Sunday, May 15, 2016
Still here
Who knows when stuff you post on the web will go missing, so all I am doing here is placing a marker, to say that I'm still here and things are just fine. I am still on the web, I am not quite dead yet and I look forward to posting something of interest, right here, in perhaps the next decade.
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Château de Chasselas
I think I'm becoming quite bored with the old interweb, although slick and sometimes not so slick websites are trying their darndest to interest me with embedded advertising.
I heard that Facebook hit $800 million in revenue in 2009, meaning that the social sites are having quite an impact on my subliminal thoughts, the trouble with that is my "liminal" thoughts are not really being tickled any more by what I see on the bazillions of pages out here in the wild, wild, interweb.
Although, a bazillion is a bit of an exaggeration as I only really click on about half a dozen news sites, one or two social sites and a few select forums. Add gmail into it and the online sessions become quite predictable and automated, cruising the usual and shutting down the computer with a sense of boredom and an odd desire to buy a Lexus.
The Monty Python four Yorkeshiremen sketch comes to mind as I think back about the beginnings of my own web experience, the dial-up Q-Link on my Commodore 64 with a 1200 baud modem (that be four times as fast as a 300 baud) - "Luxury!" and "You were Lucky" as the only source for my online (and expensive) sessions was an ascii frontpage directing me towards handy tidbits of ascii wonderment and the occasional clumsy advert in three colors.
"I used to dream about having three colors!"
You would think that because we have come so far from the early dial up and bbs days that things would be more interesting, yet, as the internet has gravitated to just another media source (with a monthly mortgage) the desire to have something more in the wild-west frontier style, something new, is rekindled.
I wonder about the new ones, the children who have now grown up with the internet as a way of life and not something that "arrived" when they were in their second or third decade, what will be the excitement in their lives that will be eventually taken away as the paint dries?
I heard that Facebook hit $800 million in revenue in 2009, meaning that the social sites are having quite an impact on my subliminal thoughts, the trouble with that is my "liminal" thoughts are not really being tickled any more by what I see on the bazillions of pages out here in the wild, wild, interweb.
Although, a bazillion is a bit of an exaggeration as I only really click on about half a dozen news sites, one or two social sites and a few select forums. Add gmail into it and the online sessions become quite predictable and automated, cruising the usual and shutting down the computer with a sense of boredom and an odd desire to buy a Lexus.
The Monty Python four Yorkeshiremen sketch comes to mind as I think back about the beginnings of my own web experience, the dial-up Q-Link on my Commodore 64 with a 1200 baud modem (that be four times as fast as a 300 baud) - "Luxury!" and "You were Lucky" as the only source for my online (and expensive) sessions was an ascii frontpage directing me towards handy tidbits of ascii wonderment and the occasional clumsy advert in three colors.
"I used to dream about having three colors!"
You would think that because we have come so far from the early dial up and bbs days that things would be more interesting, yet, as the internet has gravitated to just another media source (with a monthly mortgage) the desire to have something more in the wild-west frontier style, something new, is rekindled.
I wonder about the new ones, the children who have now grown up with the internet as a way of life and not something that "arrived" when they were in their second or third decade, what will be the excitement in their lives that will be eventually taken away as the paint dries?
Saturday, June 12, 2010
SSDD
It may be a general malaise with the interweb, but I feel as though I've lost my way, that logging on is a repetitive chore that results in very little.
Boot the PC, check gmail, check ebay, check facebook, stare at screen and wonder what to check next.
The temptation is then to switch the PC off and go and do some gardening, which isn't such a bad thing I will agree, yet, the other day either my modem, router or cable connection were acting up and I was on with tech support for an hour trying to fix something that bores me anyway.
It is apparent that I can't live with the internet and tend to fret and suffer when it is not there.
I could rant about the level and quality of technical support, and that it is irritating that someone at the other end of the line can ping my modem for ten seconds and confidently state that "there's no fault on our end". Leaving me to wonder what suddenly went wrong with a setup that has run well for years, then inextricably the problem corrects itself.
I could rant about that, but it really won't do me any good, maybe would amuse someone out there who has happened upon this blog, the overall point of this ramble is that now the internet is back up and solid I am free once again to log on and quickly arrive at my boredom point.
I shall end this entry with a random word.
mugwump.
Boot the PC, check gmail, check ebay, check facebook, stare at screen and wonder what to check next.
The temptation is then to switch the PC off and go and do some gardening, which isn't such a bad thing I will agree, yet, the other day either my modem, router or cable connection were acting up and I was on with tech support for an hour trying to fix something that bores me anyway.
It is apparent that I can't live with the internet and tend to fret and suffer when it is not there.
I could rant about the level and quality of technical support, and that it is irritating that someone at the other end of the line can ping my modem for ten seconds and confidently state that "there's no fault on our end". Leaving me to wonder what suddenly went wrong with a setup that has run well for years, then inextricably the problem corrects itself.
I could rant about that, but it really won't do me any good, maybe would amuse someone out there who has happened upon this blog, the overall point of this ramble is that now the internet is back up and solid I am free once again to log on and quickly arrive at my boredom point.
I shall end this entry with a random word.
mugwump.
Darn Adverts
Facebook has been irritating me more in the last month or so, they are fiddling and changing things that means that more chaff ends up as "top news" on my main page. I suddenly find that I am "friends" with Peter Gabriel and Queensryche and many other groups and topics that were part of my original "about me" profile.
The group of original friends, maybe a dozen, has grown fivefold and quite a few of the less focused buddies play poker or farmville or something else that needs to inform me of their every achievement so I find myself being elbowed out of the so called social network by information about nothing.
