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David Simon
2008-03-25 15:41:00
The Wire has been praised ad nauseum over the interweb so I'll simply say, I can't find a single fault with the program. The creator of The Wire, David Simon gives a talk about 'the end of the American empire.' Why hasn't he been invited to talk at TED?

Google results envy
2008-03-25 15:20:00
When I first started this blog I was way back on page nine and now only a small child, an associate tutor and a very talented comic book artist stand in my way. This is how Machiavelli must have felt.From what I understand of Google Organic the small child is ranked higher due to the amount of times his name appears across the site, that or he?s got a massive family all linking to him like the Borg collective. The associate tutor must have many an enamored student linking to his profile. The comic book artist invariably has a small army of fan boys linking, discussing and gushing over his works.Why even bother to disclose this information? I dunno, I didn?t care until I was so bored over the egg?s weekend that I Google smacked my name. Now the top is so close I can type it. The first two seem beatable. As for the comic artist you?ve got a digital David and Goliath thing going on. I?ve changed the title of this blog in an effort to make some in roads. We shall see if Google is a kind...
More About: Results , Envy

Monolith
2008-03-19 13:24:00
My TV sits in the corner like that annoying person at parties, the one you try and avoid for fear of being trapped in a boring vortex. Poor TV, no longer are you the gateway to entertainment, learning and zoning out, well maybe the last one still holds true.I can only think of three instances when I watch TV programs/the screen on the actual TV set:1) Current TV ? Although the quality of content on Current far surpasses that of say YouTube or the others, like Youtube et all I can?t watch it for hours on end via my laptop. I don?t know why. Maybe the screen isn?t big enough. Or maybe it?s the sentimental part of me that desperately wants something my long-standing friend TV and I can enjoy together.2) Hung-over: When hung-over I?ve been known to watch appalling dross like, America?s Next Top Model, The Girls of the Playboy Mansion, Vanity Lair and many more programmes that if you watched in full sobriety you?d think humanity had actually taken an evolutionary step backwards.3) Games!...

Comparison radar 04
2008-03-18 20:00:00
There was one vital bit that links this comparison that I couldn?t get a hold of. The connection was a clip from an episode of Dexter?s Laboratory entitled Ultrajerk 2000. Dexter builds a Hal 9000 style robot to help him but the robot, like its inspiration, malfunctions and attempts to take over the lab and kill Dexter. The connection between Hal 9000 and GLaDOS (from Portal) was in that episode of Dexter. Ultrajerk is a visual half waypoint between Hal and GLaDOS but you?ll have to take my word for it.Hal 9000GLaDOS
More About: Comparison , Radar

Digital protesting vs physical protesting
2008-03-17 17:49:00
It?s the fifth anniversary since the start of the Iraq war, or at least it will be on Thursday. No doubt you will have caught one program in the plethora of Iraq, ?where are we now, that?s right, just showing you this so you can keep tabs,? season.I went on a, what should have been called ?Leave the Middle East alone, they all cool? rally but was in fact called, the less catchy, 'Troops out of Afghanistan, Iraq, don?t attack Iran and stop the oppression of the Palestinian people? rally. Phew. I think my name is better. Anyway, it was a miserable day, raining and freezing but there was still a pretty good turn out.Speeches were made, some better than others. I took particular offence at a speech given by ?the girl that organized all dem walk outs at schools before the invasion and ting.? She sounded as if she?d just been pushed out on stage rambling on about, ?nukes were bad and so was America, yeah, that?s right, cos, eeer, um, they?ve got like a military industrial complex init.?T...
More About: Physical , Digital

Comparison radar 03
2008-03-14 17:38:00
What's this? The Tabula Rasa launch trailer and that ingenious, news-reel style footage from Starship Troopers bare more than a passing resemblance?
More About: Comparison , Radar

Comparison radar 02
2008-03-14 16:05:00
Watching the second trailer for the Iron Man film you could be mistaken, if you were of proper geek breeding, that you were in fact watching the teaser trailer for Starcraft 2. The former will of course be utter Red Leicester but if anyone can convincingly portray an arrogant, alcoholic on the big screen, I trust in Robert Downey Jr:
More About: Comparison , Radar

