Skyping The Kids

One of the things I had set up before leaving was a webcam for the main PC at home so I could "skype" the girls when I came to the UAE.

Well, Skype worked an absolute treat before I left... skyping the main PC from the lounge room with my laptop worked great and we installed webcams at both mine and Niki's parents places as well. Skyping them worked fine as well.

But over here, sharing one internet connection with a multitude of hotel rooms means that bandwidth is an issue. Sometimes its just slow to bring up normal web pages let alone using Skype. But we persist and thru the many drop outs and freezes, it really has been helpful in helping both me and the girls at home stay in touch. I cannot imagine being here without it... there would be alot more tears at both ends!

The picture quality is fair to good depending on the connection but the best bit is being able to take happy snaps of Niki and the girls whilst chatting to me like these ones below :

Internet Censorship

Internet censorship. The Australian Government wants to "clean feed" the net to ensure that all "objectionable" material is made unavailable... it is a complete furphy and impossible to achieve.

Now there is a movement to stop social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace to remove material of a racial or sexist nature. I am not a racist, but come on people... I think we need to realise that there are racist bigots of all sorts in every part of the world and you cannot legislate against stupidity.

In the age of printed media, we used to try and ban subversive political, racial and sexually explicit material. Given it was a material medium, it was somewhat successful but at the end of the day those who wanted to produce and/or read that kind of material were still able to.

Now in the digital age where it is impossible to stop the physical production of material, it cannot be stopped. I think that people should realise no matter what your sense of right and wrong is and no matter how good you think people are there are people who have a different view to you.

Rather than trying to legislate people into good moral decency and campaign against websites to monitoring the millions of words of content that they host how about we focus on education programs and ensuring that we eradicate the bigotry and an ability to turn the other cheek when people sprout rubbish.

Sticks and stones hey?

Internet Censorship

The Rudd Govt in their infinite wisdom decided to keep plugging away at the previous Govt's efforts to take pornography out of the internet in Australia.

Does anyone see this as some sort of Big Brother (and I mean in the sense of George Orwell's 1984, not Channel 10's Bum Dance Version) effort to control what the "Citizens" see and watch?

I am all for classification and making such material unavailable to minors, but since when do we need the government to step in and protect us from our downloadable tits and arse?

Once they "filter" content and then offer you to register to have unfiltered content, then for whatever reason, your internet viewing habits will be then recorded on some government database.

Once that happens, thats another piece of data on your "permanent record"... to me it sounds like its a big waste of money and the press have picked up on it a bit as well.

As a parent, I would sit with my kids when they're on the internet. As they get older a PC for them will be in the open area of the house. What is more worrisome is this whole issue of kids being online and chatting via myspace and MSN. It is an issue that has resulted in a pitiful 60 Minutes story and also the recent charges laid against a woman for encouraging the suicide of a neighbours girl via cyber bullying.

These are the more worrisome things and unfortunate side effects of kids and technology going wrong... not the fact that sex is on the internet freely for adults.

Geek Nirvana!

I WANT ONE!!

http://www.nikkoamerica.com/nhe/index.html

NO MATTER THE COST!!

What Utter Bullshit

Facebook / MySpace access is now a "key consideration" for employees looking to join an employer. (link)

Come on people, if you cant handle not being able to receive your SuperPokes or your latest invites to be a Ninja or a Zombie, then dont work at all. I have a Facebook profile, but my company blocks it and thats fine by me.

Sheesh! Talk about catering for the lowest common denominator!

Ah, this explains it!

This explains why my Blackberry Calendar is suddenly 1hr out of sync with my Blackberry clock and my desktop calendar...

Was wondering wtf was going on!

Proof! Mancurians Don't Speak English!

Ha Ha!

http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=92011

Look Over There --->

As a fan of Dilbert and a reader of Scott Adam's blog, I was happy to see he had put up on his site for use a "Dilbert Widget" in which there's a new comic strip everyday of the week... sweet! Enjoy the free daily Dilbert people.

2007 Freeware Listing

Regular tech site I read "LifeHacker" has a list of all their top Freeware Applications for all sorts of things.

Check it out, you may find something useful :)

LINK

Get back to work slackers!

How ridiculous is this?!

Can you imagine having to come into work and have your heart rate monitored? What happens if you “accidentally” look at p0rn on the internet?

Red Alarms and Sirens?!

This stuff is scary because I bet in 100 years, it will be considered normal and Big Brother will be real…

CrackBerry's

Skimming the paper, I saw this article on Blackberry's...

 

I have one and I am finding it both addictive and intrusive.  I can remember getting my first work email account back in the mid-90's and it was going to be amazing how much more free time you will have with such a nifty application.  Our desktops were all individually hooked up to the Internet via our own dial up modems and there would be a cacophany of sound as the modems would wirr and beep every morning.  The speed was amazing as it took "just minutes" to load a website.

 

We had a 12 year old boy - a nephew of an employee - come in and design a website for my work and it took him just 4 hours and he got $200!  (We werent terribly concerned that the website looked like it had been designed by a 12 year old boy, that wasnt the point!)

 

The new age of "greater efficiency at the office equating to greater hours of relaxation time" had arrived.

 

Now, fast forward 10-12 years, this morning my neighbour in the next cube is tired because he has been dealing with our partners in Spain all weekend via his Blackberry and laptop, my boss is in a tizz because some deal has gone awry over the weekend and he has 100's of emails in his system, I myself spent the greater part of my train trip in dealing with an issue from our Adelaide office that cropped up over the weekend and we all have these little black devices within arm reach of us 24x7 to deal with any crisis that may arise.

