Entries from October 2006 ↓

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The Beeb has a great timeline for you to play with and to learn about the the web’s history. Golly gosh mamma the net’s history goes all the way back to, (gulp!), the 6th August 1991.

That is just an awesome number of years ago. It’s eons ago! Was Oasis even a band then? Was Sir Cliff Richard a tennis playing popstar-Wimbledon-crowdcrooning-UK-icon yet?

Wow the web is ancient!

Click here to interact with the BBC’s Internet Timeline. It’s kiff.

Groovy Internet History Timeline

CAN YOU GUESS WHO THIS IS?

He is a South African and he is a successful iScatterling. Read on (courtesy of Wikipedia)

Musk was born and grew up in South Africa, the son of a South African engineer and New York City dietitian and model. He left home at 17 for Kingston, Ontario where he enrolled at Queen’s University. He left South Africa without his parents’ support, in part because he wished to avoid compulsory service in the South African Defence Force. He was awarded a scholarship to the University of Pennsylvania, where he received an undergraduate business degree from Wharton, staying on another year to finish a second degree in physics.

Musk lives in Bel-Air, California, with his wife Justine.

In 1995, Musk went on to a graduate program in energy physics at Stanford, in which he stayed exactly two days before dropping out to start Zip2, which provided online content publishing software for news organizations. In 1999, Compaq’s AltaVista division acquired Zip2 for US$307 million in cash and US$34 million in stock options.[2] Elon and his brother Kimbal held about 12 percent of Zip2 at the time.

In March 1999, Musk co-founded X.com, an online financial services and email payments company. One year later, X.com acquired Confinity, originally a company formed to beam money between Palm Pilots, and the combined entity focused on email payments through the PayPal domain, acquired as part of Confinity. In February 2001, X.com changed its legal name to PayPal. In October 2002, PayPal was acquired by eBay for US$1.5 billion in stock. Before its sale, Musk, the company’s largest shareholder, owned 11.7% of PayPal’s shares.

In June 2002, Musk founded his third company, Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX), of which he is currently the CEO and CTO. SpaceX develops and manufactures space launch vehicles, with an emphasis on low cost and high reliability. The company’s first two launch vehicles are the Falcon 1 and Falcon 9 rockets.

In addition to his business activities in entrepreneurial space, Musk is an early round investor in and Chairman of the Board of Tesla Motors, a high performance electric sportscar startup company. He is also an early round investor in and Chairman of the Board of SolarCity, a photovoltaics products and services startup company.

Musk’s fortune is estimated at US$328 million.

I find it fantastic to know that two of todays toprated online payment systems, (Thawte and PayPal) are where they are due to South African grown entrpreneurial enterprise.

Who Is This iScatterling?

It’s been a less than perfect week at iScatterlings.com due to one thing or another. All in all, I think Misty at her blog called By The Way has had an absolutely fabulous week and even crucified some poor anonymous poster. Boy oh boy the handbag bladdering and scratching eyes out that went on here in her Liquid Nitrogen article, was outrageous! A must read for all the comments.

1. Acidic Ice - Sighing her way through the Xmas snow!

2. Guy Kawasaki - Guys shows us how to Change the World’s Defensibility.

3. ChampagneHeathen - Champers is a little uninspired and overheated but learning Life Saving Skills.

4. Cheap Tart -Cheap Tart wonders if those shoes could talk, what would they say?

5. Cook Sister - Jeanne becomes the Galloping Gourmetette and says Hello from Connecticutt.

6. Doc Searls - Is Listening In?

7. CaZ - CaZ Lists her Top 10 of Top 10 Lists

8. Insanely Single - Now she’s doing touristy things at home!.

9. KattBox - Katt is back and demanding Input! She needs input! OK go give some input. But reboot her first.

10. Kyk Noord - I did not know that Kyk is an aktor. Here he talks about slippery people. As in greasy pole type slippery or skelems?

