l o o s e = s a l u t e

Brisneyland today

2006-02-13T07:39:00.000+10:00

The Courier-Mail has a blog devoted to discussion of the RU-486 debate.
Also, two opinion pieces worth reading in the Courier-Mail today.
One, written by Professor Ross Homel (Griffith University), looks at the announcement made by the Beattie Government last year about the construction of a new super-jail. Homel calls for $1 to be spent on crime preventing early intervention programs for every $10 spent on new jails.
The other calling for leadership to reduce car use in Brisbane and the rapid implementation of policy options set out in the Government's Smart Travel Green Paper. Given the spineless nature of every State Premier at the moment I don't fancy the chances of rational policy in either issue.

What's a Songbird?

2006-02-10T09:33:00.000+10:00

Ars Technica has the word on a new open source media player called Songbird that can interface with a wide variety of music stores. Looking a lot like a straight-ahead rip-off of Apple's iTunes music player Songbird is built from the ground up on the Mozilla project programmed in XML User Interface Language (XUL) the same as Firefox's UI. XUL enables programmers to build an application UI using a markup language, stylesheets, and other Webified techniques. Songbird is also a showcase for XULRunner, a small runtime environment that enables XUL-based programs to run on a machine that doesn't have Firefox already installed.

The Unfashionable Argument for Fairness

2006-02-10T07:44:00.000+10:00

Mark Peel writes an excellent review of two books about increasing poverty in Australia that argue the unfashionable case for fairness: Peter Saunders', The Poverty Wars: Reconnecting Research with Reality and Hugh Stretton's, Australia Fair (both UNSW Press). A couple of quotes will give you the feel:

These aren’t easy days for advocates of fairness and equity. During the last twenty years, governments have overseen, promoted and sometimes celebrated a significant redistribution of resources, jobs and life chances that has consistently favoured some Australians and penalised others. New investments in middle-class assets and advantages have not been matched by compensating investments in the fortunes of less affluent citizens. Policy-makers and politicians have dismantled some of the most significant architecture promoting public health and public wealth, in the interests of increasing competition and efficiency. They have done so with little sense of long-term consequences, and with a shocking ignorance of history. The architects of these changes will not pay the price of their short-sightedness, though the people of the future will.

Australia is less fair than it was. There’s less money for social mobility, and more for privilege preservation. If you wish to do well in this country, it is more and more important to choose your parents carefully. The poor haven’t got poorer, but they are a lot further behind the rich than they used to be. The schools and hospitals that cater to them are more dilapidated, and their welfare comes with a revitalised suspicion and meanness of spirit. In place of arguments for shared responsibility comes a war on the largely invented problem of ‘welfare fraud’ that should forever shame its instigators and enthusiasts. Citizens are encouraged to believe that governments can’t look after them, that everyone has an agenda, that every argument for change or continuity is just spin and that they must look after themselves and their own.

These failures of imagination and fairness lie nearer the top than the bottom of Australian society. If there’s a crisis, it is not a crisis of welfare dependency or inefficiency or alienation. It’s a crisis of compassion. It’s a crisis of obligation, from the lucky to the unlucky, the old to the young, the insider to the outsider, those rich in confidence and chances to those who despair of either.

News, fries and family

2006-02-09T14:12:00.000+10:00

News Corp on its digital strategy - My Space users look out - they're talking about "monetarising" you.
McDonalds admit their fries are fattier than they thought (or maybe they just weren't looking hard ennough).
One family through time. Touching. (Thanks Good Experience)

Slammed

2006-02-07T12:33:00.000+10:00

Just in time for Valentine's Day, the Organic Consumers Association presents an entertaining one-minute flash animation called: Slammed. So keep those flowers organic and the chocolate fair trade. A suggested improvement maybe George could step in some of Barney's doggy num nums.

Australia's DPP is a big pussy

2006-02-06T07:26:00.000+10:00

The path of least resistance. Apparently, Australia's Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions has a clear aversion to taking on white collar crime but can barely contain himself when it comes to some white trash ripping of CentreLink for a few dollars. The SMH suggests that the DPP is more interested in his hit rate in the courts than hitting the big boys ripping off millions. Give a man a target...

Busy Bee with Empire Update

2005-09-03T12:12:00.000+10:00

Yeah - long time. Guess I got busy doing other stuff. Where does this other stuff come from anyway. Green Feeder has ceased to exist due to lack of interest on everybody involved with its part. Grassy wants it to be more focussed on city living and more regional in focus - he lives in Australia. So Green Feeder may be re-launched with a different focus when I return from Europe. Yes, that's the other thing - a trip North - Amsterdam, Paris, Barcelona, Florence, Rome. So posting here will decline substantially from October for two months. Edgizmo and Slidehunter will stumble along sporadically until 06 when - fingers crossed - I'll have time to get serious.Martha Lust will keep plugging away says Cherry!

