ValentinesDay
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A priest's guide to class romance
It's a troubling yet underpublicized fact that four out of five shadow priests respecced shadow for the first time after experiencing a romantic break-up. Recent studies show that priests are 63% more likely to respec shadow within 72 hours of a break-up, while a separate poll found that 78% of healing priests had seriously considered respeccing to shadow after having an argument with their spouse or significant other. To the tenderhearted healing priest, shadow probably seems like a quick way to steel yourself and mend a broken heart; unfortunately, too few priests realize the two points they're putting into Masochism 'til they're staring down into an empty bottle of Volcanic Potion and wishing they could do the same DPS as a warlock. The simple way to avoid all these drastic courses of action is, of course, to skip getting your heart broken in the first place. Easier said than done, you think? Perhaps, but knowing the battlefield of love will certainly help you avoid the more obvious pitfalls. Want to know what your best match is? What about your worst? This week, I've got the answers in a special guide to the classes.
Love and Hate tweets collected on 3D 'Love Will Conquer' site
Valentines Day might have passed you by, but for many it's a day of conflicting emotions. Some of you may be screaming EB Browning's Sonnet 43 from the rooftops, others talking about how much you hate smug couples. Either way, if you're tweeting your feelings then (innovative marketing firm Imperial Leisure's) Love Will Conquer will record it. Geotagged tweets are being mapped, in real-time onto a 3D Earth, where an perpetually growing tree maps out who's feeling what and when. If you tell someone you love them freely and the tree will swell with red leaves, whereas hate causes cold blue ones to sprout instead. If you want to watch the world venting its ardor, point your WebGL browser (Chrome and Firefox 10.1 both work) at our source link.
Apps for Valentine's Day
Image: Shutterstock Today's smartphones are, by their nature, quite versatile. It's impossible to guide every lover on Valentine's Day to the app for their particular needs, because despite the requisite "flowers, chocolate, *something*" expectations, we all do it differently. I tried to round up a few apps that might appeal to just about anyone who participates in tomorrow's festivities. Happy Valentine's Day, if that's your thing! Going out to eat If you're trying to get a reservation, one of the fastest ways to check and make a reservation is with OpenTable (hopefully your area's restaurants are on-board with their system). If you're out and looking for somewhere to eat, I still use one of the first big breakout apps from the App Store, UrbanSpoon. Of course, you can always ask Siri, but if you don't have a 4S, try Yelp. Going out to find someone to love Personally I've had a great experience with OKCupid, probably the least skeevy of the online dating sites and its app is quite excellent. There's also Skout, which I haven't tried, but it has good reviews and features a location-based singles finder in the app. There are also most specific love-finding apps like Grindr for the gay community and Cupidtino for fans of Apple stuff. Buying a gift Don't know what to buy your sweetheart? Apps like El Gifto, and Thoughtful (not yet available in app form) will help you answer that question by asking a few background questions first. You can use Red Laser to comparison shop (you hopeless romantic, you) or Giftiki to pool your money with friends -- the gift that says "I love you enough to beg our friends for money." Setting the mood Yeah we've all heard of Pandora by now, but lately I'm digging the DJ-powered Slacker Radio for less repetition and a wider set of music. Slacker also has several romance-themed stations set up, like this one called Love Songs. If you subscribe to Rdio or Spotify, you can build your own playlist for all-night romance without commercial interruption. My personal preference is Rdio, but it'll be fun to see all the romantic songs being played in Spotify on the night of V-Day thanks to Spotify's in-your-face social mechanisms. Having fun Spending a night at home? Try Scene It? Romance Movies for some lighthearted fun -- although it could be embarrassing if you never watch romance movies. If you want to reminisce about the times you had together and snapped with Instagram, check out Lovestagram, which will bring up all the pics of you and your loved one taken using the social photo service. iKamasutra is the App Store-approved Kama Sutra for the iPhone. You could just as easily buy the real deal in ebook form, but the app provides easy navigation to all your favorite, um, love pretzels. Got any other apps you recommend for Valentine's Day? If you need to call a florist, I'd suggest Google or Siri -- and that you do it fast.
February 14th is Valen... Angry Birds day
Forget poking: from February 14th, show you love someone by flinging a mis-tempered avian toward them. It's Valentines Day that Angry Birds will finally arrive on the ubiquitous social network -- just in time to ensure half the coupled population of the world misses its dinner reservation, in order to get past one more level. The basic game will be free, but upgrades like the Mighty Eagle, double-sized birds, an earthquake weapon and a max-strength catapult will cost you. It'll be launched in Jakarta around the same time you offer up that heart-shaped box of chocolates, so if you want to ensure the day remains romantic, we'd suggest waiting until the 15th before installing.