Advertising.
The same is true with other "free" websites, even Youtube is becoming a vehicle to inform me of nothing in particular as commerce and "value added" features, such as advertising, finds its way onto my screen real estate.
Even the user agreement at wordpress, which was my fledgling blog, alluded to the potential for the slipping in of crap, I only found out by logging on to that blog without ownership, perhaps blogger is the same.
Although of course, this blog is usually information about nothing, so more would be icing on the nothing cake, so I apologise to any of the invisible readers out there for this pollution ;)
The group of original friends, maybe a dozen, has grown fivefold and quite a few of the less focused buddies play poker or farmville or something else that needs to inform me of their every achievement so I find myself being elbowed out of the so called social network by information about nothing.
Advertising.
The same is true with other "free" websites, even Youtube is becoming a vehicle to inform me of nothing in particular as commerce and "value added" features, such as advertising, finds its way onto my screen real estate.
Even the user agreement at wordpress, which was my fledgling blog, alluded to the potential for the slipping in of crap, I only found out by logging on to that blog without ownership, perhaps blogger is the same.
Although of course, this blog is usually information about nothing, so more would be icing on the nothing cake, so I apologise to any of the invisible readers out there for this pollution ;)
Filtering
I've blogged a lot over the last ten years and have alluded that I don't particularly blog what I really think, mainly because there have to be many filters on our thoughts, a concept introduced to me by a very good friend of mine who died in 2001.
The concept of filtering has to be addressed and I believe we all do it. I have a friend who has a "situation" and a close relative who has a similar "situation" and my reaction to both is the same, quiet support, but in reality, I don't agree with what's going on in their worlds.
I will not alienate, or take sides against them, so a major filter is applied to nod and acquiesce to their situation, I don't want to make matters worse by taking a contrary position against their actions and risk losing a friendship that perhaps could not be fixed in a lifetime.
If I was true to myself I should respond truthfully, however, that's not going to happen and I have to bite my tongue and watch the inevitable pair of trainwrecks happen.
The concept of filtering has to be addressed and I believe we all do it. I have a friend who has a "situation" and a close relative who has a similar "situation" and my reaction to both is the same, quiet support, but in reality, I don't agree with what's going on in their worlds.
I will not alienate, or take sides against them, so a major filter is applied to nod and acquiesce to their situation, I don't want to make matters worse by taking a contrary position against their actions and risk losing a friendship that perhaps could not be fixed in a lifetime.
If I was true to myself I should respond truthfully, however, that's not going to happen and I have to bite my tongue and watch the inevitable pair of trainwrecks happen.
Recycling
I'm a grumpy 52 year old, who has bought Tubular Bells three, maybe four, times in this lifetime, bought Titanic twice and will not be following the ship to the bottom one more time in blu-ray or whatever derivative, requiring bi-colored glasses that rises from the industry.
What's my point?, well, I'll refer back to Tubular Bells which, back in 1973 was an amazing album and, as with all our stereo or quadrophonic vinyl, was very analog. It was digitally remastered by Virgin (not by Mike Oldfield) and I considered that it would be worth the cost of the CD. In 2003 Mike Oldfield created his digital version and in 2009, when the original tapes were released back to him, he created a new stereo mix from the original.
In the last few days, I've listened (on my Axim) to the first, grabbed via a USB turntable and the last and I'm wondering why I spent all that extra money, the only difference being a slight hiss and a few crackles and pops and to my creaking ears I realise that the money would have been better spent on wine.
What's my point?, well, I'll refer back to Tubular Bells which, back in 1973 was an amazing album and, as with all our stereo or quadrophonic vinyl, was very analog. It was digitally remastered by Virgin (not by Mike Oldfield) and I considered that it would be worth the cost of the CD. In 2003 Mike Oldfield created his digital version and in 2009, when the original tapes were released back to him, he created a new stereo mix from the original.
In the last few days, I've listened (on my Axim) to the first, grabbed via a USB turntable and the last and I'm wondering why I spent all that extra money, the only difference being a slight hiss and a few crackles and pops and to my creaking ears I realise that the money would have been better spent on wine.
Hit the ground running
In the last three months I have bought myself, via my ebay dealings, into a commanding position in the technological miracles of 2005.
I have acquired a pair of pocket PCs, Dell Axim X51v's - the Vee being all about the VGAness of the units. Imagine that, VGA - say it slowly, Video Graphics Array.
According to Wikipedia (and we all know how accurate this is) the legendary VGA was the last graphical standard introduced by IBM that the majority of PC clone makers conformed to, that is, before everything went wacko and people wanted to play Doom at higher resolutions.
The Axim has offered me a way to spark a few neurons and actually learn how to do things again, after all, the yearly anniversary of me starting the lawn mower has gone by, so I needed something new to spread my limited attention span past the "Holmes on Homes" and "Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2" moments.
Exciting new, old technology.
I have acquired a pair of pocket PCs, Dell Axim X51v's - the Vee being all about the VGAness of the units. Imagine that, VGA - say it slowly, Video Graphics Array.
According to Wikipedia (and we all know how accurate this is) the legendary VGA was the last graphical standard introduced by IBM that the majority of PC clone makers conformed to, that is, before everything went wacko and people wanted to play Doom at higher resolutions.
The Axim has offered me a way to spark a few neurons and actually learn how to do things again, after all, the yearly anniversary of me starting the lawn mower has gone by, so I needed something new to spread my limited attention span past the "Holmes on Homes" and "Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2" moments.
Exciting new, old technology.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