Owen Land and Back in Brisneyland

2005-08-17T10:53:00.000+10:00

Back in Brisneyland after two days in Melbourne. Did manage to catch a collection of films by Owen Land (formerly known as George Landow) at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image while I was there. This person seems to know more about it than me. There was only a small crowd at the screening. I think I could safely say I travelled the furtherest to be there.
Today is one of those beautiful Brisbane late winter days. Not a cloud in the sky and a beautiful warm sun that just begs to be lain in. Buffy, my Jack Russell, sun drunk. Doing a few catch up posts onGreenFeeder and Martha Lust.

Exit Blogger Nav Bar

2005-08-14T13:40:00.000+10:00

See up the top of this page that Blogger nav bar! Got a Blogger blog and want to get rid of it but don't know how. Then click here., You could follow the four steps or the half dozen other ways described in the comments on this post. Is not showing the nav bar breaking the user agreement?

Shifting Feeds

2005-08-14T13:17:00.000+10:00

Spending a bit of time today at work - heading to Melbourne again tomorrow and Tuesday. At the moment I'm just transferring a lot of my feeds over from Bloglines to My Yahoo. I'm still going to keep my Bloglines account and I'll still keep adding feeds to it. The feeds I'm adding to My Yahoo are those I just HAVE to check each day - basically feeds that are related to my blogs. I'm already at Yahoo to check email so having my feeds available in the same space makes sense. I had already done this for feeds I get related to Martha Lust and I like how I can get 5 or so feeds showing in one view on My Yahoo. At Bloglines you can only view one feed at a time.
Of course My Yahoo only lets you see headlines or headlines and a short summary of feeds unlike Bloglines which has several view options including viewing a full post. And I'm not sure about sharing options under My Yahoo. The blogroll function of Bloglines will keep me continuing to subscribe feeds to my bloglines account but I think overall the number of visits I make to site is likely to decline.

Electric Bike - Blogger Bitch

2005-08-13T08:53:00.000+10:00

Treehugger pointed me to this nifty bike website - allowing me to continue my bike related posts. As I was doding that I started thinking too bad I can't link all my bike posts togther simply with a category! This actually brings me to the biggest bitch I have about Blogger. NO CATEGORIES. As simple as that! It's the one big fatal flaw as far as I can see. Makes it very hard to really expect a blog like Greenfeeder to attract a lot of traffic. Categories makes old content useable. If you can't categorise then old content basically become dead. Which leads me to think that you need to think very carefully before starting a blog about the platform you choose. (Free! was a big factor for me coming to Blogger). If its the sort of blog where only recent content has value (gossipy stuff maybe like Martha Lust) then I reckon that Blogger is a fine platform. But if you run something like Greenfeeder then you really need categories. All the past content of Greenfeeder is basicallly invisible. So I'm currently looking at various other options for Greenfeeder. I think BlogHarbour might be the way to go. So I'm setting up some there (they offer a free 30-day trial) and see what happens.

Oh yeah the bike! Avanti sell this great electric bike - with a flick of a switch the Electra changes from a 'standard' bike into an effortless ride with power assisted cycling. Way cool! When power assistance is not in use, the Electra feels as familiar as a standard bike. The lightweight alloy frame ensures a comfortable, enjoyable ride with the suspension fork and suspension seat post easing out any bumps.

Ten Lost Technologies Return

2005-08-10T08:43:00.000+10:00

How many of these 10 now defunct technologies do you miss. Manned Sapce Travel? Well I never actually got into space so I guess I can't say I truly miss it. EV1 - never owned one so agian same story. But I did use Napster and I'll always miss free. But hey, picking on Apple's Newton is not cool OK!

Elvis the Woodpecker

2005-08-10T07:31:00.000+10:00

"Now Elvis has come along," he said, "and said:'I'm the rock star. Look at me.' " Nice way to end a story about the return of an extinct species. Its been agreed that the ivory-billed woodpecker ain't extinct after all.

Let 31 Million Blogs Bloom?

2005-08-09T20:07:00.000+10:00

Blogging in China is predicted to take off. Whilst there are only an estimated 6 million boggers currently in China this report by Reuters claims that Technorati says a new blog is created every second (sounds great but given that means 31 53 6000 a year and Microsoft says it has signed up a bit over 1 million users in China to its "MSN Spaces" service which is operated out of China and was launched three months ago I'm not sure!) Plus how many bloggers would you sign up in the west if you couldn't guarantee your provider wouldn't do the governments bidding and censor your blog. Anyway how do they get away with calling it blogging if its censored!

Pop Up Pioneer Passes on the Pop

2005-08-09T15:49:00.000+10:00

Claria, the company that bought you those annoying pop-up ads when you downloaded Kazaa or 1/2 a dozen other pieces of software is abandoning the "pop-up model" (sounds like a toaster). Apart from some interesting data on pop-up penetration the article deserves to be read for this classic quote from a Claria Exec. "There are a lot of people who aren't fans of the pop-up model." Nothing if not perceptive. Explains the salary right!

Owl Pellets Starter Guide

2005-08-09T11:10:00.000+10:00

The what, when and why of owl pellets.

Will iPods become obsolete? Yes.

