Spotify is rolling out a new version of its desktop application over the coming days. Here’s a quick, rushed look at it. ‘What’s New’ Well, when you launch you begin at a redesigned ‘what’s new’ section with the top showing some recommend songs for you. Next there’s ‘top playlists near you’. This seems and is [...] Read more – ‘A quick look at the new Spotify’.
As a web-literate person I like to think I’m pretty good at avoiding the pitfalls of online advertising. You have to be an idiot to click on 99% of internet advertisements as they are spam and irrelevant to what you’re browsing. However, Google’s AdSense algorithms are as smart as its PageRank one, and it’s one [...] Read more – ‘How effective is Google’s ‘Sponsored Links’ on you?’.
Every 6 months or so I go to my local newsagents and buy every newspaper on the shelf, hoping to find a news companion I can maybe subscribe to. I sit on my floor and spread them all out and spend the afternoon reading them but I never really like any. I was going to [...] Read more – ‘My Newspaper Dream’.
I’ve become interested in football (soccer) recently. As a kid I was mildly interested, like most English children are. I inherited the sport. I also inherited my team, Chelsea FC. I remember going to a game or two with my Dad to see them play. Wether I requested to go or not I can’t recall. [...] Read more – ‘Through the teeth for in the flesh’.
I know almost nothing about UI and ‘usability’. However I know when something is stupid. And these fucking hovering bars that follow you as you scroll (highlighted in red) are stupid. They are not just over-sized and ugly but are actually giving me zero useful information and permanently taking up a sizeable chunk of the [...] Read more – ‘Hovering and Hogging’.
There are lots of figures thrown around about the percentage of world wide e-mail traffic being spam. A Microsoft report estimated back in 2009 that 97% of all e-mails sent were spam. The figure may be smaller or greater today, but I don’t know and I don’t care. That’s because spam is no longer an [...] Read more – ‘Spam is no longer a problem (if you use Gmail)’.
So what’s a good search engine? Well, Google comes to mind. Ha, obviously. Bing, Ask and Yahoo are all poor. However, a man called Gabriel Weinberg in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania has created a search engine that seriously rivals the might of Google. It’s called DuckDuckGo and is amazing. I did some basic tests comparing Google [...] Read more – ‘Of Choice: Search Engine’.
Link(s) The Independent — Sushi and whisky: hard time in Russia’s VIP prisons For most people, spending years in a Russian prison camp would be a living nightmare. But one ex-prisoner has described how it can be a time of whisky, sushi and relative freedom – if you have enough money. The Wall Street [...] Read more – ‘Today — Sunday the 28th, August, 2011’.
Link(s) Guardian — This man could save your life Ben Lopez has spent 17 years bartering with kidnappers – and he’s never lost a hostage. The secret, he says, is psychological skill and gut instinct Alex Morris — The Prettiest Boy in the World One evening in late July, a fashion model in very short [...] Read more – ‘Today — Monday the 15th, August, 2011’.
Link(s) of the Day Connor Tomas O’Brien — The Sweet Spot in Ebook Pricing For ebooks, I think the price falls closer to $4. That might seem strange to publishers accustomed to selling paperbacks for $20 and hardbacks for $40. The difference is that, in the print environment, publishers are competing against other publishers for [...] Read more – ‘Today — Sunday the 14th, August, 2011’.
Link(s) of the Day WSJ — The Godfathers Of Film Take On 3-D Scorsese, Coppola and Spielberg are coming out with 3-D movies—just as audiences are showing less interest in the pricey format. Los Angeles Review of Books – An Invitation to Forgetting As Joshua Foer points out in his book Moonwalking with Einstein: [...] Read more – ‘Today — Saturday the 13th, August, 2011’.
Link(s) of the Day History Today — Peter the Wild Boy In the summer of 1725 a peculiar youth was found in the forest of Hertswold near Hameln in northern Germany. Aged about 12, he walked on all fours and fed on grass and leaves. ‘A naked, brownish, blackhaired creature’, he would run up trees [...] Read more – ‘Today — Friday the 12th, August, 2011’.
Backing up all your Google+ data is painless and easy thanks to Google’s pre-existing ‘Takeout’ service. So, just go to google.com/takeout/ and choose the Google services you want to backup and they’ll give you a .zip file with the contents. Your contacts and circles are exported in vCard format (.vcf), your stream as HTML, and your [...] Read more – ‘How to backup your Google+ data’.
It has been a undeniably wonderful season for Barcelona. They have not only won three competitions but won over the hearts of many football fans. I certainly adore them, but do think there’s a little room for improvements and here are my (rather obvious) thoughts. Improve the squad This current team are constantly being called [...] Read more – ‘What’s next for Barcelona? Three ways for improvement’.
I’ve reached that point. That point when you realise your computer just can’t cut it anymore. It is too damn slow and now the time is right to upgrade. I’ve been at that point with my iMac for quite a while now while waiting patiently for the new Mac Pro to be announced, let alone [...] Read more – ‘Alfred will save you time and hassle’.
I’m currently reading “Critical Path” By R. Buckminster Fuller (only just started, but it’s great so far) and I came across this rather nice piece by e.e. cummings so I thought I’d share. A poet is somebody who feels, and who expresses his feeling through words. This may sound easy. It isn’t. A lot of [...] Read more – ‘A Poet’s Advice by e.e. cummings’.
I really like my iPhone 4. It’s beautiful, fast and has a great camera and lots of apps. So what do I want from the new one? Not much hardware wise. Just your usual basic upgrades and improvements. A bigger screen would be brilliant. But mainly I want software updates. I’m kind of sick of just seeing [...] Read more – ‘What I Want From The New iPhone’.
I recently got MobileMe. When I was setting it up to sync all my contacts over multiple devices I somehow lost around half of my phone contacts. It wasn’t too big a deal as I have few contacts and most are intimate friends and family. Except for my friend Sam who lives in Northampton. I [...] Read more – ‘WTF Facebook?’.
I consider Twitter a large part of my (online) life. While I’m on my computer Twitter is like a drip constantly feeding me, keeping me alive. So I consider my Twitter client VERY important. The only problem is that there’re are lots of clients. Personally, I’ve narrowed my search for the perfect client down to Tweetie, Echofon, and, [...] Read more – ‘Dilema: Which Twitter Mac App?’.
“I don’t gamble. I don’t drink. My one vice is buying a new iPhone every summer. Well, that and lying about drinking and gambling.” — John Gruber I got an iPhone 4. I queued, waited, called, hunted and begged and by the end of it all nearly prostituted and stranded myself to get one. But now [...] Read more – ‘iPhone 4 Review’.
