Newly hired defensive coordinator Collins discusses team

By: Jonathan Ramos / Sports Director Geoff Collins was announced as the Golden Panthers next defensive coordinator earlier this week, replacing Phil Galiano after a season in which FIU was ranked 119th in the Football Bowl Subdivision. Collins joins the FIU staff after serving as Central Florida’s linebackers coach last season, but previously worked under Nick Saban at Alabama, in addition to a stop at Western Carolina as a defensive coordinator. Collins was a big part of UCF’s nationally fourth ranked run defense in 2009, and will look to have a similar effect on FIU’s defense. #Why did you decide to come to FIU?# Geoff Collins: I have been aware of the program since coach…

New tracks from Usher show his ‘Freak’ side

By: Ryan Morejon/ Columnist A couple of days ago, a track from Usher’s upcoming record, Raymond vs. Raymond, was leaked on the Internet. The album already has two singles, “Papers” and “Hey Daddy.” “Papers” is about his recent divorce, which is a pretty serious, exhausting ordeal, but the song submits to silly keyboard strokes that are annoying and makes Usher sound like he’s doing R&B circa 10 years ago. “Hey Daddy” is absolutely promising at first, until Plies opens his mouth and gives this song some real crappy Becky. Seriously, Plies, stop making music and keep updating your Twitter. But Raymond vs. Raymond has somewhat of an epic ring to it, though. From the title,…

Band’s newest album reflects its individuality

By: Chris Towers/ Staff Writer There has always seemingly been a premium in music placed on authenticity. Kurt Cobain talked about how depressed he was – and joked about killing himself – so the only possible way to secure himself a place in the annals of musical history was to put a shotgun shell through his skull. Tupac often talked about the merits of “thug life” and was gunned down the same way a common drug dealer might be. It made him a tragic figure, but it also lent legitimacy to his career. In most cases, artists can only be helped by being true to themselves, no matter how stupid their true self might be….

3-D is not the wave of the future

By: Jorge Valens/ Columnist I hate 3-D content. There, I said it. The Consumer Electronics Show, a yearly expo which tends to dictate the tech trends for the year, was dominated by 3-D television sets by Sony, Samsung and Vizio, to name a few. Sadly, that can only mean that 2010 will be the year of 3-D technology – God help us all. Capitalizing on the success of James Cameron’s 3-D epic, *Avatar*, television makers are very quick to make 3-D a staple in the living room, but I don’t think we’re ready for that yet. 3-D technology has had its successes and failures. In the late 90s, the technology was rolled out to many…

Lip Dub video promotes Panther pride

By: Adrian Espinoza/ Contributing Writer FIU’s latest school-spirited event, a “lip dub” video sponsored by the Office of Global Learning’s Quality Enhancement Plan, Global Learning for Global Citizenship, will focus on spreading Panther pride on campus and around the world. A lip dub is a video filmed with a song that merges lip-syncing and audio dubbing. Participants are filmed lip-syncing to a song, which is then dubbed with the original track in post-editing. The idea of producing a lip dub music video has been used by other universities to promote school spirit, and many Panthers are excited to join in. “We watched a few lip dub videos on the Web from other schools and thought…

Life after Batman: mediocre at best

By: Pablo Penton/ Staff Writer Out of all the events that occurred in DC’s Final Crisis, one of the most devastating outcomes was the death of Bruce Wayne. Gotham City has been left without its Dark Knight, and the ailing Justice League of America is missing yet another important hero. As we mentioned last week, it’s hard to keep caring about the death of comic book heroes when it’s obvious they’re just going to keep coming back. Still, one of the more interesting things to look at when a major hero dies is the immediate circle of friends and apprentices that he leaves behind. With Bruce Wayne gone, Dick Grayson, formerly Nightwing, has put on…