11. John Dodds - It’s a numbers game according to John & The Times. Read it.

12. Misty - Misty can’t say it out loud any louder than she did when she crapped out some poor commentor at her blog who did not identify himself. Nice bitchy stuff and rude too. I loved it. Great article. Better comments!

13. Robert Scoble - Telling us what 14 year olds in Hollywood do. Really? Zits n clits?? Nah - they are into cars. Go figure it. Shame on them for destroying every other 14 year old zit infested teenagers’ erotic dream(s). Unless the car is a means to an end?

14. Michelle - Michelle now wants to clone herself. Oh yes please! More, more, more…!

15. Seth Godin - Seth talks Kitsch. Novel for him yes?

16. David Tebbutt - It’s all about Office 2.0. Read it.

17. Urban Trash - South African cartoonist Jeremy talks stereotyping but more importantly, did you know he launched his book on 17th October? Did you buy one? No? Then do so. You’ll love it. Help improve the Kak-O-Meter reading.

18. Willie Baronet - Willie is on his way home from South Africa after fulfilling a lifetime dream of seeing cheetahs and a stayover at Pungwe. Brilliant and welcome to SAfrica Willie

19. Aquila Online - Ag shamepies, Aquila is moer warm! Sistog!.

20. Bad Language - Matthew warns us about writing a lot of technobilge in our autobiography. If Carly Fiorina’s book is full of meaningless bilge, then you better never resort to Technobilge!

21. BigRic - BigRic reports on Britain’s first incident of Web Rage. Well, Sweden has now joined the club. Well done Misty!.

22. Boer Seun - Damnit! Now we know the truth about the beauty-babe business. They use PhotoShop too?

23. Escape Cubicle Nation - And here is where I got the idea for my Top 10 List of Top 10 Lists. Go see the original. You must.

24. Gaping Void - Podcasting from Cork!

25. Geeks Girl - No change!

26. La Dolce Vita - I think it’s the small things that count. Dolce does not. She hates me.

27. The Real Marbro - Keeps it Quick n Simple. Hooray!!

28. OneAfrikan - Moneytizing your site.

29. Rox In The City - Rox reckons stress sucks. It does. But she is now Roxilla isn’t she?

30. ShutterJane - ShutterJane shows us in her photo how morning dawned today. Lovely pic.

31. White African - Go read 5 different blogs from Uganda. Interesting.

32. Woza Friday - Dave found a small thing called Flikrdown. Go find out too!

This edition of the Roll-Up is a day early. I have a full day tomorrow leading into Friday night so won’t be able to blog. If I get a window though - I will serve up something delicious.

iScatterling Blogroll Round Up

I have been a customer of Lloyds TSB since the 90’s. Back in the good old days we had a branch manager to whom we go and talk to about our cashflow problems, investments, Oom Stralie’s lumbago and enjoy a cup of tea and a biscuit with him or her.

It was fabulous to leave the bank knowing that that human in that building, a respected memeber in your community, had heard you, had advised you and had also tried to save you interest fees and secured your loyalty to the institution he or she worked for.

Why do I moan?
Well today we have Regional Account Managers instead of a Bank Manager. No more loyalty to me ergo screw them and I will be looking to close all my business with LloydsTSB ASAP

What is a Regional Account manager?
Dunno. Only spoke to one in the decade since this species replaced the Bank Manager.

What do they do?
Dunno but I heard that they call at my branch maybe 3 or 4 times a month. Maybe.

Well can I call my branch?
Yes but only ‘cos I retained the telephone number in my old filofax from years ago. If you did not know any better, you have to call a call centre. Yes, you have to call a 0800 number to discuss your financial affairs with someone who does not live nearby. In fact I think there are either oceans or continents between me and the person who answered the 0800 number that I dialled.

