Spalpeen

Jesus, can the BBC get more cringeworthy? Some dude that has been working on the internet for the past 13 years is leaving, and the BBC has posted a nice little cute parting post for the guy. I would probably summarise the post like this:

“Oh my, how the internet has changed! It’s got all mature and stuff! Don’t you know: the internet is cool because it lets you display text and stuff all over the world? GLOBAL FUCKING AUDIENCE! It’s not a fad anymore y’know — BRITPOP! The early 90s! — We actually use the internet for real, important crap today. It’s like, all reminiscent and stuff. People used to think, like, the internet was for geeks n’shit. Broadcasters actually use computers. Woah. Web two point oh.”

Get with it Beeb. The potential for the internet is so frakin’ huge that I don’t want to see any sort of post like this for at least a couple of decades. A huge proportion of this country has grown up with the internet and doesn’t know what life is like without it. Get that through your publicly funded head! Stop freaking navel gazing and get into THE NOW.

There isn’t a day that goes by without the BBC hitting a “blogosphere” story that was yesterday’s news. Dump the whole process for writing news; stop asking image owners for permission to use images and lobby the Government for a US style “fair use” policy in the UK. Tell your bloggers to stop referring to the journalistic process in their blogs (we get it, you’re better than us). One of the best examples I saw was a BBC blogger writing in his first blog post — at DAVOS — was that the current post was his first blog post ever. Can you get more cliched than that? Take those crappy “headshot” images off of each of your blog posts. I mean, the BBC blogs don’t even have a “next page”: once you’ve reached the last blog post on that page, that’s it. How come only a single section of BBC.com/news has a regular link to what normal people are discussing on the internet?

There are so many bloody problems with the BBC “online”. There’s a reason why a bunch of people with little to no journalism experience are kicking their arses. There’s a reason why the BBC has to ask the public whether or not they should give all taxpayers access to BBC content online. They don’t have time to reminisce.

There are a couple of interesting debates going on about the concept of the journalist.

One, over at Valleywag, looks at the recent memo that was leaked from Microsoft to Wired. Valleywag’s (or Nick Denton’s) angle is that the memo is potentially more embarrasing for Wired, because it alludes to the possibility that Wired may have given Microsoft an advance copy of the article before it was published (hence, giving Microsoft the time to prepare a PR counter is needed). Chris Anderson says they don’t give excessive advances to the people they write about, and I believe him. I think any form of “advance” should be limited to sending out an email with a link to the article after the article has been published.

I think the bigger issue is a journalist’s relationship with anyone that they write about. It is accepted nowadays that journalists have to have a “working relationship” with their subjects in order to maintain scoops, and advance info etc. This nicely meshes with a similar debate that has been going on over at Newsnight (a BBC late news show), Guido Fawkes (a popular political blogger), and Nick Robinson (BBC’s Political guy).

The summary is that Guido Fawkes interviewed Nick Robinson, and used his words to put forward the view that reporters are attempting, and failing to be “fair and balanced” — to extremely ironically use Fox News’s marketing slogan — and therefore they do not accurately represent the views and questions of the people. I think Guido’s view is that reporters should not attempt to be objective: they should be true to their subjective nature as human beings, but in the process swing to both political extremes. He also dislikes the concept of journalists working “with” politicians. I agree here. As a blogger I feel uncomfortable “knowing” the people behind the software and products that I blog about. I take comfort in the fact that I don’t have a face behind a product. I take comfort in the fact that a company cannot physically appeal to my inherently subjective “human” side.

Political reporters working in Westminster do not have this luxury. They think that it is possible to be objective whilst simultaneously “knowing” the people behind their reports. It isn’t. I foresee the best outcome of this setup being holding the ocassional story or toning down a report as a personal favour to a politician: the worst possible outcome is doing this repeatedly in order to secure scoops and maintain a “working” relationship. This is wrong. There should be a complete detachment between reporters and the subject. Politicians, technology companies, whatever: they should have no influence over how a story is written, when it gets published, and what tone it takes.

I left a comment on Nick’s blog post, but it’s not come online yet. I said in this comment that I feel as if the BBC and others are aiming to always hit the objective bullseye. The problem is that the person aiming is human, and doesn’t always hit. My argument is that if you can’t always represent equal views, then don’t attempt to. Throw out as many partisan comments as you like. Just try and throw out equal amounts of partisan comments, and to equal extremes. Accept the subjectivity, and accept that readers understand that you are subjective.

I posted this as a comment over at MacWeek in response to the question how long could you live without your Mac?

“Y’know, I’ve been without my MacBook so often because of its hardware failure (11 of them), that I’ve learnt to live with my PC. I now actually work more efficiently on my PC than I do my Mac.

