Real-World Hackers Discredit Technology Used In Watch Dogs Video Game

Posted on June 8, 2014 by Rab

MONTREAL, QUEBEC, Canada –

Hackers around the World have been rampantly posting online about their opinions on the new Ubisoft video game “Watch Dogs,” which was released last week. The video game is based around a fictional hacker who wanders the streets of Chicago using his cell phone to control nearly any electronic device he wishes, which he uses to gain information and help avoid cyber-terrorists.

“As a hacker, it makes me feel really lame – I could point my phone at a person, and it won’t just hack their bank account. It’s completely absurd that this guy can do this stuff with such ease.” Said a self-proclaimed hacker who goes by the online name Lord Nikon. “The game makes it look too easy. He just scans people with his cell phone, takes their cash or their music, unlocks a car, and drives like an asshole through the city. I can’t do any of that at all. Watchdogs is totally unrealistic.”

Throughout the years, the art of hacking has been portrayed throughout movies, television, and now video games as some sort of exciting, other-worldly experience, where the hacker is always a half-step ahead of the law or other hackers, and spends their nights staring at a computer screen filled with gorgeous graphics. As hacker Cereal Killer points out to us, that isn’t generally the case.

“You know, I don’t see the big deal with this guy in the game.” Said Killer. “Even if I could just take a stroll and steal peoples stuff, walking just takes too much outta me, ya know? I like doing this stuff because I can sit here in my room, eating Bagel Bites, downloading music illegally and watching anime porn. That’s the true life of a hacker. Well, at least it’s my true life. I can’t really speak for everyone.”

Real-life hackers tend to experience extreme amounts of boredom brought on by so much waiting around, so bringing the technology developed for the fictional story in Watchdogs to life would be a silver lining for the hoards of anonymous hackers throughout the world.

“If these people could walk around while hacking the computers around them, it would greatly decrease their risks of collapse due to ennui.” Says Dr. Emmanuel Goldstein of the Chicago Memorial Hospital, cardiology division. “This concept would be the best thing to happen to cyber-crime since the invention of wireless internet!”

As technology expands, the hackers that we spoke with had mixed feelings about how great it would be to be able to commit hack the people around them like a character in a video game.

“I prefer to just relax, enjoy a Jolt cola, and watch reruns of The Outer Limits with my girlfriend AcidBurn.” Said a hacker whose online alias is ZeroCool. “I just can’t imagine why I’d want to run all over the city and get all sweaty. Hacking is an intelligent man’s game, a real-world thrill posed in an unreal world. I’ll keep playing the game, but I would never buy into that sort of technology.”

New Study Proves Everyone Is At Least Slightly Gay

Posted on June 7, 2014 by Bob The Empire News Potato

PIEDMONT, North Dakota –

A new scientific study performed by a private medical team at Massasoit General Hospital in Piedmont, North Dakota has proven that 100% of people have at least a little bit of gay in them.

“It doesn’t matter if you’re male, female, or a eunuch,” Said Professor Neil Louis, head of HumanZone, INC., the privately-held medical research company that performed the study. “Through many years of testing, research, development, and a tiny bit of trial-and-error, we have discovered the actual strain in human DNA that causes homosexuality. [And] these tests conclude that everyone, no matter who they are, has at least a small amount of that strain in them.”

It has long been known, although argued vehemently by bigots and religious zealots, that homosexuality is a trait that is developed while a person is still in the fetal state, being born homosexual or heterosexual. With this knowledge, Professor Louis and his team were able to discover exactly at what stage of the pregnancy a person “becomes” homosexual. Once they discovered this timeframe, they used that knowledge to find the actual DNA gene itself. They were then startled to discover that in every sample they had, whether it was from people who identified as straight or as homosexual, they could find at least some part of that same strain.

“It’s all extremely complicated,” said Louis. “I don’t expect that a layperson would understand it. When our research is published in the Boston Medical Journal of Research next month, anyone will be able to peruse our findings.”

What this means for people as whole, according to Louis, really amounts to nothing at all.

“This is not going to change any person’s day-to-day life. Knowing that you have a little gay in you, so what? What does that matter? Is there something wrong being gay? I mean, do people still think that in this day and age? What’s the matter with them? Who cares?”

In his findings, the professor and his team discovered that there were different “levels” of homosexuality, as they referred to them. Just as the stereotypes you can imagine of homosexuals, portrayed in TV and movies as anything from extremely flamboyant with female qualitites to men still repressing their sexuality, the study actually showed that the more a man claims to despise homosexuals, the more of the homosexual strain they would find in him.

“Men who we tested who considered themselves to be homophobic, or even overtly hostile towards homosexuals, were found to have the MOST amounts of homosexual DNA strains in them. I guess it does prove true the old adage that the more someone hates gay people, the more they really are repressing their own desires for some hot man-on-man action.”

Curiously, the study was not performed on any women.

“Oh, we didn’t bother studying women. Everyone already knows that all it takes to get a woman to have gay tendencies is a couple vodka and Red Bull martinis.”

