If you’ve ever played Star Control when you were a kid, you should check out The Ur-Quan Masters. Ur-Quan is an open source version of Star Control 2, based on material from the game’s original creators. What got me thinking about Star Control was the sounds in the game. I remember some of the “alien themes” vividly. I was hoping I’d find the game and try to create ringtones out of them.

Evidently, I’m not the only one who’s liked SC’s music — Precursors is a group of (Finnish!) enthusiasts who have remixed the music from Star Control II.

Digitodayn Moskova–Vladivostok-blogi aukesi viime torstaina. Toimittaja Tuomas Karhu päivittää blogia ainoastaan tekstiviestein. Vaikka viestit ovatkin haircut-tyyppisiä, on blogia ihan hauska lukea.

Alla oleva viesti on yksi blogin parhaimmista. (Anna on Karhun tapaama puolalainen kanssamatkustaja. Parilla ilmeisesti synkkaa.)

5.7.2005 klo 18:20 — Ravintolavaunussa on pari muuta asiakasta minun ja Annan lisäksi. Taustalla soi hiljaa venäläinen musiikki. Vanha tarjoilija palvelee verkkaisesti. Vietämme vaunussa kolme tuntia jutellen viime päivien tapahtumista ja juoden venäläistä olutta. Koko tilanne tuntuu epätodelliselta, kuin elokuvasta. Välillä alamme käyttäytyä, kuin olisimme osa elokuvaa. Olen koko matkan aikana lukenut kolme uutista tekstiviestinä. Elämä on täällä, tämän junavaunun sisällä. Ainutlaatuista kokea, miten ympäröivä maailma menettää merkitystään. Olen kahden päivän sisällä Vladivostokissa.

Werewolf is another name for Mafia the game. Janne’s played it, lucky him.

Web color schemes is a neat collection of websafe color schemes inspired by many sources.

Both links via Kuutio.

So yesterday Marko Samuli, Janne, Roosa and I ended up going to Tikkurila to my parents’ place and grilling hamburgers. Judging on Roosa’s reaction, this wasn’t the first time she’d seen me eat home-made hamburgers. “How do you get them so big?” she asked, meaning basically “how can you make such a big mess?”

After dinner, Marko Samuli tried to get my dad’s computers to see each other in a network. Meanwhile I fixed Mom’s Mozilla mail client. This is the fourth time in the last 18 months that Mozilla lost all her mail. (Actually, it loses the association between her browser profile and her mail files. I have no idea why this keeps happening.)

Joel and Lona came home later on in the evening. It was nice to see them. I heard Joel’s going to be working at Valio until October, so that means he’ll be living in Tikkurila till then. he was accepted to some school in Vantaa, but he won’t starting it until next year after his military service.

All in all, a nice evening. We got invited back again sometime soon. There’s still more work to be done on the computers.

Oh, it’s the 4th of July! I only just noticed. Usually we go to my parents’ house and have home-made hamburgers. Last year we grilled hamburgers in our apartment building’s courtyard — I think it was the first time we grilled there. I don’t know what we’re going to do this year.

I’ve enjoyed reading the Project Aardvark weblog. Fogcreek’s idea is great: four interns create a working, saleable software product in the course of one summer. Last Friday, they finally revealed their product.