What do you think about that?
I don’t know who the fatcat board of directors at Lloyds TSB are trying to fool or foist costs onto but I do know that they get a kickback on the calls you make to the Indian call centre and the other 0800 numbers you are forced to call if you want to complain or discuss your finances or even to make an appointment to speak to a human Regional Manager. Am surprised they are not humanoids. Mmm maybe they are!

Why do they keep sending demand letters enclosing a blank Direct Debit mandate when I have a standing order setup (to 3 times the value they want paid every month), to pay each month? I dunno. Maybe they don’t know how to review account details on a screen and translate a negative value into one of two things - a payment or a credit!

I could go on and on about the total deterioration of the bank/customer relationship but time zone depending, I know you need to go to sleep or make supper or breakfast. I cannot believe that at a time when we need that human touch, Lloyds TSB still alienate me even further. We pay through the nose in fees to feed the millions in net profits LloydsTSB make each year and all we get is ultrashite service.

They probably think that I should feel grateful for the fact that they allow me to bank with them.

Here is an idea I have nicked from Pamela Slim at Escape From Cubicle Nation!

I am not the kind of guy who can go through a day without making a list of this or adding to my other lists. So, I decided to share with you my Top 10 List of Top 10 Lists.

Starting at the top:

1. Top 10 To Do List

2. Top 10 Business Ideas

3. Top 10 Domain Names

4. Top 10 Gadgets to Buy

5. Top 10 Holiday Destinations

6. Top 10 CDs

7. Top 10 Things to buy for Home

8. Top 10 Clothing Items to buy

9. Top 10 Hiking routes

10. Top 10 Xmas Gifts for Family & Friends

There. That is my list so now it is your turn!

Over at Bad Language, you can read Matthew’s post about The Economist’s review of Carly Fiorina’s (ex CEO of Hewlett Packard) biography, Tough Choices

QUOTE:The review closes with a damning paragraph:

Her bigger theme is leadership, and this is where Ms Fiorina fails. Again and again, she interrupts a good narrative with vain and verbose harangues about corporate strategy. From one paragraph to the next, her language becomes wooden and cliched as she descends into meaningless jargon….

This makes me think that the corporate bullshit that passes for communication in large companies starts at the top. END QUOTE

Thanks Matthew! Oh how sweet this opinion is to mine ears!

Y’see, if the top fatcat communicates bullshit to his minions, they all probably think it is the way we should all be speaking. And so everybody thinks its cool to speak in acronyms and empty meaninless soundbites so eventually nobody knows how to interpret the big boss’s dreams into actions in order to realise a profit.

As a result and little knowing that he started the whole sorry mess by not speaking to his workforce in clear and simple English terms, Mr Fatcat Meaningless Communicator fires your sorry ass for not producing the results. Hey, how fair is that?!

It is not fair is it. So I think we all need to be on the hearout for bosses who rather patronisingly, speak to us in meaningless words because they think you should know how BIG & CLEVER they are when they speak to you in meaningless technobilge.

We need to kick their butts and demand that they speak to us in a crystal clear and understandable manner. Stop with the bullshit technobilge. It is not clever and makes you look like an idiot.

iScatterling Factoid: Sloe Gin by Rob the Oppressed

Below are a couple of photos of sloe berries. The berries are used to make Sloe Gin. All that the sloe gin drinkers do is go pick the berries and place them in a jar with sugar, mix in the gin to whatever ratios are required, seal the jars and then let the mix brew for 3 months. Occassional turning of the jars is required in order to release the colours and goodness from the berries.

Click the picture above to see large close-up what the sloe berries look like.

The pics I took are from a concentrated area along the Ridgeway (a section I had not hiked on before), and this avenue of bushes were laden with sloe berries. What is interesting (well to me it is!) is the lichen covered branches of the trees that face into the prevailing wind. Behind these, the trees have normal leaf foliage.

As always, an otherwise beautiful vista is spoilt by man. Destroying the view is the multi-cooling-towered power station at Didcot. Powered by fossil fuel (coal) no less that is bought in from Poland!! Yes it is cheaper than domestic coal. How do we get it so wrong?