2005-08-09T10:46:00.000+10:00

Interesting article in the SMH today asking the question, "Can the iPod survive?"

"It took the iPod four years to sell about 20 million but you look at the growth of mobile phones and it just completely obliterates that. The text message market is bigger than the whole music community globally."

"To some extent, listening to music is about listeners immersing themselves and hopefully not being disturbed. You get a form of control by using an iPod, which mobile phones destroy as soon as someone else wants to phone you. It becomes interruptive..."

Dr Michael Bull, senior lecturer in media and film studies at the University of Sussex, said: "My research shows 25 per cent of iPod users don't like their phones, [often because] they don't always work well," he said. "Phones can play music, but it doesn't mean people will want to listen to music on them.

As one who doesn't own an iPod (I use a crappy little LG MP3 player)I'm not sure what all the fuss is about. Can I suggest that history says that iPods will become obsolete, and pretty quickly at that. Vinyl, tape, ipods ... all things come to pass.

Bike mad USA

2005-08-03T15:25:00.000+10:00

Bike story No 254. What do Americans buy more of cars and trucks or bicycles? Well, in the US over the last 12 months bikes have outsold cars and trucks by a big margin. And as this article at Planet Ark points out, all without employee discounts or zero-percent financing.

Bike sales and bike equipment is a $5 (billion) to $6 billion business per year," said Tim Blumenthal, industry specialist and executive director of Bikes Belong, a national industry association. "Bicycle sales are near an all-time high (with) 19 million sold last year -- close to the 20 million sold during the oil embargo in the early 1970s.

When you're on a good thing...

My media empire

2005-08-03T12:14:00.000+10:00

A few tweaks here and there and away they go - I think both Greenfeeder and Martha Lust are up and displaying ok in IE now. Had some problems with displaying images and setting column width - which IE and Firefox seem to read differently. So if your looking for the latest in gardening products or can't resist a bit of Martha Stewart gossip pop on by - Martha Lust won't shutdown IE now!

My blogs have gone IE mad

2005-08-01T21:19:00.000+10:00

Finally got round to having a look at my two little blog projects -- Greenfeeder and Marthalust -- in IE today. What the %$#&^(*%? Marthalust (Your daily glass of Martha Juice) ain't too bad but Greenfeeder (New Stuff for Gardeners) is completely stuffed - so nice in Firefox but an absolute nightmare in IE. Looks like me be busy for a wee bit while I fix that crap up. In my little dream world I had forgotten IE even existed. Oh the harsh lava lamp of reality!

New York Doll and Moog

2005-08-01T20:20:00.000+10:00

Yadda yadda. Well has been a few days but I have squeezed in two trips to Melbourne over the last 10 days so... And you've got to love Melbourne. Well I do anyway. Managed to catch a film at the Melbourne International Film Festival - New York Doll which I thoroughly enjoyed. Apparently it was the "buzz of Sundance" this year - whatever that means? I'm not a big New York Dolls fan but the movie was quite magical. And cause I hadn't really read about the movie before I went I got the full shock of the twist at the end. Back in Brisneyland on the weekend grabbed another film at the Brisbane International Film Festival (what is it with International Film Festivals - roll on Gladstone!) - a nifty doco on Robert Moog called - Moog. (If you haven't heard of him you've heard him.)

Blog World's Little Tremors

2005-07-17T08:29:00.000+10:00

A bit of news from the world of blogging caught me eye - editor of Gawker Media’s Tech blog Gizmodo, Joel Johnson, has resigned from Nick Denton’s blog empire. Blogherald points out that in response, Gawker Media has advertised for three positions, indicating Johnson’s worth to a new employer: News Writer and Design Writer for Gizmodo, and Writer for Kotaku.
Meanwhile...Rowsey's bumped up the ante on his T-shirt competition... all this merely demonstrates the marketing nouse of "the problogger" - for the total cost of $200 he's getting a T-shirt design for one of his blogs, a whole bunch of "attention" and plenty of links. That's smart!
Finally, not really "bloggy" but (read on) Murdoch has decided Fox needs an improved internet presence.

News Corporation today announced the formation of Fox Interactive Media (FIM), a new unit that will leverage the strength of Fox’s distinctive entertainment, news and sports brands across the Internet to offer a richer online experience to its millions of users. Veteran media and interactive executive Ross Levinsohn will become President of FIM, which will be based in Los Angeles. Additionally, veteran Fox News executive Bert Solivan will join as Executive Vice President.

That would seem a reasonably smart decision. Why do I have a faint suspiscion that blogs will feature heavily in this new push? Maybe he's been tracking blog share prices!

