The web has no standards ...

... is that a good thing? :o)

BT or BE? Time to move on.

I've been thinking for a while now that I'm paying way over the odds for broadband.

I'm with BT, on their UBERSUPERMAX package, where I fork out £27 a month for a 6Mbps-ish connection (which I usually get about 2-3Mbps out of). I've been with them for several years now, and cant fault them on service ... but £27 is a lot of money! Also, you'd think that being a loyal customer (both for broadband and telephone) for so many years now I'd get some kind of discount ... but it turns out I'm actually paying more for my broadband than a new customer would on the same package.

So, I started to hunt around. I had a brief look at Orange, as I have a mobile phone with them. They were offering either free or cheap broadband, which all sounded promising until I disovered they were actually Wanadoo ... who were previously Freeserve. Yuck. NEXT!

Then I moved onto Sky. I have a Sky+ subscription, and no plans on cancelling, so their free broadband seemed promising. However, it turns out its not available in my area. They did, however, offer me a £17.99 alternative, which was not too bad ... but the important point they fail to mention is that you have to enter a 12 month contract not only for the broadband, but also for your Sky TV. Damn them!

So I carried on ... I looked at Tiscali (ha!), AOL (for a laugh), PlusNet (hmm) and some others ...

... and then I discovered BE*. Their services were enabled in my area only a week ago, and this is what they can offer me:

• £18/month
• Upto 24Mbps download speed
• 1.5Mbps upload speed
• No traffic shaping
• Unlimited bandwidth usage
• Static IP
• Free wireless router
• No contract
• Very good reviews
• Just been bought by O2 - also good reviews

Not bad. Most users are reporting about 15-16Mbps connections upto 2 km from the exchange. Since I'm only 0.5 km away, it should be pretty fast.

So I'm figuring - £18/month ... no contract ... its got to be worth a try.

I'll let you know ;o)

Betamax to HD-DVD Converter anyone?

52" Mac Mini :o)

I think I need a bigger screen.

We're all gonna' die!

It's official. The world is going to end ... in May.

Scientists in Hawaii are trying to stop the final work being completed on the Large Hadron Collider (a huge particle accelerator in Europe), believing that there's every chance we'll end up creating a black hole which will consume in entire Earth. OMG! Run for the hills!

Here's the full story:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,342854,00.html

I wonder if we're going to see any of those safety and preparation videos we saw during the cold war. "Black Hole - Complete annihilation of the entire planet - Are you prepared?"



I'd better start stock piling tinned spam and powdered milk.

It was nice knowing you all.

Hate Sky, Love Film

I've finally done it ...

Having put up with Sky's boring lineup of movies for over a year now, I've decided to ditch my movie subscription altogether, and subscribe to LoveFilm.com.

That way I get to pick the films that I actually WANT to watch, and I save £10 a month in the process :o)

Arthur C Clarke: 1917 - 2008

Goodbye Arthur. Thanks for all the stories.

Access Denied

Dear Registered iPhone Developer,

Thank you for expressing interest in the iPhone Developer Program. We have received your enrollment request. At this time, the iPhone Developer Program is only available in the US and will expand to other countries during the beta period. We will contact you again regarding your enrollment status at the appropriate time.

Thank you for applying.

Best regards,

iPhone Developer Program

Ah, alas. I guess I'm not going to be an iPhone software developer any time soon :o(

Touchy Feely

I’ve discovered something new.

(Actually, I discovered it before Christmas ... but I’ve been too busy playing with it to post here)

OK, some clarity is quickly required before you press the FLAG BLOG button! I’m talking about Apple’s iPod Touch. Ah, what a marvellous device.

I got one just before Christmas, and had the pleasure of using it during my three week holiday to Florida. At first I thought I was being a little indulgent getting on to replace my existing 4G ipod ... after all, it’s just an iPod isn’t it? It just does everything my 4G did – but with a glitzy interface ... right?

Well, it turns out I was wrong. I’ve found so many things I can do with the Touch that I never considered before I bought it. There’s all the obvious stuff, like listening to must and podcasts. I have to say that I was slightly disappointed in the way it handles some of the music and podcast UI ... but I quickly learnt that the Touch isn’t a “newer” 4G or 5G ipod. It’s something very different, and the UI – although very easy to use – takes some getting used to.

After being mesmerised by the touchscreen interface for a few weeks (trust me ... it’s not like any touchscreen device you’ve used before ... I found myself simply spinning through my track lists just because it looked nice!) ... I started to discover some of the other less obvious things that the Touch could offer:

Video. Because I’ve never had a video iPod (My old 4G only did photos), I was initially uninteresting in this feature. After all, who wants to watch a movie on a tiny screen? Well, it turns out that’s exactly what I wanted to do on the train the other week. I happily watched the first half of “The Third Man” on the train, and was so engrossed I had to find the nearest Costa to settle down to watch the rest! Since then I’ve explored so many other options including video podcasts, iTunes U (Lectures from MIT!), and actually paying for episodes of programmes from iTunes (crazy, I know!). I have to say I’m hooked. And the Touch’s ability to dim its backlight waaaay down means I can secretly watch those brain swelling MIT lectures while my wife snores away in bed next to me ;o)

Safari. Browsing the web on the Touch is amazing. Since the majority of my web access is to check a host of my favourite sites for news, I found the touch a perfect replacement for my PC. I can sit in my kitchen each morning over a nice hot mug of coffee, and within 2 minutes I’m up to speed. Compare this to clumsily carrying my breakfast and coffee down into my study; booting up my PC; logging in; loading IE ... blah blah blah. You get the picture. Throw in some of the iPhone-Webapps some sites offer (such as Facebook), and the whole internet experience changes.