Lonely & Bored In Sweden Seeks Excitement by Misty

Because Rob is suffering from mental constipation (a.k.a. writer’s block) I decided to take over and give you a rare insight into the life of a disgruntled foreigner stuck in the desolate Swedish North.

Enjoy!!!

I was going to review my favorite Swedish alcoholic beverages for this article, and with that in mind, I made the trip to the ubiquitous Systembolaget. And because my alcohol intake is limited to the Swedish equivalent of soft drinks, a.k.a. cider, I decided on 6 different varieties of the above-mentioned beverage, in flavors as exotic as raspberry with lime and peach with a hint of vanilla. Which makes me think that cider flavoring is the only area where the Swedes go wild, are not afraid of trying new things, even if those new things involved cactus flavor with a touch of grape.

Pleased with my selection, I made my way towards the cash registers, where a bored, half-dead looking young man took my purchases, along with my credit card and ID. He glanced at the ID, he looked up at me, suddenly, looking decidedly less dead, he announced:
“Oh, hey! I read about you in the paper. You really trashed this place.”
Now, he was looking positively alive.
“But don’t tell anyone. I agree with what you said. It’s just that I’m Swedish, and you know…”

The customer behind me was now listening to the conversation. Yes, you are Swedish, and you are not supposed to criticize this wonderful country out loud. I however, am a foreigner, and as such, granted certain leniency in my views and opinions.

And my views and opinions are now known to the entire country, because a kind newspaper reporter was bored one day, and thought it would be a grand idea to surf the web, find an Umeå blogger and interview him/her. Her bad luck was she found me. A foreigner with a bad mouth, and even worse manners.

The interview appeared in a local newspaper in September, complete with my full name, photo, and a link to my blog. And the hate mail started to roll in. Soon my inbox was clogged with threats, complaints and assorted suggestions to get my bum out of here and move to where the sun don’t shine. One small problem with that – I ALREADY am in a place where the sun don’t shine! Duh!

Public humiliation feels good. Now I truly consider myself to be a part of this town. Finally, I feel I belong. People recognize me and smile condescendingly when I enter their shops. Strangers say “hi”. Bus drivers ask me how my day is going. And every so often, a person secretly admits they agree with me. Like the young, half-dead cashier at Systembolaget.

To those brave ones, who voice their dissent, this Bud’s, or rather cider’s for you.
And speaking of cider, I think I was going to review my favorite peach flavor… Too late now. Instead, here’s the list that inspired more than 800 hate emails.

1. Here up North – the weather. I mean what’s up with that??? People were not meant to live in cold darkness for most of the year.

2. The food. What they call Chinese food here, isn’t. What they call Mexican food here, isn’t. And beef dishes in an Indian restaurant? Was it some kind of a joke maybe? Restaurant food here is mediocre at best, and the service non-existent. And why should the waiters stress too much? They get paid either way, and since tipping is not customary, they don’t give a rat’s ass about customers’ needs. (There are a couple of nice places to eat in our town, and I will review them in the future, no worries!)

3. Mostly non-existent customer service (with the noble exception of the Nordea bank in our town, my optometrist at Se & Synas, and the staff at the Telia cellular shop).

4. Primitive ATM machines and the fact that you have to pay for internet banking, and just about anything else that has to do with banking.

5. The monopoly of Systembolaget and Apoteket. Is the government really that afraid of allowing people to buy their wine and headache medicine at the supermarket?

6. Mostly indifferent attitude towards work ethic. Actually, work ethic seems to be a foreign concept here. Between fikas and lunch breaks, and summer vacations and winter breaks, and maternity leave and paternity leave, and being sjukskriven (sick leave), it’s no wonder that very little gets done here. But nobody seems to mind, so who cares that Swedish companies lose business simply because there is no one to answer the phone during summer? I know of at least 2 businesses that lost contracts this August, as frustrated buyers went to Malaysia instead.