Hyperlinker Guilty of Copyright Infringement

2005-07-16T10:10:00.000+10:00

Who was it that ran that ad campaign "now it gets interesting"? You remember they used to run something like "Dogs smarter than accountants" (picture of dogs whipping up a few excel spreadsheets) - then grand statement below "Now it gets interesting". Well... it IS getting interesting - especially when an Australian court has found a web site owner, the hosting ISP and employees in the ISP, guilty of copyright infringement for - wait for it - hyperlinking to illegal music files - that's right just hyerlinking - no file copying, just linking. The applicants in the case were foreign-owned recording companies Universal, EMI, Sony, Warner and BMG along with local "majors" Festival and Mushroom. Ars Technica reports

Stephen Cooper ran a website called mp3s4free. Stephen thought that he was well within his legal rights because he was just compiling a list of available mp3 files available for download on the Internet, but was not actually hosting any of the files. Earlier today, the court decided otherwise.

This is a worrying development because of its precedent setting potential and hopefully Cooper will appeal the Federal Court decision (full transcipt etc.). Monkeys? Asylums? Yes, please.

Google Factory Tour

2005-07-15T21:19:00.000+10:00

If you're really in need of a big blast of Google you can read all their spin here. Google spilling their business beans - not bloody likely, but it does give you a general idea of how Google sees the world. Plus its mildly entertaining.

Q-Bike It

2005-07-14T15:23:00.000+10:00

Y'all know how much i like weird bikes. Future of transport and all that - so this one - a Q-Bike - on The Gadget Blog caught my eye.

The yellow's nice but I like the red and black one best.

Garbage Land

2005-07-13T12:58:00.000+10:00

Spent a bit of time today cruising some of the environmental blogs I get feeds from. Planet Ark has a nifty feature on author Elizabeth Royte and her yearlong pilgrimage to find out what happens to the things that people throw away. Royte spent the last year tracking the path of everything from recycled paper to discarded computer parts and the septic sludge she flushed down the toilet. She's chronicled her quest in the book Garbage Land: On the Secret Trail of Trash which was to hit stores on Wednesday.

Pay-to -download music sites see big traffic jump

2005-07-12T11:02:00.000+10:00

Build it and they will come? Sydney Morning Herald is reporting on the latest data out of the US showing that pay-download music sites are seeing huge traffic increases. Lesson is - a good pay-download service will attract plenty of users.

The number of song downloads at authorised websites tripled among US internet users in the first six months of 2005, compared with the same period a year ago, new data shows. US internet users downloaded 159 million individual songs over the period, compared with 55 million in the same period in 2004, according to figures compiled this week by Nielsen SoundScan.T he data confirmed that internet users are moving away from piracy on peer-to-peer networks and gravitating toward pay-per-download sites like Apple's iTunes. "It's a tremendous burst, given the amount of piracy," said Rob Sisco, president of Nielsen Music.

Still overall sales are down - I wouldn't mind seeing some data on p2p traffic... me thinks p2p ain't slowing down anytime soon.

Bill Joy and What The Doormouse Said

2005-07-12T10:38:00.000+10:00

Bill Joy writes an interesting review of John Markoff's "What the doormouse said" - a book exploring the interplay of computing and the counterculture of the 60s:

You've likely heard stories about the birth of the PC: of Xerox PARC as the Mecca of computing; of its creation of the Alto, Ethernet, and the laser printer; of the Homebrew Computer Club, the MITS Altair, Bill Gates and the theft of his Micro-soft Basic; of Steve Jobs and Stephen Wozniak, the founding of Apple, and the Jobs visit to PARC that inspired the Macintosh.
But what you may not know about is the really early history. The stories of Doug Engelbart and John McCarthy, of the Augmentation Research Center, and of the early days of the Stanford University AI Lab (SAIL) are not well known. Yes, you may have heard that Engelbart invented the mouse, and that SAIL and Stanford led to companies like Sun and Cisco. But there are better stories, great and old ones from the early days of computing, about the events that led to personal computing as we know it.
In his wonderful new book, What the Dormouse Said..., John Markoff tells these stories.

Walmart - The Movie

2005-07-11T15:10:00.000+10:00

Walmart:The High Cost of Low Price is the first documentary from Brave New Films, the new media company from Robert Greenwald, the award-winning producer of over 60 films, and the director of the 2004 guerilla documentaries, Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism, and Uncovered: The War on Iraq. The film takes the viewer on a deeply personal journey into the everyday lives of families struggling to fight goliath. From a family business owner in the Midwest to a preacher in California, from workers in Florida to a poet in Mexico, dozens of film crews on three continents bring the intensely personal stories of an assault on families and American values. The film will premiere on November 13th all over the world, hosted by thousands of family business owners, churches, teachers, students, and people just like you. Currently the producers are looking for more groups and venues to show the film. An interesting piece by the filmmaker Robert Greenwald can be found here.

Treehugger Blogger Cracks

2005-07-10T07:52:00.000+10:00

Treehugger is a blog I follow and think highly of. It was partly the inspiration for my Greenfeeder blog. A post last Friday by one of their bloggers Warren McLaren reveals the thankless task professional blogging can sometimes be - sounds like Treehugger get plenty of jangling from readers. This is always a mystery to me - people complaining about a site's/blog's content - hey, its a free world - you typed the url in! Go elsewhere! Why would you bother blasting Treehugger? They are always positive and supportive.
Warren lays down a girlcott challenge - forget boycotts we need girlcotts (and I agree). More girlcotts! And leave the "treeies" alone - or I'll rip yer bloody arms orf!