Digital Bushcraft
2008-03-13 12:35:00
It?s got to the point now where I can predict, with quite some accuracy, plot developments, which adverts signify a return to ?normal? programming and lines of script from any given TV show(s). I attribute this freakish and frankly useless power to being raised by television. When I was younger the Internet wasn?t the shiny, interactive, social cohesion platform it is today. It was more like web 0.5 than web 2.0.The biggest technical advancement in my home was the advent of cable television provided by the now long debunked Cable London (who?s logo incidentally was a kind of Pac man made out of dots). Anyway, I remember the first day well. No longer would I have to succumb to the schedules of the tyrannical, terrestrial channels. I could watch cartoons well beyond the 4.30 ? 5 cut off point.Stranger still, my dad tells me that I passed a test on Shakespeare with flying colours despite never having read any of his plays all thanks to the brain melting box. I suppose it follows that i...
More About: Digital

Toiletron, guardian of the loo
2008-03-11 15:07:00
Recycling today as this story has already featured on Digg. Using Aviary, the toilets below have been combined to create a potent, porcelain, powerhouse. Whether Aviary is as powerful as the Spark is anyone's guess:
More About: Guardian

If you Stumble, you might Tumblr
2008-03-10 18:12:00
I?m finding I like Tumblr more and more. It?s like giving someone the ability to unscrew my bulbous scalp and stare directly at the pulsating, grey goo encased within. Through the useful ?share on Tumblr? button, everything I come across is posted directly on to my personal Tumblr page.How?s this different from submitting stuff to your Facebook account you say? Or maybe you don?t but lets go with it anyway. Whereas submitting stuff to Facebook is somewhat lame due to the space it takes up in your mini feed, Tumblr allows you to connect several RSS feeds directly, turning a Tumblr page into a sort of, cyber, stream of consciousness. I get all my Twitter, del.icio.us, Flickr etc updates put on there, plus, any interesting stuff I find randomly through Stumble Upon.My Tumblr page is comprised of a nonsensical collection of random oddities. A bit like my mind, no, very much like my mind. Where Twitter allows you to post thoughts and actions this allows images, videos and links to be post...

Stumble spotting
2008-03-10 14:07:00
I was using some else?s Stumble Upon account for a good few hours the other day. After sticking at this for a while, sites that I know I?d submitted into the err, stumble sphere started popping up. I?d gone full circle.There does seem to be an intrinsic flaw with StumbleUpon: My significant udder initially ticked ?arts? as her only topical preference. After an hour or so of stumbling she had run out of new pages. This says to me a) I?m a sado b) StumbleUpon needs users to be constantly adding new sites, and c) StumbleUpon truly is worse than crack.

A brief history and future of the interweb
2008-03-07 17:09:00
The voice over in the Epic video is ultra cheese but more worryingly, the tone sounds very similar to the Zion mainframe...the robots are coming.EPIC 2015Zion
More About: History , Future

Double Agent at the ICA
2008-03-07 13:41:00
Oh noes, its time for another I?m not dead art review, if you?re a connoisseur prepare to inflate your philistine poison sacks. Of the five-ish years I?ve been indoctrinated into the art world, via my significant udder, the ICA has almost uniformly proffered up wank. I?ve never been one to complain, it is, after all, only two pounds to get in. So, given my history and prejudice towards the place, I thought Double Agent was going to be equally lame. But lo, it was actually surprisingly thought provoking, imaginative and enjoyable.Take Dora Garcia?s ?Instant Narrative? well, I say Garcia?s but she wasn?t actually there, she hired writers in her stead (sneaky). You walk into a large white room. It?s completely enclosed apart from the doorway you came through and what looks like a slim exit on the far side. A projection of prose immediately grabs your jaded attention. New text is constantly added as you start to read, so far so arty but then in a Truman Show/Stranger than Fiction epiph...