7. TV commercials. C’mon now… In the land supposedly known for outstanding design, this is the best they can come up with? Those art directors and copy writers should all be fired and punished by watching their ads 24/7 for the next few years.

8. Acceptance of mediocrity, be it at work, or in daily life. Is that how the twin evils of lagom and Jantelagen rear their ugly heads? Nobody aspires to anything, but to fit in. Nobody dares to solve any problems, because the solution may contradict their philosophy, and god forbid they will have to change the way they’ve always done things. For most people, it seems, that clinging to their ways is more important than succeeding in the world.

9. Being sjukskriven (sick leave) is a career choice. I think this oddity deserves a point of its own.

10. Poor integration of immigrants and racist (and anti-semitic) attitudes of many supposedly liberal and educated people. True, the same can be said about the US, however in the US they at least admit they have a problem. And nobody would even dare say such a thing in this socialist utopia.

Quadders,Bikers & 4×4ers Break the Law

So much for banning all vehicles on The Ridgeway! They disregard the law. They openly defy authority. They leave their spoor and ripped up grass track as evidence of their bravado. What pathetic & silly idiots they are!

Click to see larger photo

Click to see larger photo

On the left of the photo above you can see the training hurdles for the jump season this winter.

In my recent travels around blogosphere, I have been struck by how many more comments the female bloggers get. They get more comments per post than I do.

Male blogger comments prevail. Why? Mmmmm now let me think this through………………..

I have been asked why I called Hugh Macleod’s business cartoons Aaaarght. The answer is simple although the thought process behind the answer is complex. Sublime simplicity creates a great reaction in me if the intelligence behind the cartoon or humour is of a wickedly satirical nature, and in Hugh’s case like Jeremy Nell’s cartoons, it is enough to make me go “aaaaaargh” in wonderment and incredulty.

Hugh has the genius to create something from nothing and make it fabulously humurous or a sad motif of his world at that moment in time. In my opinion, Hugh has that incredible ability to give you the birdie while you enjoy being the recipient! That takes a truckload and more of talent.

It Makes Me Go - Aaaarght?!

Hands up all those who would have sold their granny to stay in bed today? Me too!

I don’t care if you call it self-fulfilling prophecies, it is a day when what you think may go wrong often does. Take this morning as a fine example. Traffic at 06:45am each day this week has been light and swift moving. What happens today?

Just because it is Friday 13th, most commuters decide to not risk a train journey so go by car. But lets turn up the volume on this. Not only do they all drive in to the office, they all decide lemminglike to leave home and hit the M4 at the same time! How do they do it?

And then lemmings have to crash into each other! Nice. Why don’t we just bring down the barricades and force me to stay put in traffic while my reporting deadline trundles on regardless. Yes, guess what, I wanted to complete my already delayed report before 07:30am and have it ready for publication by 8pm. Fat chance! So two things have just been cocked up by jinx infested Friday 13th.

What else could go wrong? Would you believe it - Sweden goes wrong and do they care that my day is getting progressively worse? No way. For some reason or other but let’s call it a Friday 13th jinx, I get embroiled in a conference call at 09:25am that ends at 11:48am and although the issues are not my department’s concerns, guess who Mr CEO tasks to resolve them? Ja, you got it.

So they say things happen in threes. That is my three but let’s not count our chickens just yet - the day is but still a puppy! So how has your Friday 13th gone so far?

For some while now I have been wanting to interview some of my favourite bloggers. I never got around to doing it until recently. Now that I have been blogging for a while earning a few Brownie points and the timing seemed right, I recently carried out an email exchange with Matthew Stibbe.

Matthew runs three sites Bad Language, ModernPilot and Articulate Marketing. Matthew graciously found time after his long working days had ended to respond to my questions.