Some Flickr sets

2005-07-09T08:06:00.000+10:00

Whiling away a bit of time at Flickr. The Flickr blog is pretty sharp pointing to this great set of photos of old electronic games (see above) and lots of Live8 photos. Searched for photos of yesterday's terrorist attacks in London and came across this set tagged londonbombing.

One Weird Bike

2005-07-04T23:10:00.000+10:00

You all know that Cyclecide are a favourite of mine (I been begged them to come downunder) but I'm thinking that maybe I've been looking in the wrong place. I was lost but now I am found - one weird bike! We are not worthy.

Get on your bike.

Gizmo to go Skype.

2005-07-03T20:25:00.000+10:00

Next battle in the open vs proprietary war - internet telephony. Michael Robertson has firmly set his sites on internet telephony and the user-base that has been created by the popular ("the whole world can talk for free") Skype software. This week sees Robertson launch his latest project Gizmo a competitor to Skype. One of the key differences is that Gizmo uses open Session Initiation Protocol compared to Skype's proprietary technology. And Robertson is clearly pitching this as another chapter in the open vs proprietary battle. In his June 30th weekly newsletter Robertson claims that

Skype's calls go over the same net that we all connect to, but they are locked away from the rest of the world. They are recreating the old closed world rather than embracing the new Internet where all users are interconnected. It may be good for Skype's business to lock out other number directories because it gives them complete control, but it's terrible for consumers because they will be forced into a monopoly.

Not every reader of his blog agrees with Robertson although the Gizmo-Skype comparison chart points to Gizmo's pretty rich capabilities.

Local goes global on Bayosphere

2005-07-02T01:20:00.000+10:00

I said that i'd be keeping a watch on Dan Gillmor's experiment over at bayosphere. I think my first reaction wasn't particularly favourable but this thing is swinging a little better now - which is the best farmers market - that's cool local news but stuff that's interestng to non-bayers too - i'd think this stuff would have a lot of value to people who travel to SF and maybe stay for an extended or not so extended time.
Just to keep things moving - when can we see photoblogs on Bayosphere Dan? I want to see the local news.

GIS and the next frontier

2005-07-01T07:19:00.000+10:00

I really enjoyed Wade Roush's report on the Where 2.0 conference - where is location-based technology leading us in the larger sense?

The key theme of the conference according to Wade?
the old business of GIS is about to be disrupted big-time by the arrival of Web-based technologies that put the power to access, explore, create, and enhance digital maps into the hands of average people. That's going to change the way people think about place and space; it's also going to create new opportunies to serve people branded information (and, not incidentally, advertising).

Another key quote from Wade's story - (quoting presenter Jack Dangermond, the founder and CEO of San Diego's ESRI:

The biggest trend in the business now, he said, is the transformation of the first generation of map servers into general knowledge servers, overlaying map data with other types of georeferenced information depending on the user's needs and context.
Wade continues his report tomorrow.

Yahoo's My Web 2.0

2005-06-30T10:00:00.000+10:00

John is also blogging about the new evolving Yahoo search "tool" called My Web 2.0. My Web 2.0 has gone beta. You can find Yahoo's explantion right here.

Google googles video

2005-06-30T09:45:00.000+10:00

Video delivery is probably the hottest game on the web at the moment with new players and technology (such as this at Paticipatory Culture Foundation) popping up literally by-the-minute. Google's latest moves which sees them add a video player to their video find search tool are interpreted by Google guru John Battlle as a shot across the bows of the Hollywood Microsoft alliance. He also warns that with Google heading into more open video browsing waters, that Windows Media Player may go the way of Internet Explorer - remember that old glitchy browser we used to use! And they said it couldn't be done.

Tweakle, tweakle little blogs

2005-06-28T23:32:00.000+10:00

Have just spent another few hours tweaking my two new blogs. Having a few problems with Martha Lust but Greenfeeder is starting to look right. Just got to change the backround colour of those Amazon ads and she's nearly there - primitive but it looks OK. It's designed to be low maintenance and I hope to run it on about 3 hours a week. It's not the sort of site that has to be cutting edge, up-to-the-minute so I'm going to just draft up 5 to 6 posts at a hit and dribble them out one per day. I am also thinking of themes for particular days like Tool Tuesday.
I wasted a whole bunch of time fiddling with Martha Lust - I stuffed up the colour matching in the logos etc and am going back to the drawing board. Plus I spent hours last night trying to get headings and stuff to work - without success. So I deleted the whole thing and cut and pasted a blog I had done a while back that was roughly set up like I want Martha Lust to look like. Still have trouble getting previous posts to work on the rhs column but...One thing - I am learning a fair bit of CSS (finally).
I'm using Furl to keep maintenance down on Martha Lust. One Furl of Martha news with clippings and another of Martha items on ebay - should provide a constantly updating site without the need to actually post. Cool.

