Posts
about one sixth of the world's population is so poor that it produces no significant emissions at all
via guardian.co.uk
Posted via web from Sam Lewis
Tuesday, 29 September 2009
Stop blaming the poor. It's the wally yachters who are burning the planet | George Monbiot | Comment is free | The Guardian
Wednesday, 23 September 2009
Waze
Waze does something similar to Google Maps (as I mentioned in an earlier post) but goes a bit further and is, in some ways, a bit cooler. It has some obvious drawbacks, but it looks interesting.
You can see how it works here.
via Boing Boing
Monday, 21 September 2009
Crowdsourced traffic information from Google
I hinted in an earlier post that I'm increasingly of the opinion that when I replace my iPhone it will be with a handset running a version of Android, not a new iPhone. Apple's strict control over what will work on an iPhone, and over how software can work once it's been blessed with approval just seems too restrictive, and prevents its phones from doing really cool things.
One of those cool things is the way in which Google Maps, when running on an Android or Palm phone (but not on an iPhone), can send information on the phone's location and speed to Google (where steps are taken to preserve privacy), and then the information is sent back to the maps app in the form of an indication of traffic congestion. Simple, ingenious and useful, this is a great example of the possibilities offered by modern, location-aware, internet-connected phones, and one that will only get better as more and more people get involved. But while the iPhone can display traffic information in its maps app, it cannot (currently) contribute traffic data.
You can read more about this here.
Posted via web from Sam Lewis
Spotify searches
As its main selling point is the ability to play almost any music you're looking for, it's helpful to know how to search in Spotify. You can specify what you're looking for in the following ways:
- artist:
- album:
- track:
- year:
- genre:
You can combine these search terms, as in the example "genre:folk year:1950-1960".
And, in their ever-helpful way, Spotify have provided a list of all the available genres as a Google spreadsheet.
Posted via web from Sam Lewis
Spotify is the future
Thanks to another of my Drobo's funny turns, I haven't been using iTunes to listen to music lately, I've been using Spotify. And it has confused me – Spotify just seems to be too good to be true. It's library of music is vast (and growing), and (if you don't mind the adverts) it's free. If you pay (an extremely reasonable) £9.99 a month, you get the adverts removed, and the chance to listen to music on- and off-line on your iPhone or Android phone. And you use Android, you can even listen to music with Spotify while you're using the phone for other things, which is not currently possible with the iPhone. (This is one of what I think is a growing number of reasons to choose Android over the iPhone, but that's another story.) Sharing songs, artists, and playlists with friends or the whole world is so easy, it makes the days of borrowing CDs and making compilations on tape seem almost unbelievably archaic.
So, what are the drawbacks?
Well, you do of course need internet access. But if your connection is down, I think you'll probably cope with the lack of music. Radio does still exist, after all. And Spotify can buffer several gigabytes of data, so temporary network cut-outs shouldn't really be a problem. There are arguments against storing data (especially private data, such as email and documents), but the benefits of storing music on the cloud seem to easily outweigh the problems; storing and backing up a music collection is a job I'd be happy to pass on to someone else.
Spotify is an extremely simple app, and this unfortunately means that it doesn't yet seem to offer personal song ratings and smart playlists, so getting the best out of the huge library is less easy than in iTunes. But it might one day, and I don't think the current lack is too terrible.
At present, searching for some artists will produce a limited list, or nothing at all. This is of course a fairly major problem, but it's not one that cannot change in future. Maybe one day they'll have literally every song recorded in their library, and if the cost of that is £9.99 a month or listening to a few adverts, I think Spotify (or something like it) might just be the future of music.
Friday, 18 September 2009
Thursday, 17 September 2009
Jonathan Meades: Off Kilter
The wonderful Jonathan Meades is back on the telly for a brief series on Scotland. You can watch the first two (and soon, the third and final) episodes here, for a limited time.
I love his use of language, and his unflagging right-headedness – perhaps you will too.
Wednesday, 16 September 2009
Tuesday, 15 September 2009
Monday, 14 September 2009
Tuesday, 8 September 2009
Saturday, 5 September 2009
More on the mural: an update on my previous post
Mural no more? Well, no, not exactly.
In my last post, I linked to a story in the Hackney Gazette on the subject of a Banksy mural on Stoke Newington Church Street. I took the article at its word, and passed on the news that Hackney Council had "destroyed" the painting. I included the photograph from the article, which showed the mural surrounded by black paint, but basically unscathed. I'll admit that I didn't give much thought to the picture, thinking it was a document of the so-called 'destruction' before it was completed. If I had thought about it a little more, the lack of any workmen or ladders in the picture might have seemed a little suspicious. But surely it's gone, right? After all, the article seems to be saying that the mural has gone, a victim of Hackney Council's stated position "not to make a judgement call on whether graffiti is art or not." Well, no.
If you take a closer look at the photo (or the wall itself, as I did today), you'll see that there are a few light black marks over the mural made by paint rollers. Other than that, they have painted around the mural, not over it. Does it look less pleasant than before? Yes, probably. Would a completely black wall be a far better canvas for a new mural, council-sanctioned or otherwise? Yes, definitely. Has Hackney Council "destroyed" this particular mural? No, absolutely not.
So, my apologies. I will think a bit longer next time. This is clearly one of the dangers of instant blog posting. Hopefully I won't come to regret this one too...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)