All entries for May 2005

Citreon 2CV

Writing about web page http://www.linkshard.com/link.asp?ID=487

Tom Abbott : 25 May 2005 09:03 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Belly and the moonflowers

Radio 6 just played a Belly track – lovely to hear it. It triggered some thoughts about bands I used to listen to in the early 90s.

There is one in particular I would love to trace – Bristol's finest – The Moonflowers.

As I recall the band decamped en masse to the south of France to live in a barn with a pensionable hippy. They had a reputation for this sort of thing, after performing naked at the Ashton Court Community Festival and nude album covers.

I had a couple of albums – Hash Smits, From Whales to Jupiter… , but they got stolen when I was at Uni. I think they are now both unavailable.

If anyone (long shot I know) thinks otherwise or perhaps has a copy it would be great to know.

Tom Abbott : 24 May 2005 13:53 |  Comments (19) |  Close comments |  Trackbacks (1) |  Report a problem

spam and me

Just had some spam come to me via my normal email account and via the webeditor account I manage.

The one to me came as "Dear Mr Abbott", the one to the webeditor account was "Dear Mrs Webeditor".

Nice to know I am in touch with my female side, but never realised I was married.

Tom Abbott : 24 May 2005 13:19 |  Tags: Web Stuff |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

New consoles

There's been a lot of press about the new gen gaming consols this week. Whilst the games look great I am left wondering what we should expect the pricing policy to be.

Just looking the ambitous claims for each of the machines and considering that people are going to expect big bangs and/or complex stories, the development costs alone are going to get staggering – I guess we are getting into Finding Nemo or The Incredibles territory here.

Does anyone know if any of the producers have made statements on the expected prices for these games? I suspect we may see a considerable hike over current prices – maybe the first £100 game.

I suppose the alternative will be to fund through in game advertising or online gaming – but that may only work for the very biggest titles – so maybe expect more consolidation in the industry. Ho Humm. Remember Hungry Horace – innocent days…

Tom Abbott : 20 May 2005 13:40 |  Comments (2) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Private eye – image of the month

Tom Abbott : 13 May 2005 11:46 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Bloglines gone missing

Hmmm. Logged in this morning and checked bloglines – all my feeds appear to have dissapeared – not good.

Let's hope they are not gone for good or I may feel a rant coming on…

Tom Abbott : 12 May 2005 09:32 |  Tags: Other Blogs |  Comments (2) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Star Wars themed garden implements

Writing about web page http://www.boingboing.net/2005/05/08/darth_vader_rotating.html

Via Boing Boing:

This Darth Vader lawn sprinkler, you can "let the Dark Side defend your lawn from the ravages of summer heat" as Vader "spins around with water spraying action, wielding his lightsaber in a furious battle to save your lawn!"

Genius! I look forward to the AT-AT Slug removal system – Watch as these 4 legged slug tracking giants blast the cabbage eating pests into the next galaxy.

Or even better – the Light Sabre pruning system – Let the force flow through your rose garden.

This could go on all week… (but won't)

Tom Abbott : 09 May 2005 09:11 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

nice google/yahoo cross over map

Follow-up to Google Maps – UK Version from Contemplating the Frame

link

Clever chap has mapped Yahoo traffic news onto Google Maps – US only, unfortunately, but a neat cross application

Tom Abbott : 06 May 2005 15:23 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Spot the link

Writing about Another gravestone for UK high tech? from George Riches: Complaints from a middle aged layabout

To expand on a comment I made in George Riches blog.

There are a number of links between Rover and Marconi – two manufacturers in serious trouble of late.

1. The Lord Simpson of Dunkeld – "After first working in the Scottish gas industry, Simpson joined the then-nationalised British Leyland in 1969, rising to a Director by 1976. He became Managing Director of the Leyland Trucks business in 1983, returning to head the Leyland car business, Rover Group, in 1989, which was now owned by British Aerospace. He revived this company and was able to sell it to the German car-maker BMW." – I might query the use of the word 'Revive' with hindsight!

Lord Simpson went on to be… CEO of Marconi – and lead them into corporate hell and nearly terminal decline. So, Rover and Marconi, both victims of the Simpson way!

2. China. Rover went into a trading deal with Shanghai Automotive shortly before the big bang – and Marconi have also recently reached an partnership agreement with Huwawei – another major Chinese manufacturer – who are now favourites to asset strip, sorry, buy out, the company. Hmmm – I wonder what IP the Chinese have already taken from the ailing telecoms company.

I knew a lot of good people at Marconi – I worry for them. I also knew a lot of arrogant pricks – I feel less sorry for these.

Tom Abbott : 05 May 2005 15:25 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Backpackit

Writing about web page http://www.backpackit.com/

Interesting new application from 37Signals.

Backpackit allows you to keep an online record of things to do, set reminders, notes and store images and files. This can be shared or made public. It's a minime version of their Project management system Basecamp (which John Dale might know more about).

This could be a useful collaborative working tool – especially for situations where people are in different locations. As a private tool it may have no more use than a good notebook. The interface is pretty straightforward, though you have to pay for some of the more advanced features – such as image storage and files etc. This might keep ads away from the system, but may restrict uptake as the free capacity is pretty limited. The system also seems to pretty self contained. For example – the links utility only seems to allow links to other backpack pages – not links to external websites. this may be an 'advanced' feature but we will see.

Not sure if there is enough of a USP to make it a must use application though. Examples page has some interesting ideas on it, but these are all predicated on having the paid for version.

Something to play with further anyhoo. Might be a nice app to supplement WarwickBlogs – WarwickToDo.

Tom Abbott : 05 May 2005 10:28 |  Tags: Web Stuff |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem