No dust-bunnies were harmed during the making of this post

I cleaned my desk today.

I’m so proud of myself, that I’m posting pictures to celebrate! Read the rest of this entry »

Music is my best friend

Its been such a long time since I was excited about new music.

When 5fm died, my passion for music died too.
I think it was more the way that 5fm died. It made me realise that the music industry has no interest in the art behind the music, or the musicians. It was made very clear that they were in it for the money, and to get that, the higher-ups at 5fm decided to go after a different target market.

Perhaps I had more of an attachment to the station than your average radio listener. Sitting in the studio during a live show made me realise that being a DJ was more than just a job. You don’t just talk between the songs, there’s a real passion behind it.

Until money gets involved. Then you end up with a station manager that gets rid of the best talent in South African radio, and replace them with a bunch of wannabe’s, fresh out of the celebrity factory.

They got rid of Barney Simon! And Alex Jay!

Thats when the music died for me.

5fm is nothing now. So far removed from the 5fm of the 90′s, that It feels wrong to call it 5fm. A talentless, money spinning, stream of crap that will make your ears bleed if you accidentally tune in.

Music “charts” have nothing to do with good music. Its all about how much money the labels can throw at PR and promotions. Just keep playing a new track to the masses, and they’ll “like” it. Don’t even get me started on the rampant abuse of Auto Tune.

But today, at the ungodly hour of 4am, I’m listening to a stream of endless new songs on thesixtyone. And it feels good, because I get to listen to the music that I like, and I get to share it with others. And I get to show my appreciation to the artists that put their hearts into creating the music.

From thesixtyone site:

On thesixtyone, artists sell their music directly to their fans. Unlike a record or distribution deal where they only make $1-2 per album (if they ever get paid, that is), artists on thesixtyone make at least $7 per album and are paid every 30 days — no wait for recoupment and no complex royalty schemes!

Giving the music back to the artists, I like it.

This is not a Hack

I’ve noticed an annoying trend lately, and its starting to get on my nerves.

Every 2nd person who figures something out on their own, is writing up a HOWTO.
This isn’t a problem. Its the fact that they’re calling it a “Hack” thats getting on my nerves.

A Hack is where you take something, and make it do something it was never designed to do. Not using something that was designed to do something, to do something slightly similar. Thats not a hack, thats an adaptation.

Well, thats my rant for the day. If anyone wants to sponsor some real gadget hacking, let me know and I’m sure we can work something out

Funding? Anyone?

I have so many nifty things I want to do. So many Ideas floating around in my head, from the nifty to the bizarre.

And they all involve gadgets of some description…

Anyone want to fund my exploits?

Why do we need so much variety?

What ever happened to Butter?

The stuff you cook with, bake with and spread on bread? Just simple butter.

I can get Low fat butter. Butter thats not really butter. Butter with added Omega’s. Low low fat butter. Half fat Butter.

Where’s the normal butter? In a tub. Just plain butter in a tub?

And Shampoo.

I don’t tint or dye my hair, its not permed, I don’t have dandruff, I don’t need extra volume.

I stood there for 5 minutes just staring at a wall of too much choice.

I just want shampoo, for hair, on my head.

*mumble*

Possibly cooler than Photosynth

Yes.

Now my little stick figure drawings can actually look decent.

This is possibly the coolest thing ever.

Researchers have come up with a way of taking your stick figure drawings (and keywords), and using them to find actual images that match. Then compositing them to create the complete image you were thinking of.

From Crunchgear

Google Wave is a lonely place

Everyone (at least, where I am), knows what Google Wave is.

And if you don’t, check out the About Google Wave page

I was quick to jump on it when Google first announced it, and I was lucky enough to get an invitation today. I’ve been waiting for months!

Its as awesome as I thought… but Its a lonely lonely place. You can only collaborate with people in your Wave Contact list. And my Wave Contact list is empty, because no-one else I know has a Wave account yet.

Its so lonely *sob*

Why is District 9 awesome?

It just is.

Its a Sci-Fi Movie, it has aliens, and people go splat alot.

Its great.
Read the rest of this entry »

I feel better now

I’m not sure about you, but I’m glad that someone has taken the time to do this research.

I link you to a paper titled, “When Zombies Attack!: Mathematical  Modelling of an Outbreak of Zombie Infection” by Philip Munz, Ioan Hudea, Joe Imad et al.

Thanks guys, I believe this paper is a step in the right direction. The better we understand our enemy, the more prepared we are to protect the world from the impending Zombie Apocalypse

(Thanks Dave for sending me the link to the paper)

Numb

Its my on-call week, and its been a killer so far.

At the moment, I’ve got a guy on-site transferring a new IOS image to a Cisco Router (which is long looong past its End of Life date), over a Serial cable with XModem. This is going to take a while (its 1am).

Last night, I was up from 00:30 until 03:00 trying to figure out why a router dropped off the network. Only to be told this morning that it was due to planned works being carried out by a 3rd-party. Oops, we forgot to tell you.

So, I’m cranky, sleep deprived, and can barely focus on my screen. But thats fine, I’m only oncall until Friday.

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