Yes, I do miss expose, the dashboard, the better multitasking capabilities of OS X (my Mac has two cores and 2GB of RAM, my PC has one core and 1GB of RAM), and I do enjoy using my Mac when it’s around, but I’m rapidly starting to think that maybe when I get it back next that it should go straight onto eBay.

If I can get used to it not being around (and I have to, because I’ve gotta do my job), then what’s the point in sticking with this unreliable piece of junk that could get me £600-700 on eBay?”

Specifically, I’ve calculated that I’ve been without my Mac for 2 months out of the approx. 9 or so that I’ve had it due to repairs. During those periods I usually switch to my PC, which I keep around for situations where my Mac breaks. It’s been a reliable little bugger that whole time.

Honestly, I’m starting to get the feeling of relief when I sit down to my PC. Sure, I know it’s not perfect, but the mere fact that it keeps running and doesn’t conk out (even if it did, I could replace a component) makes me happy to use it. I’ve also discovered that the PC is a whole lot faster for blogging, especially in conjunction with a big monitor. Yes, that’s right: I find the workflow a lot smoother for blogging at Engadget. Surprisingly, I also find that my 1 core, 1GB PC is a whole lot snappier when it comes to window movement, and browser activities (especially flash) than my 2 core, 2GB Mac — although recently that may have been attributed to this.

It’s got to the point now where my Mac has broken so many times through no fault of my own (and I’m quite fault prone: I’ve killed at least 3 Mac laptops before) that I honestly can say that I don’t miss expose, dashboard, Comic Life, Photobooth, or anything else about Mac OS X. The reason for that is because I don’t freaking remember the last time I used them due to repairs! 

Why can’t I have it both ways: the rugged, modular, no nonsense PC approach coupled with the sexy, attractive, and fun Mac? I think Apple have seriously sacrificed reliability with the MacBook range, and they have therefore then lost a customer.

I discovered before I sent my MacBook in for repair the other day that when the battery isn’t plugged in, the CPU automatically clocks down to 1GHz. So for the past week I had it, it’s been operating at half speed. I wondered why it was so slow.

It’s still out for repair at the moment, and it definitely won’t be back before I go home tomorrow. Bummer. Lets see if I can get the repairpeople to send it back to me.

One of the most taken for granted aspects of blogging at Weblogs, Inc. is the Photoshop side of the job. It’s very much encouraged for bloggers to fire up Photoshop and alter images. I’ve heard of people who browse some blogs purely to look at the images, so it’s not surprising that the practice is encouraged. Most of them are five minute jobs, so you won’t be blown away, but the main aim is to compliment the writing anyway. Here are a selection of my favorite Photoshop jobs in the time I’ve been blogging at WIN. Feel free to blog your own favorite photoshop jobs!

Update: James from Joystiq reminded me of one of his “creations”. It pwns everything here

Einhandkiller’s PS3/Xbox 360 controller mashup

The first example isn’t actually my creation (although the idea to ask users to create mock-ups was mine).

Insane Spiderman DDR Dance routine

This took quite a while, and as at least one person points out in the comments, it probably wasn’t worth the effort!

Colorblind gaming: or, Table Tennis is impossibly hard

This one goes really well with the post, and only took me 30 seconds. Bonus points for at least two people looking at this image and discovering they can’t see the numbers inside of it (which means they’re colorblind, like me).

Japan Airlines offers DS lites in flight (sans WiFi)

A simple one, but I think it’s effective.

Wright rocks out with the mainstream media

Another simple one, but fun to make.

EA and Jeep go for a cruise

Jeep. Jeep. Jeep. Say it a dozen times and it sounds weird.

Real scientists use Duke Nukem

Yep, they really do! A subtle one here.

Dutch prisoners could get remote knee locks

Haha, one dude in the comments thought this was the actual “remote” knee lock. The power of Photoshop is unlimited! Muahahaha!

Face recognition system identifies terrorists so soldiers don’t have to

Lots of praise on this one: “I must say I and everyone in the office here laughed hard at the picture used. Perfect illustration of the systems effectiveness.” “That is, without a doubt, the best freaking picture you could have possibly used.”

But also a few people were offended: “I know this is light hearted and all, but why show that damn image?” “Please Engadget, have some decency and remove that pic so all the stupidity, ignorance, and hate can end.”

This has to be my favorite image, simply because I laugh everytime I see it, and because it was so polarising. The best comment on it was: “‘I find that picture in questionable taste……’ I find the tech in questionable taste. who gives a damn about the picture.”

LG gets pissy at Motorola over KRZR design

I like this one because it came off rather well (it was originally of the model holding two KRZRs, but with the right one she was holding it up as a side profile).

Eight ways to kill someone with an iPod nano

I didn’t even notice the devil’s tail on this one until like a day later (the original source image had it, and I didn’t notice in my hurry).

Apple’s market share falls/rises, depending on who you ask

Nothing beats a Pac-Man pie chart.