Email. OK, I admit I initially jailbroke my Touch to get the iPhone applications working (but I’ve since paid the measly £12 to get the suite from Apple.) Since getting mail on my Touch, I’ve hardly used my PC. In fact, combined with Safari, my PC usage at home has more than halved – which is impressive for an ipod!

iTunes Music Store. This is another feature I immediately ignored. Why would I want to buy songs from the iTMS from my ipod? Surely its easier from my Mac or PC? Well ... turns out its just as easy from the iPod ... dangerously so. (For example, I was really getting into an album by Jonathan Coulton the other week. Curiously, I looked to see what other albums were on iTunes (from my iPod) ... 60 seconds later I’d bought his latest album, and had already started listening to it!) Its just a shame they don’t offer their audiobooks via the iPod.

Maps. The google maps app is so easy to use, and was a life saver in Florida. Want to know where the nearest Best Buy is? It’s all there. I can see the attraction that app has on the iPhone, where you always have an internet connection.

I know that’s not everything the Touch does, but its the features that I’ve been most blown away by. I can’t help but feel like its something off Star Trek every time I pick it up. It doesn’t seem right to have something that thin; that small offer so much (and run for so long without charging ... my record is over 25 hours over several days. Compare that to the Pocket PCs or Palm devices I’m currently using as door wedges ... I recall you’d be thankful if you got 2 hours continuous use out the PPC!

The other benefit of owning an iPod Touch is that everyone who sees it thinks you have an iPhone. That helps me feel a little richer. To be honest, I still don’t feel I want and iPhone. The Touch offers everything the iPhone does ... just without the phone ... or camera .... or Bluetooth. I miss the ability to take photos, but that’s about it.

So, there you have it. I’m impressed. However, it doesn’t stop there. Last week Apple released it’s SDK for the iPhone platform (iPod Touch included), with plans to release a major iPhone/iPod update in June. The update alone promises some exciting features (including the ability for me to connect my iPod to my works Exchange server to get my contacts, email and diary). But it will also open the door to 3rd party developers to create their own software. Already there are demos of console quality games, and productivity apps. The list will undoubtedly grow, and my nerdy dream of the Touch turning into a kick-ass PDA-type device will potentially come true.

My advice – buy one. Dont think about it. Just buy it. Now. Do it already.

:o)

Oh yeah ... I have a blog!

Hi everyone,

Sorry – I’ve completely forgotten I even had a blog. It’s been a while, and looking at the last few posts I’ve not been making that many posts!

I have to admit, I’ve been swayed towards Facebook, where the amount of effort you need to put in is a lot less ... however, I’ve felt the urge to talk about random stuff recently, and thats the primary purpose of my blog ... so some posts are to follow ...

:o)

Merry Christmas y'all

Just a quick update to wish everyone back home a Merry Christmas. :o)

BBC Bitesize want me ...

... well, actually, they want one of my photographs.

I know its a bit of a minor event when you consider the context, and how many photos they'll be using, but still ... it's nice to be asked ;o)

Here's a snippet from the email I got:

My name is Dave Percy and I am a Researcher at GCSE Bitesize at the BBC. GCSE Bitesize is a revision website used by 16 year olds revising for their GCSE examinations in the United Kingdom.

www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize

We are making a Flash picture slideshow to accompany poetry audio for students to revise GCSE English. We would very much like to include your picture, ‘Passing Clouds', which can be found here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/olitee/127211251/

to accompany the poem ‘Sonnet' by John Clare which can be found here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/english_literature/poetryclare/1clare_sonnetsubjectrev2.shtml

Your picture would accompany audio of the line:

'I love to see the summer beaming forth
And white wool sack clouds sailing to the north'

So there you go ... :o)

HD Here I Come!

Ah, at last ... a post where I can geek out:

I visited IBC this week in Amsterdam (Flickr Photos), and was blown away by the high-def goodies on show.

I got back thinking that it was finally time to take the plunge, and upgrade the edit suite to fully support HD.

We already have an AJA-IO for input and output from FCP, so the first logical choice was something from the same company that offered HD. AJA have recently announced the ioHD, which is an amazing little portable HD capture and playback device. It follows the same basic design as the IO, in that everything is handled via a single Firewire link (in this case, FW800).

