This inefficient behavior bothers people like Fitzpatrick, but not the ordinary Web users who take reregistering for granted. "This shit is too pedantic, too convoluted, and violates too many preconceived notions of how authentication works," writes Dziuba. While it's always fun to watch Dziuba go off, he's also got a point in asking why more software is the answer to, as he puts it, "a problem that doesn't exist." (Photo by adactio)

According to Iminlikewithyou's Charles Forman, who's working on porting his startup's copycat games to the iPhone, there's not much in common between the platforms besides the word "app."

A Facebook app is easy. It's a Web app. The hard part is all the viral "mutherfuckery" that they do. iPhone is like writing a program. Theres a big upfront learning curve. It's a totally different ballgame. A shit developer can make some Web app. But you have to be a good developer to make an iPhone app.

Forman couldn't deliver a cogent explanation of the differences — something to do with the "real-time" nature of iPhone apps. So we asked our favorite developer with a heart of gold and a tongue of acid, former Uncov blogger and Pressflip cofounder Ted Dziuba, to elaborate. The best he could do, below.

• You're going to have to figure out how to store data without MySQL. Years of PHP development has warped your mind to think that everything must be object relational. There's no 12-step program yet, Apple will release it with the next firmware update.
• We know you like to live a life free of authority and rules, but there's one rule you're going to have to follow: Objective C syntax, and the compiler will taser your ass if you get out of line.
• Information wants to be free, right? Well, not Apple's. Especially the developer documentation: that will cost you $99. But you already own more than $8,000 worth of Apple equipment, what's another few bucks? Anyway, since I'm not forking over $100 to look at documentation, that's really as far as I can go.

Dieting and exercising suck. You are not going to have fun. The science is simple: eat fewer calories than your burn. Start quantifying. I use FitDay to track calories. Run a 1,000 calorie per day deficit. Go easy on the drinking. Take up smoking — a zero-calorie alternative. Eat one serving. Drink more coffee, an appetite suppressant. Low-fat ice cream has around 120 calories per half cup. After two weeks, your stomach will shrink. Step two is exercise. It's awful. Use an elliptical machine. Treadmills make you run. One hour per day, hard. You should be close to vomiting. Easy, huh?

(Photo by mandj98)

Explains Dziuba:

When you play with someone who has been in the military, they spend 10 minutes before the match going over strategy when all you really want to do is play. In the end, the civilians on the team end up shooting the marine because he's barking orders to everyone on the field who is just trying to have a good time.

(Photo by Chris McGrath/Getty Images)

Update: SmugMug's Don McAskill, also an Amazon customer, thinks it's all a big misunderstanding. The short version: Not all gigahertzes are created equal.

GDC 2008 is wrapping with Video Games Live, where your favorite videogame soundtracks will be performed by a live orchestra. Weekend Apps is happening in Santa Clara starting at 6 p.m. and continuing through Sunday, where developers will sit around and try to make as many Facebook apps as they can in one weekend. (Let's just hope they're not as annoying as those pesky vampires) Tomorrow night, io9 is co-sponsoring the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund at 111 Minna.



Got something to add to the calendar? Send it to calendar@valleywag.com.

First, he's making far more money as an engineer for Persai than anyone will ever pay him to write. (B) Ted's probably afraid that by appearing on TechCrunch he would, to use his own words, "get classified in the same short bus as all of the other failboats in there."

c++ standard library: developer platform
java with hibernate & struts: developer platform
ruby on rails: developer platform
myspace: not a developer platform

In case you forgot, Pownce is a Twitter clone whose added value is the resale of Amazon S3 space. It's written in Python (Django) by someone who rounds floating point numbers using strings, and is only noteworthy by virtue of being cofounded by Kevin Rose of Digg.

There was no pressure to pass out business cards or pretend to listen to a pitch out of politeness. But the Uncov guys are sly. They have an angle, like everyone else in the Valley. They're running Uncov, advertising-free, just to get attention — and then, when they launch their stealth startup, they're going to milk that attention for everything it's worth. Add to that this guarantee: Their company is the one startup that will never get savaged in Uncov. It's just so cynical it might work.

But besides that hidden scheme, it was just a night out at the bar with your sarcastic know-it-all coworkers. "We're less than 30 years old! Nothing we do now is going to have repercussions in the future!" Uncov writer Ted Dziuba cheerfully slurred towards the end of the night, after the shots of Patron but before he started flashing the shocker in almost every picture he posed for.

Other guests were just as charming. AdBrite salesman Joel Sacks, after trying to steal videographer Sarah Meyers's camera, spilled an entire pint on himself and spent the rest of the night smelling of stale beer. When Meyers pointed her camera towards Friendster and Socializr founder Jonathan Abrams, he pretended he couldn't speak English, mumbling gibberish instead. The chaos was capped off by Forbin Group biz-devver Cindy Phung shouting "Geeks gone wild!" If only.

And of course, there were the haters. "I liked these guys before the started getting on the scene," said one guy by the bar, as if he were complaining that his favorite indie band was picked up by MTV.

Not like the Uncov guys are all that cool, really, when you get right down to it. Dziuba drinks whiskey sours, the same cocktail my 93-year-old grandmother orders on a night on the town. And his wife Julia is adorable and way too hot for him. Watch out, guys: I'm going to be exploring this Silicon Valley phenomenon of the too-hot wife soon.

Speaking of too hot, Pownce engineer Leah Culver was upset that her new relationship with LiveJournal founder Brad Fitzpatrick, who plans to celebrate the conclusion of his still-pending divorce next month, didn't merit a Valleywag post. Oh, Leah. If we posted all the things we heard about you, what fun would that be? A lot of fun, actually. "Hot swap," indeed.

–Video by Sarah Meyers