Question #1
During your last two senior years at high/grammar school, were you already aspiring to go into the career you have now carved out for yourself? If yes – why? If no – why not?

In England, in your last two years at school, you generally specialise in three subjects and I picked English, French and History, mainly with a view to what I planned to read at university. I didn’t give a great deal of thought to my future career. I was going all different ways. I toyed with becoming a pilot, a lawyer and I designed games. I also loved computers and wrote programs and things. The one thing I didn’t plan on was becoming any kind of writer. Funny how things turn out.

Question #2
What did you begin to study at college and end up receiving a degree in? Explain why if it differed. Explain the rationale behind your final selection.

I originally applied to read law at university but I had a change of heart and took a year off and reapplied to read modern history. During my year off I designed a couple of computer games - ‘Nam which was eventually published by Domark and Imperium which was published by EA. I chose history because I had really enjoyed it at school and because I was having so much fun designing historical games. I spent three years studying modern history and nothing else. I loved every minute of it. I went to Oxford University. I think the Oxford method comes as a surprise to foreigners - the only commitment, apart from sitting exams, was to attend 8-12 tutorials a term and produce an essay for each one. The tutorials were with practicing historians rather than teaching assistants. It was just you and perhaps one or two other students in each tutorial. You read out your essay and then argued about it for an hour. It was daunting - especially because the tutors were often world authorities on the subjects whereas I had spent just a day reading about it. Flimsy evidence, little research, last minute preparation - I suspect that the whole process was a wonderful rehearsal for the life of a freelance journalist!

Question #3
What music genre do you like listening to most? Who or which band influenced your early musical preferences?

Eeek. I like a lot of different kinds of music. It’s bit glib to say I like everything. Perhaps I should say that I adore some artists from lots of different genres. I wrote a blog post once about music I listen to while working which contains one of the two Philip Glass jokes that I know. (The post itself is at Bad Language). But if pushed, I’d say my favourite group is the Wu Tang Clan. Partly, I like the shock value (I’m a posh white boy from England). Partly, I think that we’ll look back on them and their like as the Shakespeare’s of our era. They are busy reinventing the language for us.

My wife, Aileen, is an actress and a beautiful singer. To my utter astonishment she has got me onto musicals in a big way. Particularly Stephen Sondheim. Into the Woods is my all-time favourite. Also, a big shout out to Aileen’s friend and colleague, Helen Chadwick (at www.helenchadwick.com). Once described as the Kylie Minogue of the natural voice movement, she is a unique and wonderful singer. She and her group sang at our wedding: “the words we speak, they become the house we live in.”

Come to think of it, although I have the musical ability of a badly tuned radio, I am surrounded by singers and musicians. Two dozen of our friends recorded a CD of songs as a wedding present - one of them had a recording studio and another friend produced it. It was SO moving and special. It would definitely be my Desert Island Disc.

Probably the bands that influenced me most when I was a teenager were The Smiths and The Cocteau Twins. Like going from Oscar Wilde to Salvador Dali. More recently, Sigur Ros do a similar thing to The Cocteau Twins with lyrics that are, well, lyrical without actually making any sense. Also, Talking Heads. Cool, deadpan and very playful with words.

Question #4
Given a choice of vacation, where would you go to experience an ideal holiday? And what is the best bit about a vacation for you, the travel to or the arrival? Why?

I’m more of a city person than a beach person. San Francisco is my favourite destination and I’d happily go there again. For a long time, I used to travel a lot for business and I used to enjoy getting on a plane and being away from the phone and the to-do list for a while. Now, I’m paying for my own tickets and travelling economy, it’s not so pleasant. My favourite kinds of trips are where I fly myself. I fly light aircraft as a hobby and I write about my trips and aviation in general on a blog called ModernPilot.com I had a business meeting in Rotterdam a few weeks ago and flew there myself and my door to door journey time was less than my colleague spent in security and checkin at Heathrow. Plus, you never miss your plane if you’re the pilot - it goes when you’re ready!