Apart from being a little dissapointed it didn't offer uncompressed or 4:4:4 editing (the IO is only 4:2:2), I figure it was still the best option from AJA, given that the Kona 3 card was SDI only ...

... that is, until I found this:

Blackmagic Design's Multibridge Eclipse was finally confirmed to be shipping only a few days ago, and with the same pricetag as the AJA-ioHD, you get far more for your money.

Not only does the box offer full 4:4:4 editing, support for ProRes422, and 2K HD ... it also has a fantastic array of analogue and digital input/output options.

If you're thinking of buying the AJA-ioHD, check this product out first. You loose the portability of the IO, but you gain an incredibly low-latency system that offers all the connectivity of the IO, but with additional support for 2K, 4:4:4 and hardware support for the RT Extreme timeline in FCP.

I've ordered mine today, and they're scheduled to be in Europe in the next few weeks, so I'll let you know how I get on.

In the meantime, I think my existing AJA-IO must have seen me browsing the brochure, as it's decided to completely die on me. What incredible timing! I would say I'm lucky that I was ready to upgrade anyway, but with at least 4 weeks to wait for the Blackmagic box, I'm going to have to be technically creative with the upcoming film festivals. Eeek!

Anyway. I've geeked out, and I feel a little better for it. I'll have some more geeking to do tomorrow, as I'll be buying a nice 42" 1080-line HD LCD monitor to go with this setup. Oh, how I love my job!

Goodbye Old, Hello New

Yes, yes, yes ... I change the design of my blog more often than I change my socks, which explains why everyone has been avoiding me lately :o)

Hello again! It's been a long time, but as you can see from my last few posts - I've been a bit busy. Quite a bit has changed. I've moved house, got married ... ok, so that's about it - but it took up a lot of time!

In a lame attempt to rejuvinate my blog, I thought I'd upgrade it to one of the newer Blogger templates. Can anyone spot the difference? Hmm.

The other problem I've encountered is a feeling of guilt every time I've wanted to post some highly geeky comments about some new gadget (say ... an iPod Touch) alongside earlier postings about my wedding. It just didn't seem right ...

... but I've since got over all that rubbish, so lets get back to some geeky posting ;o)

Speak to you soon,

Oli.

I'm married!

First of all, sorry for not posting to this thing in ages. I've been a bit busy with the topic of this post!

Secondly, to any strange people who are still checking this site after so many months, I thought it was worth a post:

I'M MARRIED! We were Mr. T and Miss. T ... we are now Mr & Mrs T ... how very exciting! If you fancy having a nosey, just click on the image above to view the album.

Oh, and yes - I know my blog has restarted the wedding countdown clock. One day I'll get rid of it ;o)

Oli.

Home Sweet Home

Hello. I'm back. I just thought I'd post a quick snap from my new home. Very yellow isn't it?

We're all moved in now, with only a small number of boxes yet to unpack. Not bad going really!

If my move is news to you, don't worry - I'll be emailing you soon with the address and phone number.

Speak to y'all soon.

Almost there ...

I'm just about to go to bed for the very last time at Whitefield Cottage. Tomorrow is the final day of our move (sort of ... ).

One slight problem though: My broadband will take a week to get transferred to the new property, so you'll not hear or see anything from me in that time (hurrah! cries the internet :o).

I just wanted to say what a pleasure it's been blogging all this time from this room, at this desk, on top of this hill here. Soon I'll be blogging from another room, at most likley the same desk, and not the slightest sign of increased elevation relative to my neighbours.

Even my telephone number is changing ... so if you're used to contacting me on the old landline, from Tuesday morning there will be a new number. If you're supposed to call me on that number, you'll get the details soon. If you're not supposed to ring me - FOR GOD SAKE STOP CALLING! (That mainly applies to Kitchens Direct and all those people who are always 'calling on behalf' of some company - you know who you are!)

So then. There it is. Goodbye for a week. Keep the internet tidy whilst I'm away.

Oli.

Whitefield Cottage. 2007.

New Home

We've got the keys - it's all official!

The move starts tomorrow. Should I have started packing this up by now? :o)

Moving House!

Well, it's official. We're moving house!

Surprised? So are we. We started looking for possible new properties for 'after the wedding' ... but we found a place we loved so much that we simply had to go for it. I'm not going to tell you much about the new place ... that way it'll be a surprise!

So, not being allowed to upload photos of the new place, I'm afraid all I can offer is a photo of the current state of our living room!

So there you go. This may well be the only post for the month of April, as we're gonna be busy. I'll update you with anything interesting tho...

New Wedding Venue!

Don't worry, we're not moving the wedding ... but we are having the ceremony in a much fancier location. The hotel were concerned about the number of people we were trying to fit into here:



And admitted that it was their own fault for allowing us to book that venue ... so for no extra cost we're getting married in here:



It's about 10cm due north of the previous venue, but we'll make sure minibuses will be on hand for anyone who doesn't fancy the hike.

We've also booked the DJ, confirmed the itinerary for the day, discussed table decorations and top-table layout. All in all, not bad for 30 minutes work ;o)