Minimal

Ripping yarns

Matt and Phil have made a couple of excellent posts recently about the availability of music in digital form. In Matt’s post, he discusses the failings of BuyMusic.com — a new and fatally flawed music download store. In the other article, Phil laments the CD copy protection he recently encountered that stopped him listening to his music on an iPod. Both are well worth reading and raise issues where the consumer’s message is failing to get back to the record companies properly.

Of particular interest (to me, at least) was the revelation in Phil’s post that Amazon actually do tell you which of their CDs feature copy protection. Big kudos to them for doing this — other sites have wilted under pressure from the recording industry. Yet again, however, Amazon are putting the customer first. I might just have to switch my business back to them for this alone. The question is, how much extra am I willing to pay to get that message across and will I be alone in doing so?

Blunt

Reading Tony Hawks’ list of responses to skateboarding kids who think he’s Tony Hawk is great. I’ve not laughed at something on the web that much in a long time. :)

Thanks to Ash for the link.

TypePad

Good lord, I think I’ve just creamed me pants. Sorry about that, but I’ve just been looking at SixApart’s TypePad preview. How good is that? How much does it make me want switch from Blogger? I’m struggling to come up with reasons for using anything else in the future, although we’ll have to wait and see how much they charge for it. Still... looks good, doesn’t it?! :)

Panning Rama

I’ve just experienced some kind of revelation (nothing illegal, mind you). I think I know what it’s like for countless unfulfilled women when having sex with their partners. There you are, building up to what promises to be a fantastic crescendo, only for everything to come to an abrupt halt. You can forget your moment of joy, it’s all over. And how do I know this? I’ve just read Arthur C Clarke’s Rendezvous with Rama.

That book has to be the best definition yet of the term “anti-climax”. Last week, I nearly blogged about how much I was enjoying it and how I’d rediscovered the joys of science fiction, but now I’m just another textually frustrated reader. For all of the glowing reviews it received (including the 1974 Hugo and Nebula awards), it really has the least satisfactory ending to any book I’ve ever read.

Ok, yes, there is a series of books following this one, but each should surely stand alone. I get the sense from reading about the allegedly-inferior follow-ups that they were an after-thought. Perhaps Clarke later realised how poorly he’d concluded Rendezvous? Maybe he would’ve been better off making a kind of literary director’s cut — a book with an improved ending — rather than trying to compensate for the inadequacy of the original with unsatisfactory sequels?

Whatever, I’ll not be hurrying to get more of his work if that was some of his best. All this from the writer of 2001, as well. :(

Peopleware

When people blow it, they should be congratulated — that’s part of what they’re being paid for.

Hell, yeah! Peopleware has long been considered a classic book in software engineering circles. Having finally got hold of a copy (only laziness had stopped me before), I’m enjoying it already and I’m only on page 9. :)

If you’re interested, Joel Spolsky has more good book recommendations on his site.

GM FAQ

GM — the truth [Guardian]
At last, an article that addresses the real issues surrounding genetically modified food, answering them in a non-sensationalist way. Please read it.

Eating my words

That stuff I wrote about F1 being a bit boring a few weeks back... ermmm... just forget I ever said it, ok? Phil’s description of the British GP as being like karting was spot on. What a race. :)

WTF?!?!

Body ‘matches’ Iraq expert [BBC News]

“If it is (Dr Kelly), it is just awful. What can you say? Nothing,” he said.

“There must be more to this than we had thought. I do not know what that means, I just think there is.”

What the hell is going on here? I’m completely at a loss for words. Searches for the truth aren’t meant to lead to this. :(

Simple, clean, elegant, usable

I don’t know what it is with me and black/white/red colour schemes, but 37signals’ and Coudal Partners’ latest training venture, bloggingworks.com, really hits the spot. It’s as good a homepage as I’ve seen in a long time, although somewhat ironically, it’s not that easy to spot the weblog at first. But then maybe that was their point — they can be integrated very neatly into traditional designs.

Strokes of genius

Have you ever listened to The Strokes? I over-indulged on them last year and was afraid I’d ruined my chances of liking them long-term. (I can barely pick up Mansun’s Attack of the Grey Lantern these days, simply because I listened to it ad nauseum during a Carmageddon addiction.) Coming back to Is This It today, however, I’ve been pleasantly surprised to find that they’re still really quite splendid, despite my earlier binge-listening. Bravo! :)

I am Jack’s deep sense of inevitability

I christened my new IKEA frying pan last night. I called him Keith. I can see myself heading back to that shrine of cheap design in the future. For the moment, though, I think I’m resisting quite well. I’m certainly nowhere near the “What kind of plates define me as a person?” depth of immersion portrayed in Fight Club. And hallelujah to that. But you just know it’s coming...