Greenfeeder and Martha Lust

2005-06-28T02:48:00.000+10:00

Spent a bit of today working on two new blogs I'm getting ready to lauch during the week. One is a blog covering new stuff for gardeners. I have been tinkering away on gardening blog now for quite a while but haven't really got the formula right! At first I just focussed on linking to news - sort of a human gardening news aggregator, but RSS made that redundant. It's a hard nut to crack. My latest version I'm calling Greenfeeder and I will post new garden products daily and through a "furl list" I'll link readers through to interesting gardening sites, stories, people and news.
The other blog is one I've thought about for a while but never did anything about - Martha Lust. Martha Lust will provide readers with their "daily glass of Martha juice". I'm hoping to sell a bit of merch through Martha Lust as well - my first dabble in that area.

Hopefully both will be up and running soon.

Phobia feast for ear and eye

2005-06-26T12:04:00.000+10:00

Yesterday I went to see Chamber Made's Phobia at the Powerhouse. Well it just blew me away totally. This is the coolest thing I've seen in donkeys. The whole concept of the performance is brilliant - a homage to Foley artists and film -noir. The performances by the six cast members are fantastic. If you imagine Reich, Glass, Laurie Anderson and Byrne/Eno pushed through a psycho-delic meat grinder obsessed with the soundtracks of B-grade crime films from the 40s and 50s, you may have some idea of what Phobia is like. It was truly a wild mix of theatre, opera, jazz, sound collage, Never has celery made such a cool sound! My advice - if you get a chance to see this "opera" don't even think twice. Go!

Bloggers new clothes

2005-06-26T11:42:00.000+10:00

Hooray! Hooray! Blogger yesterday activated photo uploading directly within the Blogger post interface. Blogger users can now directly upload images to their blog without the need to use a third party image hosting site like Buzznet or the very fiddly (at least I found it so) Picasa. Finally, we get to use that little image upload icon that has sat on the Blogger post interface all these years. According to their Image Upload FAQ, Blogger is currently allowing each user 300 MB of server space for their images and supports JPG, GIF, PNG, TIF or BMP formats.

Double-Click makes stupid statement to protect own patch

2005-06-24T10:06:00.000+10:00

Come on, one more post for the day. God I love it when money talks. Like this. Bennie Smith from Double-Click telling us that free content on the net will die when every browser can block advertising. Ho, Ho, Ho. Bennie, I actually remember a time when there were no ads on the internet.
Oh yeah, and regarding your comment that we'd all miss the ads in newspapers if we could block them - (This is the weird statement - "You'd go to your local corner shop and buy the daily paper, and you'd have these large holes where the ads were.You'd somehow feel like your 25 cents had not gotten full value." ) - like I'd freak out if newspapers didn't carry ads! Oh Bennie, Bennie, Bennie, you're just trying to make me laugh, right? You read the newspaper for the ads? I can't recall looking at one in years! Value proposition - come back down to this lovely planet where the rest of us live Bennie.
Bottom line is, in Firefox you can block ads (in pop-up windows only) or you can see them if you feel so inclined - just switch off the pop-up window blocker. Funny thing is Bennie, I dont know anyone using FF who ain't using the pop-up window blocking feature. Doesn't that say it all - if we all missed the ads Bennie we'd turn the blocker off.
Can anyone tell me whether we know what percentage of FF users have pop-up window blocking switched off?

Beenie reckons we'll all be paying for content access if we all block ads. This reminds me of the time I wrote to the Australian Financial Review when they started charging for on-line access - I pointed to the NYT as a site that didn't charge. I was told, in no uncertain terms, that I was stupid if I expected free access to the AFRs content and that the NYT would soon find that they need to change to paid access too (all that about 5 years ago or more maybe). Well, the NYTs is still free and I just popped back to the AFR site (I haven't been there since the letter, plus I stopped buying the occasional paper copy I used to buy as well) and guess what? A whole bucket load of free content sitting right there at the top of the front page. The paid access material? Shoved away quietly below the fold. Says it all really.

File swapping may be here to say - you don't say?

2005-06-24T09:33:00.000+10:00

Stupid headline of the day? Gotta be this AP headline carried on Yahoo. "File-Swapping May Be Here to Stay". May be here to stay? Are they for real? Apparently last year on the net 300 millions tunes were bought legally, whilst 5 billion were swapped for free via p2p. Numbers tell a story - yes I too believe that file swapping is here to stay - that's not a maybe by the way but a definite yes!
Actually most of the article is about the upcoming launch of Peer Impact a music download service where you pay to download songs but earn credits when others copy your "peer impact" music files off the shared folder on your computer. It will be interesting to see the impact Peer Impact has on free p2p file swapping.

Ebay bites back with store extensions and more

2005-06-24T09:10:00.000+10:00

Well the reaction from Ebay to the Google threat has been swift. Actually whether its a reaction to Google's announcement is a moot point as the latest developments attempt to resolve what have been obvious "weaknesses" in the past particularly the lack of integration of seller's Ebay stores and their own independent e-com sites.
Yahoo reports:

The company's new ProStores service helps sellers and other small- to medium-sized businesses build customized e-commerce sites independent of the eBay marketplace.
The site-building tool enables eBay Store users to connect their independent sites with their existing eBay Store, allowing them to manage listings and inventory for both stores and accept eBay's online payment service PayPal. It also is intended to attract new sellers to eBay.

