internet traffic was coming from other college campuses, a huge social network of young people who normally weren’t part of a huge social network developed. Before “the internet,” college campuses also served as larger-scale examples of the comic book store phenomenon, with numerous people with non-mainstream interests meeting enough people with those same interests to create a community where discussions could take place about those interests beyond the “Comic books, Dungeons & Dragons, and etc. suck and so do you” stereotypically presented by the “mainstream.” Members of “the internet” would indignantly mention that I skipped the discussion of BBSes, IRC, usenet, and other things that our readership wouldn’t care about.

Oddly enough, “The Internet” doesn’t really have much to say about music. Sure, there are fansites, but if one were to list influential music websites that are just websites, pitchforkmedia.com will probably be the only he can think of. I’d guess that this is because the world of music is simply too huge and diverse; genres are so monolithic that there can’t be a general-purpose site serving all of it.

Oddly enough, considering how similar members of “the internet” are, they have no central meeting point. That doesn’t mean there aren’t sites “they” frequent. Fark, sort of a weird news aggregator, serves as the general news-gathering device. To be fair to Fark, I know of no one, member of “the internet” or not, who didn’t get a kick out of it, at least during their first visit. If they want more scathing humor that specializes in topics of which “the internet” is conscious, there’s Something Awful. Both Something Awful and Fark have Photoshop contests; naturally the two subcommunities hate each other. Usually the Something Awful’s Photoshop efforts go over better with whatever we’d consider the mainstream internet user. Slashdot provides computer news and some of the most frustratingly inane arguing about each and every story without fail. The Internet Movie Database, originally “property” of “the internet” is very much a mainstream internet tool and continues to be “the internet’s” definitive source for movie info, while Roger Ebert, the unofficial official movie critic of “the internet”‘s already high profile has managed to rise since “the internet” adopted him. His stance on video games turned off many, but there’s no widely agreed upon second place critic for “the internet” to worship. Computer hardware is taken care of by Anandtech or Tom’s Hardware Guide (or any of the dozens of other hardware reviewing sites). Aint It Cool News continues to be “the internet’s” movie site and, like SlashDot is famous for its attracting of relentless fanboys of particular movie properties. TheForce.net provides Star Wars news (an interest/passion among much of “the internet”). I’m sure there’s an unofficial official site for every science fiction property (I’m condescendingly including LOST in there, Nate). Professional Wrestling is known for having one of the biggest divides between casual fans and “internet” fans. I’m not sure if I’ll do a full review of the mechanics of how the Internet Wrestling Community functions (I think it might be so messed-up that it would be somewhat interesting to those that don’t care one bit about wrestling.), but I’ll say that I will. Due to that messed-up-ed-ness, there’s no real universal destination, but 411mania and insidepulse are popular (though both have expanded to cover pop culture and more traditional “internet” interests). Simpsons fans have The Simpsons Archive where you can find “episode capsules” where you’ll learn more than every wanted to know about everything about each episode of the show. Wikipedia and Google had begun as jewels of “the internet,” but Google has long since become the standard for all users and Wikipedia, for better-or-worse, is in the process of becoming the standard for informal research (and formal research by those that don’t realize that an encyclopedia that has a more detailed entry for the Green Lantern than for the Watergate scandal might not be the best source of information).

The above wasn’t an all-encompassing tour of the popular destinations, but that’s a lot of them; each category could have more added and I glossed over some categories (such as shock sites, so it’s your own fault if you see something in three clicks that you wish you hadn’t).

“The Internet” receives two-and-a-half stars not due to its interests, but due to its attitudes. The ending of Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back really captured the whole concept, with two guys previously unfamiliar with the idea of the internet going after (and beating up) everyone that trash talked them on a movie website, not unlike Aint It Cool News. Aside from the fact that much of “the internet” has become used to anonymous, consequence-free trash talking, the significance is that the “mainstream” still doesn’t understand the whole community, why anyone would visit, much less create, comment, or contribute to a websites devoted to, of all things, Star Wars action figures or the intricacies behind how the episodes on the Simpsons DVDs aren’t 100% complete.

The Something Awful “Photoshop Phriday” examples came from the Paintings of Light competition parts 1 and 2.