Apple Store is down (Update: Back up with Valentine's Day gift guide)
The yellow sticky note of doom has appeared, and the Apple Store is currently down. What sort of updates will this bring? Since it's early Friday on the East Coast, most likely maintenance. But with Macworld, it could be anything. We'll let you know of any changes once it's back up! Update: The store has come back up. No new items have been added, but Apple has a new campaign on the store focused on Valentine's Day. Apple has positioned it as a gift guide, and the iPad 2 with a (PRODUCT) RED Smart Cover is prominently displayed.
Pink Samsung Galaxy S II makes UK bow on cupid's bow, is the new Godiva
Pretty in pink, isn't it?! Sammy's already slapped a bit of rouge on the casing of its über-popular Galaxy S II for denizens of South Korea, making that special edition available for coloristas last November. But in an effort to share the "love," synchronize with a certain money-milking, greeting card holiday and maximize profits, the company's releasing this precious-hued wünderphone to our cousins across the pond on Phones4u and Very. Arriving just in time for you Brits to tell that special someone in your life, "I spent a few hundred pounds on this silly phone and I'm made of money, so let's seal this deal," the GS II packs the same boatload of specs that made it the undisputed smartphone king of 2011. So, come Valentine's Day, you can either give the gift of roses and chocolates or a blush-colored mobile. Or, you can stay at home, drink a bottle of red, watch Love, Actually on repeat, buy one for yourself and pretend you didn't. Go ahead, we won't tell.
AMD can't even get through Valentine's Day without knocking Intel
Oh AMD, is no corporate-mandated, decidedly commercialist holiday sacred to you? While we were all snuggling with our snookums and/or cooing to our cohorts the marketing team at Advanced Micro Devices was shipping out something a little bit nasty -- and not in the "go get the fuzzy handcuffs" kind of nasty. The company sent out a mug of chocolates that, on the front, says "I ♥ APU," referencing the Fusion platform that's recently powered the HP Pavilion dm1z and Lenovo Thinkpad x120e to solid reviews. Sadly, that wasn't enough, as the note started like this: I heard that Sandy B. broke your heart and wanted to let you know that I'm here for you. Oh, and I have a cousin from Llano, Texas I'd like to introduce you to soon--I think you two will really hit it off! XOXO, AMD Fusion APU Cute, AMD. And here we thought maybe you and Intel had finally made up.
Valentine's Day iPhone apps for the woman who bore your children
You love her. You admire her. You have given her the gift of children. (For the purposes of this post, they will be considered a gift. A loving gift. A blessing, even.) You share a home, a past and a future. It's Valentine's Day. Now what? So, first the obvious. No amount of chocolate or roses are going to make the kid's sniffles go away, the dog walk herself, or the laundry folded and put away magically. If you're thinking about making her day special, just buying an app isn't going to do it, especially apps that involve farts or beer. Get real, people. Large quantities of time to herself, along with her friends, at a day spa is thinking in the right direction. But if you're determined to go tech, here are a few ways to give your minivan-bound true love the gift of iPhone.
TUAW's Daily App: Rayman 2: The Great Escape
For a few different reasons (the recent Verizon iPhone release probably being the primary one), Valentine's Day has become another holiday for big sales on the App Store. We covered quite a few titles on sale last week, and of those, Rayman 2 is the one I'll recommend today. It's a port of an old Ubisoft title, so the controls aren't quite perfect, but it's an excellent platformer, and if you've never played through this game but like the genre, you should definitely give it a shot. There's no Game Center integration or any extra features, but if you just want to explore your way solo through the 45 different levels, the game is great. Plus, for Valentine's Day, it's only US 99 cents on the App Store, along with a bunch of other EA, Gameloft, Capcom, Sega and other developers' titles. Even if you don't have a big date planned tonight, odds are you'll find something on the App Store that you'll love.