Another interesting development sees Ebay boosting product sourcing opportunities for its "power sellers" who buy low-priced inventory to sell at a profit. A recent deal with Global Sources is part of that strategy.

As I said yesterday this will be an interesting development to watch.

Hi Fructose

2005-06-23T12:04:00.000+10:00

Posted by: Bondi Tram on Buzznet

A new magazine for you to subscribe to.

Will Google choke on PayPal battle?

2005-06-23T10:33:00.000+10:00

This is the best short analysis of the "Google to take on PayPal" story running round at the moment that I've come across. Maybe I like it because it says what I think as well. That displacing the fairly well entrenched PayPal will be a hard task for Google. As the article points out, apart from its search engine google really hasn't developed any other killer web tool or application and switching search engines is pretty painless. Even with a massive technology and cost advantage I think this will be a tough call. We will watch with interest.

Bayosphere

2005-06-23T10:12:00.000+10:00

I will be keeping my eye on Dan Gillmor's Bayosphere. Dan's trying to set up a news site focusing on SF, all fed by postings of "citizen journalists". I like this idea a lot - and no doubt it could be replicated elesewhere. But I see already some posts are already, in my view at least, well off topic - interesting and worthwhile story sure, but is it SF news? I think posts like this will dilute the usefulness of the site. Of, by and for the bay? Like if I want SF news and go to Bayosphere and find a whole bunch of posts like that will I come back again? I don't know? Maybe? Maybe not?

Buzznet vs Flickr: a real usability test.

2005-06-22T05:36:00.000+10:00

Posted by: Bondi Tram on Buzznet

American Jihad. Scanned Collage 2004

Just set myself up a Buzznet space to post visual stuff.
Also this will give me a chance to compare Buzznet with Flickr. I already noticed one difference. In Flickr "sets" you can arrange the order of the images whereas in Buzznet "galleries" you can't do this - or at least I haven't figured it out yet. You can compare the order of the Buzznet images (by posting order) with that in my Flickr account, where you can re-arrange the order after you post. As well on Buzznet I'm having trouble setting up a new gallery although Ive done this before at Buzznet when I had a bit of a fiddle a while back so I don't know what's wrong today.
Buzznet certainly does have a nicer looking interface but I reckon you can find things easier on Flickr's white, spacey, Google style layout. But, like Google, it's plug ugly.

Is the cassette dead?

2005-06-20T23:26:00.000+10:00

Buying Neil Young's Tonight's the Night and On the Beach on cassette turned out to be two of the worst decisions of my life. What came over me? (Young male and stupid I guess) Well BBC is sounding the death knell of the cassette and I'm glad that fucker is dying - I don't care what you say, I think it was a pretty crappy bit of technology. Sure Thurston might get misty eyed about the death of the mix tape but while every vinyl record I bought in the 70s (I eventually got smart) still plays not one cassette I bought plays anything remotely resembling its original sound. But if you're a fan I suggest you stock up on your favourite brand of blank tapes now - remember what happened to Super8. Just Kodak left.

St Vinnies scalps CIS

2005-06-20T12:05:00.000+10:00

At home here in Australia the debate continues - is the land of the "fair go" becoming less or more unequal. The latest shots have been fired between St Vincents de Paul and conservative commentators Peter Saunders of the Centre for (not) Independent Studies and The Australian's Chris Pearson.

The score so far - Chris Pearson, Peter Saunders and the Centre for "Independent" Studies 0, St Vinnies 1. All over rover, no contest.

You'd think that CIS would think up some new tricks, ignoring those little footnotes at the bottom of ABS data is so passe now Peter!

Peter Saunders wrote:

The ABS warns that a gain of just 0.007 is not statistically significant: it could have resulted from sampling error.

Vinnies wrote in reply

If he had read the ABS commentary in full he would have seen the following:
The statistically significant movements are the increase in the P90/P10 [the ratio between the top and bottom 10 per cent of incomes] and the decline in the share of the total income going to persons with low income.

Well Peter?

Chris Pearson is just plain confused - I love it when pagans such as Chris rattle on about Catholic Church social teaching and history -- the lack of understanding of how the Catholic Church operates is always amusing, but at least Chris did know who started St Vinnies.

diy tv sounds cool but will it be as international as it hopes?