Sprint Looks To Buy T-Mobile; Plans To Completely Dissolve Company

Posted on June 5, 2014 by Bob The Empire News Potato

OVERLAND PARK, Kansas –

Negotiations have begun for Sprint, the third largest wireless company in the US, to purchase T-Mobile, the fourth largest wireless company, from their parent Deutsche Telekom. The merger is reported to be worth approximately $32 billion, with part being paid in cash and part in stock, a typical option for deals of this size.

Assuming that the FCC approves the deal, Sprint has stated that their plans for T-Mobile would be to phase it out completely, while converting their customers into the Sprint family. The T-Mobile network, which runs on the much faster GSM technology would remain intact, with Sprint converting their handsets to take advantage of the higher speeds necessary for such a large subscriber base and congested network. Combined, Sprint and T-Mobile would have nearly 100 million customers.

“We feel very strongly that there is absolutely no need for T-Mobile to continue on as a company once our purchase is cleared.” Said Dan Hesse, chairman of Sprint Corp. US. “They’ve done some great things for the wireless world in the last year or two, but it’s nothing that we can’t continue without them. If this merger happens, it will definitely be the end for T-Mobile.”

The news that T-Mobile could possibly be closing their doors hit hard for many employees in the company, especially low-ranking retail and call center workers, who just went through a similarly stressful situation a few years ago when AT&T was looking to purchase T-Mobile. That merger was denied by FCC regulators, citing laws against creating a monopoly within the industry.

“It’s extremely disheartening, the idea of them shutting us down.” Said Christopher Pike, a call center employee. “I was here when AT&T came strutting through, and tried to pick us up. It was horrible, stressful. No one knew what was going to happen. This is almost worse, because they’ve already told us that we’re going to be out of a job if this buyout is approved.”

Jon Legere, CEO of T-Mobile, doesn’t seem too worried about keeping a job within the company if the buy-out happens. Legere, who has only been with T-Mobile for the last couple of years, has become an outspoken president, known for his profanity-laced speeches calling out AT&T and Verizon for their “shady” practices and their old-school mentality.

“I always talked about AT&T, Verizon – I rarely ever talked any [expletive] about Sprint, because I knew this was going to happen eventually. It’s no surprise to me. You can’t be #4 in the game forever without #3 knocking on your door. Well, the door is open now, and it’s about time I take off this magenta shirt and start thinking about how I’m going to look in yellow.”

With T-Mobile inevitably on the route to the end, many customers who recently switched from Sprint were delighted that they would be able to go back.

“I switched over to T-Mobile when my contract with Sprint ran out. Needed to try something new, ya know?” Said Alex Winter, a long time Sprint subscriber. “They don’t have contracts, sure, but they suckered me into buying a phone for $750, and with monthly payments, it’s going to take 2 damn years to pay off, so it’s basically the same thing. I can’t leave them without paying an arm and a leg to get rid of this phone, and their service is terrible. I can’t wait to get back with Sprint.”

As of this writing, there were no definite terms completed for the possible buyout, with representatives for Sprint and T-Mobile refusing to comment.

Twitter Launching New Paid Service With 200 Character Limit

Posted on June 5, 2014 by Bob The Empire News Potato

SAN FRANSISCO, California –

Twitter [NYSE: TWTR] may have finally put an end to the jokes about getting all your thoughts down in 140 characters or less, as this morning they announced their new paid service, dubbed Twit-Pro, which allows users an additional 60 characters per ‘tweet,’ bringing the total to 200.

“We are very excited to be debuting our new paid service, Twit-Pro, to the world.” Said Jack Dorsey, Chairman. “This new Twitter experience should help those micro-bloggers out there who want to say what they’re thinking and feeling, but need more than 140 characters to do it. We think it’s a huge leap forward for the Twittersphere.”

Twit-Pro, which Dorsey said will be fully integrated into existing Twitter apps for all platforms, as well as the Twitter website by the beginning of next month, will allow users the ability to pay a nominal monthly fee in exchange for the extra 60 characters when tweeting. Dorsey did not say how much they would be charging, but he did say they had worked out deals with all major U.S. cell phone carriers to allow users to bill directly to their provider.

Aside from just allowing for extra characters, Twit-Pro is also going to be offering the option of recording and posting videos into the user’s Twitter feed, with recording time up to 45 seconds.

“We wanted to take the best experiences you find on all social media, the most popular apps and websites, and combine them. We will now be allowing users to use more characters and record short video tweets, much like Vine, and embed them directly to all your followers. The days of linking and using other services to post into your Twitter feed are coming to an end. We want everything to be handled right by our own service.”

Other features announced with Twit-Pro are a song and media identifier, so you can instantly tweet the song or TV show you are watching just by letting your phone “listen” to the sounds around you, as well as a check-in feature that will let users mark down places they’ve visited with links to reviews for restaurants, movies, night clubs, or even national parks and resorts.

Twit-Pro is slated to become a live feature in the next Twitter update, scheduled for July 1st on Android, July 7th on the iPhone, and July 13th for Windows OS.