Valentine's Day specials coming to the App Store
Ah, Valentine's Day, when Spring is just around the corner, love is in the air, and ... iOS games are on sale for 99 cents? Apparently -- since the holiday is largely made up by gift card retailers anyway, a bunch of big iOS developers are putting their games on sale for just a buck over the weekend. If you've been waiting to pick up games by Electronic Arts or Gameloft, this coming weekend will be your chance. There are actually multiple reasons for this -- not only is it Valentine's Day, but a lot of folks are receiving their new Verizon iPhones this weekend, so there's a lot of incentive to sell some games and break into the top paid and free app charts. We can probably expect to hear about more sales as the week goes on. Some games are also updating for Valentine's Day -- both Angry Birds and Cut the Rope have updates planned or shipping already, and we'll probably see a few more of those as well. Flower Garden is also going free starting Thursday for the holiday. Just be careful -- if your Valentine catches you playing any of this new content during your date next Monday, the rest of February might be a little more lonely for you.
T-Mobile offering all phones for free on contract this weekend
T-Mobile has a reputation for offering some of the more steeply-discounted promotions among the big four US carriers, but this one takes the cake: as long as you're willing to sign on for a new contract, you can get any phone they offer for free this weekend. Billed as a Valentine's Day deal, shoppers on Friday and Saturday will be eligible to get literally any handset in the store -- including the myTouch 4G, HD7, G2, and Vibrant -- gratis, albeit with their names inked on a new two-year deal. You still might be contending with a mail-in rebate to bring the net cost down to free, but it still ain't bad -- and if you already have a line of service, you can get in on the offer by agreeing to a full upgrade. Follow the break for the press release.
Soundfreaq's SFQ-01R Sound Platform goes red and black for Valentine's Day
Remember that SFQ-01 Bluetooth audio system you were swooning over late last year? If you twiddled your thumbs on buying one, here's a shot at redemption: Soundfreaq has just pushed out a limited edition red and black version just in time for Valentine's Day, and outside of the color change, everything else remains the same. It's up for pre-order now at Amazon for a penny under $200, and trust us, your significant other will love it. Even if said SO is... you.
IBM's Watson supercomputer will play Jeopardy! on these dates
What are February 14th, 15th, and 16th? We've known it was going to happen for a while, but now we know when to set our DVRs. A rack of servers -- soaked with natural-language processing, armed with a battalion of esoteric pop culture knowledge, and "represented by a round avatar" -- will face off against Jeopardy! millionaires Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter (both profiled in video after the break) for three days starting on Valentine's Day 2011. We're also hearing that Watson will sign autographs after it's done decimating its opponents. It will then donate all its winnings to charity and spend the rest of its natural life dodging paparazzi on an undisclosed beach in the South Pacific. [Photo from Ben Sisto's flickr]
Couple marries at 5th Avenue Apple Store on Valentine's Day
We've seen robberies at Apple Stores before, we've seen kids rapping and we've even seen death threats, but I don't know that I've ever heard of a wedding in an Apple Store. That's what newlyweds Ya Ting Li and Joshua Li decided to do at midnight in the Fifth Avenue Apple Store on Valentine's Day -- right there among the iMacs and Macbooks, they got their wedding officiated by a turtlenecked Steve Jobs stand-in. The rings came in on an original iPod, and the cards and decorations were Apple-themed as well (one says "I love you more than this" with a picture of an iPhone on it). Why did they choose to have their wedding in an Apple temple? The couple even met at an Apple Store. We don't know the details of that, but we'd like to think their eyes found each other over a 17" MacBook Pro. Very cute. Congrats to the happy couple -- we would hope that they got AppleCare for the marriage, but we doubt they'd need it.
TeleNav: GPS helped guys get out of the Valentine's Day doghouse
TeleNav is known for its phone-based GPS navigation products, particular the AT&T Navigator app for iPhone. The company has over 11 million subscribers to its services, so it has a lot of data to sift through to find interesting location search trends. That data showed that GPS location searches helped a lot of guys keep from getting in deep trouble with their significant others in the period surrounding Valentine's Day. Mark Burfeind of TeleNav tells us that they put together all the florist and flower-related GPS searches in their products around Valentine's Day, over 11 million users total, and "found that GPS may have come to the rescue for last minute shoppers." Among the interesting finds: During Valentine's Week (Feb. 8 – 14), searches for flowers increased more than 5.5 times over the previous, non-holiday week of Feb. 1 - 7. In fact, searches on Valentine's Day alone outnumbered searches for the entire week of Feb. 1-7. It looks like GPS may have helped some people get out of the "doghouse" following Valentine's Day. Searches for flowers by TeleNav's users the Monday following Valentine's Day were twice as high as those on an average Monday. How about you, TUAW reader? Did you use your favorite iPhone navigation app to find flowers, candy, or an available restaurant reservation for Valentine's Day? Leave us a comment and let us know if your iPhone's GPS saved the day.