2005-06-19T21:06:00.000+10:00

DIY TV? ... Mmmm this is a cool idea. Eric Hellweg gives it a bit of analysis. God knows we need TV like this but I suspect that TV is caught up in a vicious cycle -- as intelligent viewers switch off, the pressure on TV to be intelligent is reduced - they churn out even dumber stuff ... and the cycle goes on. Point is I'm not sure if there are many intelligent people left watching TV or at least people who are watching TV for its ideas.
But I can't help thinking that while $25m is a shitload of money it may be well short of what's required to produce what appears to be a channel based heavily on world content. I think its underestimated how the planned international content is to be integrated into what looks like a product aimed at the North American market produced by North Americans. I'm not sure but I don't think North American TV has a lot of experience with "world" content (compared to say a TV station like SBS in Australia which was specifically set up to broadcast world content). I had a look at the Board members and there was one lonely soul who wasn't North American, even the Founding Committee - with 102 members only had 10 people from outside North America aand most of those were South Africans - not exactly your typical developing nation. No staff or consultants are from outside North America. The human resources don't really match the international focus promised in the programming content. Will you cope with content in Mongolian, Amharic, Wolof, Haitian Creole, Esperanto and Zulu?

reelin reelin reelin (in shock)

2005-06-17T09:13:00.000+10:00

today IS a good day.
Ha ha ...first something to make you laugh - reel it in ... ride that fish big boy!...

Now something to laugh at - six solar powered bins, six solar powered benches, London "artists" GreyWorld and a whole bunch of bullshit.
Let's allow Andrew Shoben, from Greyworld, to take up the story --- Andrew?

"At first glance it may look like nothing has changed at all but the bins and benches all have unique personalities."They are what's called "generative" so that over time they develop more and more personality."You'll find that one bench may be particularly attracted to a particular bin. They will chuckle and giggle sometimes or make rude noises."

Impressive isn't it... But wait! There's more - the "how you say it"... kicker? Those tricky "artists" Greyworld managed to get a three year maintenance contract to keep those benches and bins bonking. Now how much would you pay for all this - what, a cold toasted ham sandwich and a cup of tea you say - well, actually, the UK Arts Council is forking out £110,000 for all this - Damn cheap at twice the price I hear you mutter. You're muttering because your a dog! Each of those benches works out at £18,333 or £6,111 per year.

Both these nibbles via inflight correction.

tv dads so unreal its scary

2005-06-17T08:36:00.000+10:00

via brednecker Benjamin Adam's today list, this from CNN Money

Today's TV dads average salaries of $195,000 after adjusting for inflation, according to Salary.com. By contrast, the favorite TV fathers of the 1950s made an average of about $75,000 a year in today's dollars.

And we'd all be surprised by that? Even the unreality TV is unreal. So, let's get this straight - unreality TV is not like reality (viz above) and "reality" TV is completely unreal (like when was the last time you had to live in a few small rooms with 10 stupid 20yos or had to complete a bunch of "challenges" on a jungle covered island - fuckin never right!). So right now there's nothing that's real on TV?

And...you...say - that's the way we like it! Scary isn't it?

if you really must, then adsense

2005-06-17T08:26:00.000+10:00

If you really must run ads on your blog and you think ad relevancy (zzz! what? sleeping already?) is important then you'd best run Adsense. But who gives?

google s.f. 3d map useful for non-profits

2005-06-17T00:39:00.000+10:00

Wade Rouse thinks up some uses for Google's latest "technology according to..." a 3D map of SF. As well as the apps mentioned by Mr Wade I think it would be a very cool tool for those involved in public interest advocacy, education aand a heap of non-commercial uses.

people's grocery linecast

2005-06-16T14:33:00.000+10:00

ENNs latest EarthNews netcast on the People's Grocery. Get the food to the people. Fuck yeah! This one is right up Bucket Lard's alley.

2005-04-23T21:18:00.000+10:00

avid

save google searches so they're never lost

2005-04-22T14:56:00.000+10:00

The SMH reports that Google has launched a beta version of a personal search tool that maintains a record of all your Google searches - forever. Currently, Yahoo!, Ask Jeeves and A9.com, a search engine owned by Amazon.com, offer a feature that provides users with a limited look at past search activity. Google's software for searching computer hard drives, introduced last fall, also provides a snapshot of past web searches. Check out the personal search tool at Google Labs.

australians take to firefox

2005-04-18T09:57:00.000+10:00

Australian's are taking to Firefox like a duck to water. ZDNet reports a big jump in the number of Australians downloading Firefox over the last 12 months and one of them was me. Now all I have to do is convince IT staff at our school to make the switch.

And whilst a better browser is part of it all I'm sure a lot of Firefox users are there for the free-kick against Microsoft. Beyond the browser wars Marc Andreessen is spot on when he says that "Firefox is chipping away at [IE's] stranglehold, but more important, it is showing that a loose collection of volunteer contributors from around the world can deliver software that can compete with any commercial effort". That's the big lesson here.

super 8 ... i think i love you

2005-03-31T11:08:00.000+10:00

Super 8 is starting to appeal to me (again) and is pretty cheap to pick up on ebay - for $10-80 - well below the price of video cameras. Plus there's the "charm" of film - real cut and paste! Plus I've got a shitload of old film I took that I should really edit up. Stupid punk and art stuff from Brisbane in the early 80s

Some resources
Super8site
The Super 8 wiki
Mondofoto's Super 8 museum
Article and review of some key texts on Super 8 by Joe Heuman