Question #5
What legacy would you like to be remembered for?

I don’t really think about a legacy much. Shelley’s poem says it all: “Look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair.” What matters is the here and now. With that in mind, I must keep reminding myself of what Dani Bunten said: “on their deathbed, nobody wishes they had spent more time playing video games.”

Question #6
Has electronic gaming progressed in a way you previously envisaged it would? If yes - provide a few salient examples of how.

Like a lawyer, I’m going to say yes and no. The graphics have improved way beyond anything I expected. Some games today are almost indistinguishable from movies. I was playing Call of Duty on my Xbox 360 and it’s astonishingly realistic. Similarly, I’ve seen Flight Simulator evolve over 20 years or so, from a simple grid and a few triangles for hills to something that looks like the real thing (even if it doesn’t quite fly like it). I have add-ons that simulate the look, performance and avionics of the Cirrus that I fly in the real world and
I often use it to practice tricky instrument approaches. I’m playing LEGO Star Wars and it is as beautifully animated and rendered as a Disney cartoon and, I think, more imaginative.

On the other hand, the actual gameplay - the rules and design that make the game fun to play - has hardly changed. People were playing multi-player online games in the late seventies. World of Warcraft looks awesome but it’s the same as MUD underneath. Most run and jump games have the same timing and feedback mechanisms as Super Mario did in the eighties. Today’s first person shooters have a history that goes back to 3D Monster Maze and similar games. I think some new ideas have come out of Japan but I wish there was more inventiveness in game design and less technical mastery in graphics. The problem is that a hit game takes 100 people two years and $10m to make. You wouldn’t gamble that much money on an untested idea.

Full disclosure: I founded and ran Intelligent Games, a development company. I designed a couple of games and programmed one, but mainly I was a boring, suited manager. Now I’m a writer. I’m cool and I wear jeans.

Question #7
Has blogging had a big impact on your personal life and career? ie Has blogging placed extra demands on your time? When are you most creative? Morning or evening? Do you only blog at certain times of the day or night?

I came late to blogging and I only started Bad Language this year. I had been writing restaurant reviews for pilots for a bit longer on a different site but that wasn’t really a blog. Being a professional writer means that blog isn’t a big challenge: I write 1-2,000 words a day so an extra couple of hundred isn’t difficult. Actually, it’s a pleasure being able to write without constraint as to subject, deadline or style. The blog, for the most part, is just me writing about stuff I’m interested in.

However, it is time-consuming. I probably spend 30-60 minutes a day on blog-related stuff, either reading other blogs or writing new posts. I spend a day or two every few months on blog techie stuff. I batch up improvements to the site that I want to make and then do them over a weekend. By writing first thing in the morning and getting up earlier, it hasn’t really eaten into my working day although it has made it longer.

As to whether it’s a benefit, the answer is ‘yes, definitely.’ I have had at least one piece of work commissioned directly through blogging - actually, from another top blogger. I’m sure several other projects were assigned to me because people knew me through the blog. I’ve also been quoted in national newspapers, Slate and on other leading blogs which is tremendous PR and much more coverage than I ever got from having a live PR person working for me. I get asked to do interviews like this and guest columns which are fun. I’ve also had a publisher contact me to see if I want to do a book. We’ll see what happens there. So it has generated real opportunities, cash money and new friends and interests. My flying blog, ModernPilot.com also has Google adverts which bring in enough money to cover my monthly hosting bill!

Question #8
BAFTAs for electronic games? Merited or not? How do you view the electronic game industry in terms of warranting artistic achievement awards and how does your view determine your answer to this question?. Do you support the inclusion of PC gaming software into what was once traditionally held as a pure theatrical arts based award?

Once you get past the fact that all awards are essentially commercialised in some way, there’s nothing intrinsically wrong with them. Especially where they recognise individual talent (and I don’t mean the owners and managers) or where they recognise invention and originality. I don’t think the big industry awards do either very well.