 

And thats the difference... with email, the definition of a "crisis" has changed... basically it is now expected that you deal with ANYTHING that comes onto your email - either via the work PC or the BlackBerry - with immediate expediancy.  No longer do we "deal with it on Monday", but now it is the norm that things are dealt with before anything else - even if thats a family matter.

 

Sad, but true, we are now working longer than ever before....

Yes Please!

My ultimate household appliance!

 

With my birthday coming up, dont be daunted by the US$2000 price tag, get bidding!!!

 

Ideal Gift Idea For The Man About The House

The Life of Riley

Blogging is a relatively new media and sometimes you wonder how it all comes together and why people do it. Is internet publishing via a blog forever? Will Lime Kettles be around for all of eternity as some sort of time capsule?

Interesting thought... and how should we use the internet to record history? Well the site below is an example of how the internet is not just for computer games and porn, but rather a way to keep history. The Life of Riley is a blog about 107 year old Olive who tells her stories to the blogger who then types them up along with old photos.

A great idea! See, internet publishing can be purposeful and historic!

55 Essential Articles Every Serious Blogger Should Read

I haven't read this, but am posting it for my own reference and future reading... Ironic hey... posting a blog post about an article on how to do better blog posts... mmm, very freudian.

55 Essential Articles Every Serious Blogger Should Read | Entrepreneurial Blog of Matt Huggins

Are You Living in a Computer Simulation?

Seen the movie The Matrix? Reckon it could be real? Do you think that maybe we are simply energy sources for a post-humanity world and to while away the time, human history is played to our subconscious on a continuous loop?

Does that explain the view of Near Death Experience and the "going to the light" or also the plausibility of reincarnation - i.e. we were rebooted and rejoined the simulation at a later date and time?

Do you think its a load of rot?

Well, at least some boffins at Oxford are debating it...

Are You Living in a Computer Simulation?: " "

Webware Top100

A link I came across for the voting for the Top 100 web applications in a variety of categories... I personally don't care who wins, but I will be trawling thru these lists for some gems for my personal use...

What are the best 100 Web 2.0 sites and services? We don't know. But you do.

How the time flies...

Just realised I forgot to do a post today... been flat chat...

But not all work... I won't get into work issues, but I have been busy on the gaming front too...

On Tuesday night, played my Round 7 game of the Spike Cup - a western Sydney Blood Bowl League - and won that game 4-1.  I am now running second with a 5-0-2 record and face the unbeaten (assuming they win Rnd 7 as well) Dwarves (how ironic) in Round 8.  Using the new LRB5 rules, the comp has been excellent!

Also, have been getting ready for Eucalyptus Bowl in July... am playing the Death Roller and the team is all ready to go... I also finished painting my Pro-Elves and am now back to the Skaven... when they are done, the next project is a Rotters team for CanCon 2008... busy on the painting front!

Still on Blood Bowl, my mate Noyz has bought himself a game board and a team and we'll start getting him back into the game... he hasnt played in about 10-15yrs, so it will be interesting to see if he's still as keen as he was.

On other things, its Mothers Day weekend... so it will be a busy weekend seeing our Mum's and then also giving Niki a good day on Sunday... I have a present, but its a secret ;-)  ssssh!

Podcasting - am loving it... my evening routine now involves downloading the podcasts i have subscribed to and I must admit I was pissing myself (embarrassingly so) on the train this morning listening to Tony Martin... very funny.

OK... sorry for the lame evening post... something tomorrow :)

Podcasting

I have finally discovered the world of Podcasting... I like to pride myself on being up with the latest technology, but this mythical Podcasting thingy was something I never really got into, until now.

I like radio shows... I like breakfast radio and the like but a) the ads shit me and b) the music gets in the way sometimes and I am not 100% aligned to one station on the basis of its music programming... (Triple M best suits me, but sometimes there is only so much Barnesy one can take!)

So, now that I have a PSP and I now know how to download music and other MP3 files to it I have now taken to podcasting these shows...  You will see on my Blog Roll on the right hand side of this site the current radio shows I am podcasting.  If anyone has any others (doesnt have to be radio comedy) let me know!

End of Pandora

I use quite heavily the website Pandora to listen to tailored radio streams.  Its a great service, and has been running for many years after it was commenced as part of the Music Genome Project.

I received an email from Pandora yesterday stating that due to US Legislation changes they can no longer offer Pandora outside of the US.  As an Aussie, that means me!

I cannot follow this legislation, but there is a petition and a blog link trying to explain it all...

If you're a Pandora listener, you should have received a similar email to me...

Quick One

Been very busy at work this week and am going to be out of the office all day, so a quick post before I leave for the train...

Firstly, the power of the internet... this Virginia Tech massacre... so many people blogging about it that even main stream media were hitting blog sites looking for scoops.  But then the kicker... the shooter took the time out to compile a multi media manifesto!  Shoot 2 people.... get on the PC doing some video and photo edits... burn a CD and post it to NBC then shoot 30 more.  How clinical is that!  Amazing and I am sure more on this will come out over the weekend.

Second, the weekend will be pretty quiet this weekend except Kate makes her netball comp debut on Saturday morning.  First "comp" game after weeks of training and a trial.  And we are the family entrusted on the roster to bring the oranges this week!

Will give a wrap of the big game over the weekend!