Making the transition to full digitlism
2008-03-05 13:10:00
Do you want to save paper by not reading magazines or newspapers, don?t want smug idiots from a by gone authority like the NME telling you what to listen to, had enough of barely, brain celled DJs, blathering on radio, wish to squash inflated TV personalities? Embrace the digital alternative:Music ? Last.fm, Pandora (to a lesser extent Myspace)News ? BBC news site/widget, Guardian news site/widget, New Statesmen/widget, Current TV etcT.V/Films ? quicksilverscreen, surfthechannel, videolemon, alluc, BBC iPlayer, 4OD, torrents etcThis is just the tip of the digital iceberg. Lets ban smugness now.
More About: Full , Transition

I miss point and click adventure games
2008-03-04 16:22:00
Deep and complex stories driven by genius dialogue, investigatory/ problem solving game play, fantastic sprite based art and some genuinely catchy midi soundtracks made point and click adventure games a completely different experience from what many would play today (except maybe on the DS).Considering I learnt to read playing these gems, that alone should be enough to silence any nay-sayers who think children should be reading, ?and Jill sat on a red mat while she wore a blue hat.? It's counter productive, believe me. Saying that, my speech patterns may have differed from the other children, slightly. Some firm favourites:Monkey Island 2Indiana Jones And The Fate Of AtlantisDark SeedGrim fandango
More About: Games , Adventure , Click , Miss , Point

Chained to Boho
2008-03-04 15:34:00
There is a pub in Sohoboho called the Pillars of Hercules. It?s very narrow bordering on the claustrophobic but this is forgiven when compared to its opposite number on Charring Cross road, The Montagu Pyke, a concentration of chain bar aesthetic mixed with cynical marketing ploys.Anyway, The Pillars of Hercules, apart from the name, has next to nothing to do with Greek Mythology, that is to say there?s not even any faux statues or terrible epic paintings decorating the nicotine stained insides.Something that has everything to do with Greek Mythology albeit in a round about sort of way, is the excellent God of War series. The latest has been released on the PSP. Enjoy the review:
More About: Chained

Super Mario Source Engine
2008-03-03 16:09:00
I like finality, some people don't. This is what can spring out of fanboyism, creativity and homage:
More About: Super , Source , Mario , Engine , Super Mario

Google Page Rank 4 achieved
2008-02-29 19:10:00
Wow, I'd like to thank the interweb, the is alivites and a supreme being too. We've come a long way since the last state of the Benunion. I'm off to Hoxditch to celebrate. Hoot.
More About: Google , Page Rank , Page , Rank

Streamlining web presence
2008-02-29 19:01:00
Entering a sweltering hall at seventeen there?s no way I would have made a connection between a University/Careers Prospectus Fair and the current state of my web presence. As I walked through the hall, teaming with confused minds belonging to both students and sellers, physical and metaphorical arms tried to reach out to me. ?Come and join the army, we?ll pay for everything, except your life. Sign up to Nottingham, our prospectus was designed by an artist.?The same thing has happened to my online life. I must belong to a least a dozen social networks, forums, rss feeds, and mailing lists etc but to make any of them really worthwhile you can?t just take. Like the best relationships, communication, mutual interests and attraction are key. I?m not saying I want to make sweet love to my Facebook page or Tumblr account but investing some time will obviously result in positive results/searches/babies?The problem is, there are too many. I talked about having it all in my iGoogle page and ...
More About: Presence

Producers of content and I
2008-02-27 16:39:00
Meeting the creator of something you enjoyed is great. The first time it happened to me was during my raving days at Peach (at the Camden Palace).I have such a vivid(ish) memory of listening to Graham Gold, Pete Tong, Judge Jules or someone else with an equally stupid name, play choons that would feature later that Friday evening.There, amidst bodies, stewing in bass, vibrant images and luminescence, I could and often did, stumble up to the raised stage and talk to the DJs. Granted, the conversation usually went something like, ?Hey, hey, Armin Van Buuren? Yeah, I?ve got your new choon, yeah. It?s a blinder mate. This set is banging.?The important thing to note, is the ease of access between a producer of content, in this case a DJ and I, the consumer. Had I been a bit more coherent and the music a little less loud, there?s no doubt in my mind that Armin and I could have discussed what exactly made his ?choons so banging.?Imagine my surprise when I discovered the interweb is not too...
More About: Content , Producers

