Wangtang Clan

I can't connect to Facebook or Twitter out here in Beijing. On the plus side, I'm planning on seeing the real Great Wall sometime this trip. :)

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Getting my home office in shape for a productive '09. Consolidated my stacks of business cards I've gotten from various trips and conferences over the past 3 years. Even with my CardScan I'm not sure what to do... Insanity.

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Here's the offending code for Zune bug that's been causing the mysterious hangs. Can you find it without looking at the solution?

//------------------------------------------------------------------------------
//
// Function: ConvertDays
//
// Local helper function that split total days since Jan 1, ORIGINYEAR into
// year, month and day
//
// Parameters:
//
// Returns:
//      Returns TRUE if successful, otherwise returns FALSE.
//
//------------------------------------------------------------------------------
BOOL ConvertDays(UINT32 days, SYSTEMTIME* lpTime)
{
    int dayofweek, month, year;
    UINT8 *month_tab;

    //Calculate current day of the week
    dayofweek = GetDayOfWeek(days);

    year = ORIGINYEAR;

    while (days > 365)
    {
        if (IsLeapYear(year))
        {
            if (days > 366)
            {
                days -= 366;
                year += 1;
            }
        }
        else
        {
            days -= 365;
            year += 1;
        }
    }


    // Determine whether it is a leap year
    month_tab = (UINT8 *)((IsLeapYear(year))? monthtable_leap : monthtable);

    for (month=0; month< 12; month++)
    {
        if (days < = month_tab[month])
            break;
        days -= month_tab[month];
    }

    month += 1;

    lpTime- >wDay = days;
    lpTime- >wDayOfWeek = dayofweek;
    lpTime- >wMonth = month;
    lpTime- >wYear = year;

    return TRUE;
}

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Could this be him?

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So, I was catching up with some friends' blogs, and my buddy Sean recounts the time we almost died in Shanghai, much more eloquently than I could have. It's even a cliffhanger in two parts!

Part 1 and Part 2 

Until she skidded into an intersection like she was performing the stunt routine for a Goodyear Aqua-tread commercial and Froggered us halfway through ten lanes of terrifying cross traffic. That we are, ass-a-kilter pointed at a forty five degree angle inside of the far-easts largest intersection. And traffic is just racing by. Well, that is until one car wasn't as agile as the others in swimming right around us. And slammed on his own breaks and fucking hit us.

So what does she do? "Oh no, I've been in a car accident, I hope my patrons and the other vehicle are all right!" That's what a sane person would think. She fucking  giggles. Yep, a shrill little giggle and then she slowly drags our car out of the intersection like some sort of retarded four-wheeled sloth. And away we went.

So that's how we almost died."

BTW, Sean screamed like a girl... actually, so did I.

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Now I think that maybe he's an evil mastermind genius.

Item 2.04 Triggering Events That Accelerate or Increase a Direct Financial Obligation or an Obligation under an Off-Balance Sheet Arrangement.

The change in control transaction described below in Item 5.01 of this Current Report on Form 8-K and incorporated herein by reference (the "Transaction"), has certain consequences with respect to the Registrant's 6.0% Convertible Senior Notes due 2025 (the "6.0% Notes") and 7.125% Convertible Senior Notes due 2026 (the "7.125% Notes," and together, the "Notes"). Specifically, the Transaction constitutes a Fundamental Change for purposes of Section 3.09 of each of the Indenture, dated as of September 19, 2005, between the Registrant and Wells Fargo Bank, National Association (the "Trustee"), relating to the 6.0% Notes, and the Indenture, dated as of May 30, 2006, between the Registrant and Wells Fargo Bank, National Association, relating to the 7.125% Notes (together, the "Indentures"). Pursuant to Section 3.09 of the Indentures, upon the occurrence of a Fundamental Change, the Registrant is required, within 20 days of the occurrence of the Fundamental Change, to send to each holder of the Notes a notice (the "Fundamental Change Repurchase Notice") regarding the occurrence of the Fundamental Change. The Registrant will be required to specify in the Fundamental Change Repurchase Notice a date (the "Fundamental Change Repurchase Date"), not later than 30 days from the delivery of the Fundamental Change Repurchase Notice, on which holders of the Notes will have the option to require the Registrant to repurchase their Notes at a price, payable in cash, equal to 100% of the principal amount of the Notes plus accrued and unpaid interest. Based on current market conditions, the Registrant expects that all holders of the Notes will elect to require the Registrant to repurchase their Notes in accordance with the procedures outlined above. The Registrant has already received a notice from an investor in each of the 6.0% Notes and 7.125% Notes.

If all of the holders of the Notes exercise their repurchase right under the Indentures, the Registrant would be required to purchase the Notes at a repurchase price of 100% of the principal amount of the Notes, which would equal $150 million. If this were to occur, the Registrant does not believe, on the basis of its current liquidity, that it would have the ability to satisfy its obligation with respect to the repurchase of the Notes. A failure to satisfy its obligations with respect to the repurchase of any of the Notes on a Fundamental Change Repurchase Date would constitute an Event of Default under the Indentures, which would permit the Trustee under each Indenture or the holders of 25% of each series of the Notes to declare all of the Notes of that series immediately due and payable.