I’ve recently requested an Apple replacement for my battery (read more about my ongoing MacBook problems here) and I discovered an interesting fact whilst doing so.

The Apple representative I spoke to said that Apple would charge me £71.00 if I did not pack up the old, broken battery — which wouldn’t take charge after I got an AC adaptor replacement — and send it back to them (which I will be doing). I had to give them credit card details to this end.

Interestingly, a quick trip to the Apple Store UK shows that a new, 13-inch white MacBook battery is £99.00. So technically, by opening a “fake” repair request, you can save £28 (~$60) on a new MacBook battery. If you were feeling particularly brave, you could send your old MacBook battery back and swap it for a new, factory fresh one at no extra charge: although admittedly Apple might spot that it is in fact not broken, and charge you the money anyway.

Yeah, so this is very likely to constitute fraud, but Apple has seriously screwed me over with a complete lemon of a MacBook (the customer service rep refused to replace the MacBook, despite it having a total of 11 components replaced in 6 months), so I wouldn’t feel particularly bad if they lost some of their bottom-end with a few owners of worn out batteries playing dumb and saving a bit of cash.

Inspired by Beau Bo D’or. When I get my Mac back, I’m going to splice some masculine and feminine music into each 5 second switch in response to all the crazy talk that the hairdo switch was an attempt to make David look more masculine. Hah!

I’m going to go out and buy some healthy food in a bit. Here’s what I’m going to buy:

-Brown bread (preferably wholemeal)

-Pitta bread

-Brown rice

-Pasta

-Curly lettuce

-Tomatoes

-Cucumber (this, plus the tomatoes, lettuce, brown rice, and tuna will make a killer salad)

-Bananas

-Grapes

-Apples

-Lemon

-Salmon (i’ll have this on sliced bread with a bit of lemo)

-Smoked mackerel (great in sandwiches, but I plan to cook this with peas and rice for lunch today)

-Tinned tuna (also great for sandwiches and with pasta/rice)

-Margarine

-Semi skimmed milk

I’m gonna start. I weigh about 14 stone (196lbs) and I’m around 6 foot tall. My aim is to drop a single stone by the start of the next academic year.  I will do this by changing basic foodstuffs which I know are unhealthy to healthier variants, stop eating entire foodgroups altogether, and start doing regular exercise using my bike.

Bad stuff that I want to change within the next week or so.

-Bread, and butter

Every morning I usually have about 4 pieces of toast with Marmite or Peanut Butter spread over them. Within the next week I want to make myself not eat more than 2 pieces of toast a day, and switch from butter to margarine. Ultimately I’d like to wean myself off toast altogether.

-Takeaway

Being a student, takeaway ocassionally gets ordered. I want to stop eating takeaway entirely - it’s expensive, it’s extremely unhealthy, and honestly I don’t need to eat it (most time takeaway is eaten between 12 midnight and 4am).

-Milk

I’m going to buy semi skimmed milk from now on. I have a habit from childhood that I always buy full fat. Unnecessary, since I can’t taste the difference!

-Crisps (chips in the US)

Pretty much every time I go into university my lunch will consist of a sandwhich, and a packet of crinkle crisps. Every now and again I’ll buy a packet of walkers. I’ve gotta stop this. I think the replacement is making my own lunches at home. For now I’ll just skip on the crisps and stick with buying just the sarnie at uni. In future I hope to make my own food.

-Alcohol

This is probably the number one culprit (second only to takeaway) that has caused my weight gain. It’s expensive, it’s fattening, it’s unhealthy, and I tend to drink a lot of it on nights out. That’s gotta change.

Good stuff that I’m happy about and want to do more of.

-Fruit

I like fruit a lot, but I don’t buy it regularly enough. From now on I want to have a bag of apples, oranges, and grapes in the house. That means I’ll have to look at doing a regular weekly shop. Lets say I do that on Friday.

-Exercise

Last year I cycled a lot of the time. This year I haven’t even picked up my bike from storage. I’ve gotta get my bike and use it. It’s a lot more practical than walking everywhere.

So, for now I shall:

give up:

takeaway, crisps, butter, too much toast, and full fat milk

eat more:

fruit

and get my:

bike

Police say a 13-year old male has fallen prey to Twitter, the addictive, web based social networking website that allows users to inform members about their current activity using free text messages.

Currently no dodgy middle aged man has been arrested on suspicion of being a sexual predator, although it is widely suspected that the currently unnamed suspect would use the service in order to satisfy their perversions: investigators are currently not searching computers of the dodgy middle aged man in order to find evidence that the man did not meet the child using Twitter.

Both the man and the boy were not found at a hotel near SXSW.

Thought I’d do Fox and co’s work for them, y’know, just in case they have to make a scaremongering article about twitter. Seriously though, I think twitter is probably the social network with the most potential to be exploited - the service encourages people to tell other people where they are and what they’re doing at that precise moment.