I used to be a judge on an independent games festival for several years and I’d rather see those guys rewarded and recognised than throw bogus attention on industry giants who can spend their way out of problems.

Bit of a digression but it relates to the question of awards. My biggest regret looking back on my days in the games business was that I didn’t pay enough attention to the genius of the people who worked for me. I was distracted by administrivia most of the time. It seemed important but it wasn’t. People make great games not awards.

Question #9
What are your 3 all-time favourite PC or electronic games and why?

Top three games by time wasted: Civilisation, SimCity and Command and Conquer. Although as Bertrand Russell said: “time you enjoy wasting isn’t wasted time.” Of the games I’ve been involved with, I am very fond of LEGO LOCO. It’s just very cute. Also, Azrael’s Tear - the best 3D adventure game you’ve never heard of. It came out the same week as Quake and died.

Question #10
Given that blogging has entered our personal lives and mainstream business, do you find that blogosphere’s ‘elite’ or Blogebrities is dominated by the tekkie/ marketing/advertising/branding clique despite being the minority user group? If yes, is it healthy for blogging’s future? Also, do you subscribe to Web 2.0 or is it a myth?

The blogs I read are a mix of technology, business and aviation. The aviation roster is interesting because it shows that a subject with a small audience can produce stimulating, well-written blogs. I don’t think it matters which blogs are in the Technorati Top 100 if there’s a blog you like about a subject you enjoy. To use a bit of jargon, it’s the long tail of blogs that interests me, not the hit-driven peak. Interestingly, however much I care about my ranking and stats for Bad Language, I see my other blog, ModernPilot.com in a very different light. Perhaps I personify the very split I’m describing.

I just wrote a long article for Director, a leading UK business magazine, about Web 2.0. Not the word (which I don’t think is terribly helpful) but the technologies and trends that underlie it. One aspect of human behaviour is that we overestimate short term change and underestimate long-term change. Web 2.0 as a buzzword falls into the first category. But underneath the myth are real changes that will be genuinely important.

In Interview with Matthew Stibbe

I have this thing about Technobilge. If you don’t know what Technobilge is then go read my rant here.

It appears that there is a growing pushback on industry to begin communicating in plain English or mother tongue rather than in acronyms. The use of acronyms is a lazy way for people to gain respect. If people who sound off in acronyms to me think it makes me believe they sound clever, then they better think again.

I actually think it is very rude, arrogant, insecure and not at all clever.

This is what the BBC has to say about it.

Geekspeak still baffles web users
Britons are increasingly tech-savvy but are still bamboozled by tech jargon.
According to research from Nielsen/NetRatings, people are buying cutting-edge technology but often don’t understand the terms that describe what their device actually does.

So while 40% of online Britons receive news feeds, 67% did not know that the official term for this service was Really Simple Syndication.

Click here to read the full article

As well as Auntie BEEB “agreeing” with my sentiment, Matthew Stibbe across at Bad Language has a point to make as well. Click here to read Matthew’s Bad language article

Doom mongering by the UN over the Internet. Or is it valid?

Who exactly are the stakeholders who are said to be concerned about what the Internet will be in 5 years time?

Warning over ‘broken up’ internet
By Darren Waters
Technology editor, BBC News website

China has one of the biggest online populations The internet could one day be broken up into separate networks around the world, a leading light in the development of the net has warned.

Nitin Desai, chair of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF), set up by the UN, warned that concerns over the net’s future could lead to separation.

“People are concerned about whether the system we have now will also work five years from now,” he said.

Mr Desai was speaking at a conference in London to discuss the net.

The conference was organised by Nominet, the UK body in charge of domain names ending .uk, ahead of the first-ever Internet Governance Forum, a global gathering of stakeholders in Athens later this month.

Read the rest of Disai’s monologue here