A failure of the Registrant to satisfy its obligation to repurchase Notes on a Fundamental Change Repurchase Date would also have consequences under (i) the Loan and Security Agreement, dated as of February 29, 2008, between the Registrant and certain of its affiliates, as borrowers and National Amusements, Inc. ("NAI"), as lender (the "Loan and Security Agreement"), (ii) the Unsecured Loan Agreement, dated as of February 29, 2008, between the Registrant, as borrower and NAI as lender (the "Unsecured Loan Agreement") and (iii) the Unsecured Subordinated Loan Agreement, dated as of February 29, 2008, between the Registrant, as borrower and NAI as lender ((i),(ii) and (iii), collectively the "NAI Agreements"). Specifically, NAI would have the ability in such a circumstance, under the terms of the NAI Agreements, to declare all amounts outstanding under the NAI Agreements immediately due and payable. There is currently approximately $90,000,000 principal amount outstanding under the NAI Agreements. If these amounts were declared immediately due and payable, the Registrant does not believe, on the basis of its current liquidity, that it would have the ability to satisfy its obligations to repay these amounts.

Item 5.01 Changes in Control of Registrant.

The information disclosed in this Item 5.01 is based entirely on information contained in a Schedule 13D/A, dated December 1, 2008, filed with the SEC by Mr. Sumner Redstone, NAI and Sumco, Inc. and the exhibits thereto.

On November 28, 2008, each of Mr. Sumner M. Redstone, NAI and Sumco, Inc. (collectively, the "Sellers") entered into a Stock Purchase Agreement (the "Stock Purchase Agreement") with Acquisition Holdings Subsidiary I LLC (the "Purchaser"), pursuant to which the Sellers sold to the Purchaser, and the Purchaser purchased from the Sellers, all of the shares of common stock, $0.01 par value (the "Common Shares") of the Registrant beneficially owned by the Sellers immediately prior to such sale, representing, collectively, approximately 87.2% of the total issued and outstanding Common Shares of the Registrant. Concurrently with the execution of the Stock Purchase Agreement, NAI and the Purchaser entered into a Participation Agreement (the "Participation Agreement"), pursuant to which NAI granted to the Purchaser, and the Purchaser acquired from NAI, (i) an undivided interest and participation in certain of the loans and advances made by NAI, whether before or after the date of the Participation Agreement,pursuant to the Loan and Security Agreement and the Unsecured Loan Agreement and (ii) all of NAI's right, title and interest in, to and under the Loan and Security Agreement and the Unsecured Loan Agreement including guarantees, collateral, pledges, distributions, claims and causes of actions against the borrowers thereunder, all on the terms and conditions set forth in the Participation Agreement. The consideration paid by the Purchaser for the interests acquired under the Stock Purchase Agreement and the Participation Agreement was $100,000. The Registrant does not have knowledge as to the Purchaser's source of these funds. MT Acquisition Holdings LLC is the sole member of the Purchaser. The President of MT Acquisition Holdings LLC is Mark Thomas.

---

Summary

Mark Thomas buys shares in MWY for $100k.

Today's MWY chart:

MWY  - Midway Games Inc. (NYSE)

Google Finance   Yahoo Finance   MSN Money   AOL Finance   CNN Money   Reuters  

0.28 -0.02 (-6.67%)  Dec 4 4:03pm ET
Open:  0.34 High:  0.34 Low:  0.22		Volume:  409,164 Avg Vol:  152,000 Mkt Cap:  25.80M
Disclaimer

After Hours: 0.25 -0.03 (-10.71%)  Dec 4 4:07pm ET

As of right now, with a market cap of 25.80M, 87.2% is worth $21.34 MILLION ...

He is also now owed $70 Million in loans by Midway ...

This triggers an EVENT which sets in motion the following:

1) Midway now has 30 days to buy back $150M in Notes, money which it does not have right now.

2) If it doesn't, these Notes become immediately due and payable. (Not sure exactly what that means... and if that means it's more than $150M... ?? )

2) This further triggers an event that allows NAI to collect on $90M in debt, immediately due and payable. Of this $90M in debt, Mark Thomas controls $70M of this.

This seems to give Mark Thomas quite a bit of leverage, and puts quite a bit of pressure on Midway now, but I'm not quite sure how it all works out... Definitely seems like evil genius material though.

January will be an interesting month, eh?

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Over 350 people killed since September in Tijuana, including decapitations. Mostly drug cartel related, but it is oddly not covered much in the news - I guess it's not as psychopathically sensational as the crazy Mumbai terrorism.
 
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-fg-tijuana2-2008dec02,0,6016852.story

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