Aaaaaand... relax!

Oh yeah baby, this rocks! :) Why didn’t I put shorts on earlier? For weeks, I’ve been suffering in a stuffy office, sweating away in my jeans, but not any more. Today, my unattractively hairy and milkbottle-esque pins are on show and I’m soooo comfortable. Life is sweet. :)

Leftie lunchtime reading

Is organic food always better for you? [Guardian]
Yet another newspaper piece misses the point, at least as far I see it. I thought organic was all about the environment, not the supposed nutritional benefits?

Boost for offshore wind power. [BBC News]
Hurrah! On a related topic, I was amused recently to see Blyth’s wind farm listed as an attraction on BBC Tyne’s beach guide. I seem to recall local residents moaning that it would be an eyesore when it was first proposed. :)

MozWiki

Kev’s recent post on the Tatu version of How Soon Is Now? has plunged me back into listening to Morrissey and The Smiths. Since then, I’ve stumbled across what could be my favourite application of a wiki to date: MozWiki. Although I’ve yet to spend any great time trawling it, I just love the fact someone has done this. After all, there’s so much to talk about. Great stuff.

Huff

Right, that's it, I've had enough of this website malarkey. I've also had enough of replacing every goddamned apostrophe in my posts with ’. But I've had enough with web back-ends more. Much more.

I just can't spare the time for this rubbish any more. Scraping by with non-validating HTML and the occasional bit of hosting/domain help from Ash was fun, but the honeymoon's over. I'm outta here. See you next month... or maybe tomorrow, should I regain my composure. ;)

Shut up, I’m driving!

You might think from that title I’m about to lampoon some research that says it’s dangerous to talk while you drive. Far from it. When the ban on mobiles was first proposed, it made me stop and think about how distracting any kind of conversation can be. It’s only denial and double-standards that stop us (well, me) accepting such a restriction.

The truth of the matter is there are loads of things that can distract you. Did I pay that gas bill? How am I going to sort out that fool at work? Where might I have left my jacket this time? Be honest, how many times have you switched off for a mile or more, only to be woken from your mental slumber when something looms large ahead? Short of electrodes on the genitals, there’s not a lot you can do about it. Hmmmm... now there’s a thought... ;)

Caked

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a pan more caked in crap than the frying pan I attempted to clean last night. I spent 2½ hours scraping and scouring this damn thing. I even resorted to a serious kitchen knife to shave away layer upon layer of grime from the sides and base. The noise of that alone was hellish. My neighbours must love me.

And still I reckon I’m only 42.971% done (roughly speaking). Indeed, the worst part is yet to come — the inside of the pan. At least I was able to get the knife onto the outside. The inside’s going to be a whole other kind of purgatory. This flat I’m renting might be fully-furnished, but it’s fully furnished with clag.

But hey, at least it was more exciting than Big Brother.

Who’s your hosting provider?

I’m getting a bit cheesed off with various things about my current hosting. First, it’s the inaccessible web-mail interface, then it’s the disappearing site stats, and now it’s basic stuff like CDONTS.NewMail just not doing anything. And I rarely get a response to my support emails.

So, who’s your provider, what technologies do they offer (ASP?), and are they any good? I would like to offer you a comments form for responses, but it’s not working. Any recommendations via the contact link above would be appreciated. Cheers.

Update: As if to seal their fate, my hosting providers have just responded to my latest email with complete setup details for f-productions.net, passwords, the lot. Some poor muppet’s going to be left floundering, wondering where their details have got to. I bloody well hope my details aren’t being distributed like this. Sigh.

City life

The ups and downs of living in the centre of Newcastle:

• Up: Getting out of bed at 9:25am and making it into work on time easily
• Down: I’ve not driven the car for over 3 days now and I’m GeTTing KinDa JumPy!!
• Up: Walking home at lunchtime, picking up a pasty or two and a fudge doughnut from Greggs, having the shave I missed in the morning and then walking back to work.
• Down: Ermmm... dunno. :)

Verdict: there are definitely more ups than downs at the moment, although I do feel a thoroughly unwarranted drive out to Tesco coming on... :)

Bowyer

It’s official — Lee Bowyer’s now a Newcastle player. :(

Needless to say, there will be plenty of fans seriously disappointed about this and I’ll count myself among them. I’m not sure how I’ll react the first time he emerges from the tunnel at St James’s, but it won’t be with a hearty cheer. All I can think right now is “Good luck to Bobby Robson!” I can’t think of a harder task than turning that thug into a respectable man.