Thursday, April 29, 2010

Halo Reach Beta codes at Microsoft Expert Zone

Google Top Searches today show two separate search strings halo reach beta code and microsoft expert zone, which got logically linked today, since Microsoft's community website, the Microsoft Expert Zone, was put down for some time today, preparing to give away free Halo Reach Beta codes for the website members.

Instructions on how to get 5 Halo Reach Beta codes

For a limited time, Microsoft Expert Zone members have been given the opportunity to take a Halo 3 Reach Beta quiz and collect free redemption tokens directly from Microsoft. All you need to do is get all the quiz answers right. Troy Hemingway has collected 100 points and received five answer beta codes with the answer key, which he kindly shares:
  1. You play as Master Chief in Halo 3: ODST. [FALSE]
  2. What does ODST stand for? [Orbital Drop Shock Tropper]
  3. What mission are the ODST on in the game? [Find clues pointing to the location of the disbursed squad and the reasons for the Convenant's attacks on New Mambosa]
  4. Players will continue to enjoy all the great “Halo 3” technological innovations, including Saved Films, screenshots, Campaign Scoring and four-player co-op over Xbox LIVE. [True]
  5. Who are the developers behind Halo 3: ODST? [Bungie]
  6. How many total multiplayer maps will be available at launch with Halo 3: ODST? [24]
  7. When do the events in Halo 3: ODST take place? [It's a prequel to the Halo 3 storyline]
  8. What special bonus do customers get when they purchase Halo 3: ODST? [Access to Halo Reach Multiplayer Beta]
What is all about?

Halo: Reach is an upcoming first-person shooter video game for the Xbox 360. It is part of the Halo series, and it is scheduled for release during the fall of 2010. The game takes place in the year 2552, where humanity is locked in a war with the alien Covenant. Players control Noble 6, a member of an elite supersoldier squad, during a battle for the human world of Reach.

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Friday, April 9, 2010

The Buried Life Poem by Matthew Arnold

In modern times, reading poetry is not on the top of people interests, so name of the Victorian poem on the top of Google Search Trends is quite a remarkable event. Even thou, the top reason of the spark of interest is not directly associated with the famous author Matthew Arnold, the chance to slow down and read beautiful poetry cannot be missed.
This poem, The Buried Life poem, was the inspiration of friends — Jonnie and Duncan Penn, Ben Nemtin and Dave Lingwood to come up with The Buried Life concept. The group was on the Oprah Show today to share each others' experiences.


Matthew Arnold (1822-1888)


The Buried Life

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Light flows our war of mocking words, and yet,
Behold, with tears mine eyes are wet!
I feel a nameless sadness o'er me roll.
Yes, yes, we know that we can jest,
We know, we know that we can smile!
But there's a something in this breast,
To which thy light words bring no rest,
And thy gay smiles no anodyne.
Give me thy hand, and hush awhile,
And turn those limpid eyes on mine,
And let me read there, love! thy inmost soul.

Alas! is even love too weak
To unlock the heart, and let it speak?
Are even lovers powerless to reveal
To one another what indeed they feel?
I knew the mass of men conceal'd
Their thoughts, for fear that if reveal'd
They would by other men be met
With blank indifference, or with blame reproved;
I knew they lived and moved
Trick'd in disguises, alien to the rest
Of men, and alien to themselves--and yet
The same heart beats in every human breast!

But we, my love!--doth a like spell benumb
Our hearts, our voices?--must we too be dumb?

Ah! well for us, if even we,
Even for a moment, can get free
Our heart, and have our lips unchain'd;
For that which seals them hath been deep-ordain'd!

Fate, which foresaw
How frivolous a baby man would be--
By what distractions he would be possess'd,
How he would pour himself in every strife,
And well-nigh change his own identity--
That it might keep from his capricious play
His genuine self, and force him to obey
Even in his own despite his being's law,
Bade through the deep recesses of our breast
The unregarded river of our life
Pursue with indiscernible flow its way;
And that we should not see
The buried stream, and seem to be
Eddying at large in blind uncertainty,
Though driving on with it eternally.

But often, in the world's most crowded streets,
But often, in the din of strife,
There rises an unspeakable desire
After the knowledge of our buried life;
A thirst to spend our fire and restless force
In tracking out our true, original course;
A longing to inquire
Into the mystery of this heart which beats
So wild, so deep in us--to know
Whence our lives come and where they go.
And many a man in his own breast then delves,
But deep enough, alas! none ever mines.
And we have been on many thousand lines,
And we have shown, on each, spirit and power;
But hardly have we, for one little hour,
Been on our own line, have we been ourselves--
Hardly had skill to utter one of all
The nameless feelings that course through our breast,
But they course on for ever unexpress'd.
And long we try in vain to speak and act
Our hidden self, and what we say and do
Is eloquent, is well--but 't#is not true!
And then we will no more be rack'd
With inward striving, and demand
Of all the thousand nothings of the hour
Their stupefying power;
Ah yes, and they benumb us at our call!
Yet still, from time to time, vague and forlorn,
From the soul's subterranean depth upborne
As from an infinitely distant land,
Come airs, and floating echoes, and convey
A melancholy into all our day.
Only--but this is rare--
When a belov{'e}d hand is laid in ours,
When, jaded with the rush and glare
Of the interminable hours,
Our eyes can in another's eyes read clear,
When our world-deafen'd ear
Is by the tones of a loved voice caress'd--
A bolt is shot back somewhere in our breast,
And a lost pulse of feeling stirs again.
The eye sinks inward, and the heart lies plain,
And what we mean, we say, and what we would, we know.
A man becomes aware of his life's flow,
And hears its winding murmur; and he sees
The meadows where it glides, the sun, the breeze.

And there arrives a lull in the hot race
Wherein he doth for ever chase
That flying and elusive shadow, rest.
An air of coolness plays upon his face,
And an unwonted calm pervades his breast.
And then he thinks he knows
The hills where his life rose,
And the sea where it goes.