Archives for December 2003

Christmas! My old enemy! We meet at last... (December 20, 2003) Imagine me, if you will, in a smoking jacket. Imagine a thin moody moustache is slithering across my upper lip rather than the manly unkemptness that I call my beard. Imagine that I'm sitting in a 60s pod-chair - almost...

A world of iTunes tips... (December 19, 2003) So an upgraded version of iTunes appeared on my Software Update this evening. For the most part - if you're not from AOL and looking to buy music - there aren't very many changes that I can notice (except hopefully...

Is physical presence necessary for community? (December 19, 2003) A few months ago I responded to a site that claimed The Internet is Shit with a reposte designed to illustrate that although our networks might contain difficult and unpleasant material, they also contain enough of value and facilitate enough...

Guardian Award Winners... (December 18, 2003) So the Guardian's Weblog Awards have been announced, and although I'm surprised by a good few of the sites who made it onto their lists, generally the standard's pretty good. Some recommended sites from the published list: Beyond Northern Iraq...

A fragment of a world full of metadata... (December 16, 2003) Metadata, then, is data about data. Jason has posted a piece about metadata called Metadazzle Overfizzle, the vast amounts of metadata that seems to be appearing for every piece of actual content we're producing on computers and how much this...

In which one particular floodgate bursts... (December 15, 2003) So I've discovered a few exciting things today. Some of my glaring shameful ignorances have finally been smeared full (to bursting) with that most horrible unctious goo that is 'unpalatable truth'. For example, I discovered today (thanks to a conversation...

Saddam Hussein has been captured... (December 14, 2003) Tony Blair has confirmed this morning that Saddam Hussein has been dug out from a cellar in Iraq and is now in custody. Apparently DNA testing has now confirmed that it is not one of his doubles. It's a shame,...

iPod local syncing... (December 12, 2003) So imagine that you're coming home from work with your iPod and you're listening to a song. Let's say that you're listening to Don't be Light by Air, because it's an extremely good song. Now let's imagine that your iPod...

On the decline of anti-gay sentiment in the UK... (December 12, 2003) The Guardian has an article today about the increasing acceptance of homosexuality in society that is worth a read: Without Prejudice. It's generally a pretty well worked-through piece, even if it has a tendency to represent things in perhaps too...

"The Bookman's London" reviews Foyles on Charing Cross Road... (December 11, 2003) I'm sitting in Foyles' café on the second floor of the massive and esteemed London book store and I'm having one of the most pleasant moments of my life. The café has a nice murmur of activity meandering around me....

Dance, familiar. Dance... (December 11, 2003) An interesting line about the selves manufactured by spies (that seems to me to have currency for all people who have cause to narrativise their lives in one way or another) from John Le Carré's rather blandly-titled (but also rather...

The Million Pound Property Queens... (December 10, 2003) So there's this TV show called The Million Pound Property Experiment. It's presented by these two charming young men called Colin and Justin. Evidence suggests that the two young men in question come from a dimension that - let's just...

A Collection of Conundrums... (December 9, 2003) How to talk about thoughts about work (in public) that I need to articulate and work through a bit without said thoughts taking on a political dimension - feeling like part of some attempt to game social reality. How to...

How many weblogs are there in the UK? (December 9, 2003) Right. For a whole range of reasons, I'm getting increasingly interested in finding out how many weblogs there are in the UK. If we could demonstrate that a large number of UK-based webloggers exist, then it could have a whole...

A lovely article on Gaydar... (December 8, 2003) There is a quite charming article on the Independent's site today - Confessions of a Gaydar junkie - which is about one of the world's most successful (and mostly unsung) pieces of social software: Gaydar. Like most truly dedicated social...

David Shrigley on the Tube... (December 7, 2003) After watching a particularly interesting episode of The Art Show, I now plan to go and visit the work of David Shrigley currently being displayed on the London Underground. Here's a detail from one of the displayed works:...

On the Geography of the Bloggies... (December 7, 2003) Soon it will be time for the annual Bloggies - the weblog equivalent of the Oscars (voted for by the community that makes them, heavily slanted towards blockbuster-sites that get bums on seats, vaguely ridiculous and highly entertaining). The best...

On the genesis of two ways of seeing the world... (December 7, 2003) So I'm sitting in the BBC canteen in Broadcasting House with one Matthew Webb, who is (I fear) the husband part of our particular TV husband-and-wife Research and Development team. I say that because he sits really quietly and reads...

On the subject of cheese... (December 6, 2003) This may sound like a bit of an advert, but frankly I don't care. You have to be able to express joy in the things you like - I think - whether they be commercial or not. Only let me...

Why has the cheese returned? (December 6, 2003) A weekend without my beautiful Powerbook means lots of time to sort out my disasterous financial / bill-paying / mounds of paper situation. This - in turn - means that some forms of music television have become an essential part...

Farewell, my lovely... (December 5, 2003) And so with a deep sigh I have consigned my beautiful Powerbook (which has been with me a such a very little time) back to the welcoming arms of Mother Apple. My child needs to be fixed. The strange mottling...