Botanicalls Twitter
2008-02-26 13:42:00
I used to be a big fan of Cacti. I had a prickly forest?s worth when I was younger. The problem with Cacti; you assume that they don?t need much water and so lapse into forgetting to give them any at all. A dead cactus looks infinitely more depressing than say, some withered flowers. They sort of implode and whole chunks fall off, until it starts to resemble some zombie/cactus hybrid.If you have a propensity for being absent minded, never fear. Not since the invention of the automatic sprinkler have plants had a reason to give a collect, err, flowering.Behold:"Botanicalls Twitter answers the question: What's up with your plant? It offers a connection to your leafy pal via online Twitter status updates that reach you anywhere in the world. When your plant needs water, it will post to let you know, and send its thanks when you show it love"Now you can talk to your plants and they?ll talk back, albeit only when they want something. A bit like real people then.

Stage6 to close down, Pirates take another blow
2008-02-25 16:34:00
Arrr, me hearties, these be bad times indeed.From Surfthechannel forums:"...In many ways, though, the service did succeed, beyond even our own initial expectations. Stage6 became very popular very quickly. We helped gain exposure for some talented filmmakers who brought great videos to the attention of an engaged community. We helped prove that it?s possible to distribute true high definition video on the Internet. And we helped broaden the Internet video experience by offering content that is compatible with DVD players, mobile devices and other products beyond the PC.So why are we shutting the service down? Well, the short answer is that the continued operation of Stage6 is a very expensive enterprise that requires an enormous amount of attention and resources that we are not in a position to continue to provide. There are a lot of other details involved, but at the end of the day it?s really as simple as that."
More About: Pirates , Close

One page interweb
2008-02-25 14:11:00
As I understand it, prolonged surfing leads to a contracting of the muscles. This, as you can imagine, makes if very difficult to keep going time after time. There are ways to get around it, like taking up Yoga but frankly this analogy has run its course.Web surfing, if people still use that expression, maybe it?s, speeding through the ether (net)? Anyway, I was having a conversation (a real one, with body language and everything) about the one page interweb. I mentioned before how watching news stories jump from widget to widget on my iGoogle page could send a person insane but through the madness, there came a sort of clarity, (not to be confused with ?a moment of clarity? ala alcoholics) a thought trail.When first boot kicking my laptop to start, I used to execute a very Zen like and fluid movement (prepare for ultra geekness). Opening Firefox and then hitting command + T about five or six times, I needed only to type a few characters to see familiar web urls spring to life. Now ...
More About: Page

You feeling lucky, cyber/steam/bio/ punk?
2008-02-22 14:45:00
With countless youth movements failing to bring down the establishment over the years, it follows that the establishment will remain a prominent force for the present and near future. Its proliferation might well lead us to?Cyber punk:Wrought from the pages of William Gibson, Alfred Bester, Bruce Sterling etc Cyberpunk brings together all the rebellious anti-corporate/government sentiment inspired by the Punk movement of the 70s but places it in a post-industrial dystopia where mega corporations, corruption and a breakdown in the social order are prevalent.If you?ve seen Blade Runner, the Matrix (because we don?t talk about the other two, in the same way we don?t mention the second Star Wars trilogy) A Scanner Darkly or Ghost in the Shell, then you?ll have a good understanding of a cyberpunk tone and setting. If you imagine Cyberpunk as the daddy, then these sub-genres are its bastard, steamy, gene-spliced, offspring:Steam punk:Often set in 19th century England or a world where steam ...
More About: Lucky , Feeling

Memex Trails
2008-02-21 13:55:00
To understand what Mexmex Trails is, you need to decipher what it means: Memex or ?Memory extender,? was a theoretical proto-hypertext computer system that Vannevar Bush proposed in 1945 (wow, that sounded more geeky than I?d originally intended).From Whackypedia:?The MEMEX proposed by Bush would create TRAILS of links connecting sequences of microfilm frames, rather than links in the modern sense where a hyperlink connects a single word, phrase or picture within a document and a local or remote destination.?There you have it, ?Memex,? memory extender and ?trails,? as in, links connecting media within a programme at a local and remote destination. Well, Microfilm did go out with the old spy movies after all.What?s so cool about Memex Trails is that it lets you organise visually. My memory has always worked from a visual basis so it?s like having my grey goo on a screen staring back at me, a sort of cerebral mirror.Memex Trails adjusts to how much stuff you?ve put into it, a bit like...