Pentax K-x DSLR goes pink for Valentine's Day, naturally
You know what the world needs? Another stereotypical pink gadget to commemorate a Hallmark holiday. Bitterness and shame aside, it looks as if Pentax has decided that too few people were using its custom color shop to craft completely pink K-x DSLRs, and in the honor of Saint Valentine, the company has decided to roll out another stock hue to sell alongside the red, white, black and navy blue versions. It'll set you back around HK$5,990 (or $770 in greenbacks), but trust us, your honey is totally worth it.
TomTom Ease arrives in limited edition red for Valentine's Day
Funny that this special red edition of the TomTom Ease is actually beating the regular version to market, but hey, it's Valentine's Day. Nothing new here apart from the case color -- you're still looking at a 3.5-inch QVGA display, 2GB of internal memory preloaded with Tele-Atlas maps, Map Share / IQ Routes, an integrated battery, and a built-in Fold & Go mount. Amazon has the limited-edition red exclusively for $119 now, if you're ready to commit -- or you can wait and just be friends with the boring gray model, which should be out any day now.
New seasonal vanity pet, the Toxic Wasteling
Vanity pet collectors, rejoice! The Crown Chemical Co. apothecaries not only drop some pretty nice necklaces, they're also the source of a new vanity pet, the Toxic Wasteling. You may think this looks a lot like the Disgusting Oozeling, but there's a major difference -- rather than a debuff applied to your character, the Wasteling is a hungry little guy. So hungry in fact, that he'll eat random critters, and as he does, he grows in size. Check out the video to see the Toxic Wasteling in action -- and for those pet collectors wondering about the Truesilver Shafted Arrow for the Perma-Peddle achievement, he's now available on holiday vendors for the low price of 40 Love Tokens.
Fool for Love just got easier
Love is in the Air on most servers by now, and players should notice a substantial change in the way the event is being run this year. No longer do you have to furtively log on each hour on the hour during the course of the event in the hopes that you'll get that candy bag with that ONE piece of candy you need for the Be Mine! achievement. The candy bag, as well as all other random rewards from previous years are available on vendors in each capital city, and purchased with Love Tokens. How do you get the tokens? Well, you certainly don't have to run around begging people to give you cards and building gifts. This year, the tokens are available through daily quests. Since it's the first day of the event, we may not have seen all of the possible dailies, but here's the rundown on two of them: Remember the Gifts of Adoration? This year, faction leaders are looking for jewelry. You can turn in a Lovely Charm Bracelet to the faction leader of your choice for a Lovely Card that will give you an hour long buff, and 5 Love Tokens. The method used to obtain these bracelets? Kwee will give you a Lovely Charm Collector's Kit with the following flavor text: "Pliers, bone saw, scalpel and sundry other tools allow for the collection of Lovely Charms from worthwhile enemies. Collect 10 charms to make a bracelet!" Yes, you read that correctly. You murder beasts and creatures in your level range, and hack Lovely Charms off of their corpses. I'm thinking I love this event already. Other ways to obtain Love Tokens include the daily quest "A Perfect Puff of Perfume," which requires you to hose down ten players or NPC's with perfume. Vendors and city guards will work just as well as other players, so don't worry about running out of people to spray. This quest will also earn you 5 tokens. The changes so far to the event make it much, much simpler to get that coveted Fool For Love meta achievement, and should provide a welcome change to players used to the same old grind from previous years. Check out the gallery below for the complete list of items available on the vendors, and stay tuned for more Love is in the Air info as it comes in! %Gallery-84863%
City of Heroes announces Secret Admirer Contest
Valentine's Day is just around the corner, and City of Heroes is ready and willing to help you woo your sweetheart. Well, as long as your sweetheart is the War Witch -- anyone else and you're on your own. They're making it worth your while, though. The City of Heroes Secret Admirer Contest invites you to create a digital or homemade Valentine's Day card for the War Witch and submit it for the chance to win some great prizes. While we can't guarantee that the lady herself will be presenting you with her phone number, three people in each category (homemade and digital) will be presented with prize packages including Logitech gaming headsets and a pile of CoH goodies. The contest is going on now and will last until the submission deadline of February 28th. Take a look at all the rules and regulations here, and good luck to you!