Listening Post at the Science Museum
2008-02-20 15:04:00
Listening Post is an art installation currently on display at the Science Museum in London. It allows visitors to see and hear thousands of four letter words (not just tourettes four letter words) as they are displayed on screens and ?sung? by synthesised voices from across the interweb.From the BEEEEEB, ?Sound artist Ben Rubin has programmed a voice synthesizer to create tones and sound effects that respond to shifts in the data-streams, building up a musical score of online activity.?How scary would it be if you were there, mesmerized by the spectacle, and then in unison, all the voices said, ?We are the Borg, resistance is futile!?
More About: Science Museum , Listening

PixelJunk Eden
2008-02-20 14:46:00
Name that doesn't make sense but sounds cool, check. Minimalist artistic direction, check. Abstract gameplay, check. Congratulations, you have an indie game. Is it art or wank, a fine line to be sure.
More About: Eden

Addicted to Tech-anphet-thc-mean
2008-02-20 14:11:00
'I got the shakes, real bad. I haven?t checked my messages in like?five minutes! Oh God! J?j?just a little bit of plastic, I just want the feel in my hand.' There has been a rise in ?Tech no? addiction says Professor Nada Kakabadse of Northampton University.When I first read this over at the BEEEEEEB, I thought she meant techno, as in the music. That would be a far more interesting story. Everyone knows you can get addicted to practically anything. Technology runs the same reward gambit that drinking, gambaling, drugs etc does.?Bing? I just levelled up on some generic online game. Woot! Gimme more. ?Bong? I just got a new message on my Crackberry, who could it be? A new friend, a NEW friend on Myface!An addiction to a music form, now that?s new. I?ve gone through many phases of musical appreciation, often renouncing all the others at one time or another but I?d never say I became addicted. I can become obsessed with just about anything but it?s a very fickle obsession, usually with...
More About: Addicted

From my iGoogle tower I can see everything
2008-02-19 18:39:00
With my iGoogle page I feel like Colin Laney in William Gibson?s, Bridge Trilogy. He has an innate ability to spot ?nodes? in the sea of information that is the interweb.It only occurred to me yesterday when two stories originated in one widget and then spread like a virus to others. The first was a speculation that Toshiba were going to announce that HD DVD had officially lost against Sony?s, Blu-ray. This sprung up on Digg and a few hours later had spread to my guardian, BBC technology, Google technology and Wired widgets.The next story to multiply was the announcement that BBC programs were to appear on iTunes. This proliferated in much the same way. This suggests that there are people out there getting paid to essentially watch what appears on other news sources and regurgitate them. I can do that too, gimme moolah!
More About: Tower

Oddworld
2008-02-19 15:03:00
What ever happened to Oddworld Inhabitants? A company that had such a clear and singular vision has all but disappeared. Before it became fashionable for companies like Virgin and Innocent Smoothies to talk to you like they were a slightly cooky mate, rather than a large corporation, Oddworld Inhabitants were churning out games that were so odd, they were almost normal.The underlying theme throughout all the games is the idea of pending ecological disaster. Each Oddworld inhabitant can be split along the lines of Industrial, Native or Wildlife:The Industrialists:Consumed by greed, they relentlessly pick at the natural resources of Oddworld. Smoke belches out of smokestacks and cigar ends alike.Wildlife:The wildlife species are caught in the middle, their major concerns are to eat and not to be eaten. They act as a sort of symbolism for Oddworld?s ecological health.Natives:They are big believers in karma or as its known in Oddworld, Spooce. They?re simplistic means make them easy pre...