Monthly Archives: April 2010

Digital Britain: Heil Geffen!

Well, it’s happened – our quaint analogue Britain, full of steam trains and paper books and casette tapes, has made the switchover. We are now, and forever, a Digital Britain.

The Digital Economy Bill has been floating around for some time now, but really gained momentum when Business Secretary and Demon Headmaster lookalike Lord Peter Mandelson got involved, fresh from a totally unrelated trip with, and courtesy of, music industry tycoon David Geffen. However, after much controversy, the Bill has been developed and passed, at a much faster pace than most bills of this nature are, following closely on the heels of Gordon Brown’s announcement of a May 6th election. The dissolution of parliament that precedes a general election, which began on Monday 12th April, means that, unless they did it now, there wouldn’t be a chance to pass the bill until after the election, by which time there could be a new government which may look less kindly on a mostly Labour-backed proposal. This was, quite literally, Labour’s last chance to fuck things up before their, I feel, inevitable defeat at the polls next month, considering that it remains to be seen if the new conservative undetermined ruling party will bother to remove the freshly passed bill when, I’ll freely admit, they have more important things to fix after a turbulent 13 year shit storm run under Labour. To illustrate just how rushed and disorganised this bill was, the debate that preceded the passing of the bill was attended by a meagre 5% of MPs – good to know they’re working for us rather than cleaning out their moats.

The sun is setting on Labour's shit storm

The Digital Economy bill, among other things, essentially gives copyright holders (for example, music labels) the right to anonymous lists of suspected filesharers from ISPs and, if the copyright holder so wishes, get the ISP to send out letters to these customers asking them to stop downloading illegally. If the “offender” continues, record labels can, through a court order, request their name and address from the ISP. Overly persistent “offenders” can get their internet connections choked and/or cut off (the ISPs get fined for not doing so, I gather they’ll end up being quite trigger happy just to cover their own arses). As usual, you have the right to appeal, but I anticipate it’ll be an unnecessarily complex process that many simply won’t bother with.

As all preceding events surrounding this bill, it shows, if nothing else, the government’s complete lack of knowledge about technology; ignoring all manner of technical wizardry that can mask actual “offenders” and pass the blame onto an innocent party, check for unsecured WiFi connections in any urban area and you’ll quickly see what I mean. If your IP address is linked to counts of illegal filesharing, the person who owns that internet connection is responsible, with no accounting for the person who actually commited the offence, which is a problem for anyone lacking the technical knowledge to secure their networks – hopefully something internet security firms will be keen to promote over the next few months (at great financial benefit to them I might add). For this, and so many other reasons, this bill is entirely biased against internet users and dedicated in near totality towards protecting the interests of the music industry.

I am not opposed to these laws because they’re anti-filesharing (though I concede that’s a pretty big part of it), but mainly because this bill has been introduced specifically because of the influence of those with the most money – the music industry – and is entirely about benefiting them rather than any sort of level ground. Obviously, filesharing is illegal – but I hate that these laws will mean that people can be labelled as criminals for something so mindlessly small. In any other circumstances, the copyright holders would be told to take their case up with lawyers, but for some reason the government is getting involved – I’m not suggesting (because I can’t) that any bribery took place, but I feel as though money may’ve been an influence, even if it never passed hands.

I’d hoped, when I first heard about this bill, that it may be the lesser of two evils – with there being concrete and clear laws on filesharing, we can prevent another Jammie Thomas incident, a woman who was fined $1.92 million by record labels for downloading 24 songs, a meagre number by most filesharer standards. However, the moment there was talk of cutting off internet connections, something which is both unfair and nigh-on impossible to properly impose, it became clear that this was not for our benefit.

Another shocking addition to the bill, one which I was convinced would be pulled, is the right of Lord Mandelson to block access to websites who are likely to be used for, or in connection with, illegal filesharing. This is a kick in the balls for video sharing site YouTube, of which there are probably more copyrighted videos than original ones – but don’t hope that the government makes an exception for YouTube, because if they do then by what criteria are they doing so? Because they’re bigger than the others? Well that’s smashing, and oddly reflective of this bill, but if they do so then they can justify blocking and allowing any site on the same grounds – then what you’re left with isn’t the Internet as we’ve known it, it’s simply another list of government moderated and approved content.

If Labour remain in power, or more specifically if Peter Mandelson remains Business Secretary (he’s been sacked from every other position he’s ever held, except bending over for the music industry), then this bill – sorry, I mean act now – is simply the first step in a much bigger re-invention of the Internet. What started out as an independent, fair and open media has gradually degenerated into a culture of monopoly (Google), profiteering and, as we now see, corruption; holding a mirror up to western society. Labour’s party slogan is “A fair future for all” – my arse!

If you want a vision of the future, imagine Peter Mandelson’s boot stamping on a face, whist giving David Geffen a hand-job — forever.

Apple iPad Nano

Not that I’m one to recycle old news – unless you’re not a geek, you will have heard the fable of the now unemployed Apple tester. In a show of stupidity that would make politicians tut with hypocrisy, an Apple employee was testing out a, supposedly, prototype iPhone 4th generation in a bar and left it behind. Whoever picked it up got on the wire to Gizmodo and came away an iPhone prototype poorer and, apparentely, $5,000 richer.

iPhone Fourth Gen - bit like an iPad

For my money, I’d say this is genuine. Firstly, it addresses most of the big problems that iPhone users have, including a front facing camera and a bigger battery (Gizmodo cracked it open and found it to be 16% larger). It has a totally new shape that removes the weird bevels around the edges and slightly rounded back-casing, which made the previous incarnations kinda slippery, to a flat cuboid but maintaining the rounded edges, to stop the people who realise how much money they’ve spent on a piece of crap and attempt to poke their eyes out to punish themselves. Looking at the images, the build seems too well-made to have been an amateur and no professional company would dare mock up an iPhone lest they have their arses handed to them (see Apple’s reaction below). Apple generally announce a new iPhone model at WWDC every summer, and have done for the past three years, so it’s entirely plausible that they’d have a completed model in the prototyping phase by now. Plus, given the collective feeling of “meh” about the 3GS last year, which saw the addition of no major dealbreaking features, Apple would surely want to bring out something that, at least visually, is noticeably different.

Apple are not best pleased about this, apparentely, and e-mailed Gizmodo almost immediately after the story broke asking for it back, which I guess they’ve done. They gave the tester, Gray Powell, a 3GS case to hide the different appearance and, I imagine, told him not to show it off given that the front facing camera (and probably a bunch of prototype serial numbers) would be visible. After Powell abandoned it, the finder picked up the device and, reportedly, noticed the front-facing camera, soon realising (after removing the case I gather) that this was an iPhone – but not as he knew it.

Of course, it’s entirely possible that Apple purposely leaked this – intending to drum up hype and interest in the device before formally announcing it in a couple of months. Of course, none of this has been admitted to, but many devices with significant aesthetic or feature changes that Apple have developed usually have a few workshop pictures leaked by “anonymous sources” on the inside; having done it so many times, if Apple wanted to leak this, they’d have to go big. However, Gizmodo is of the opinion this cigar is just a cigar – that this wasn’t a controlled leak but exactly how it looks: an internal screw-up. Certainly, Apple’s insistence to get the thing back is a break from form, acknowledging a leak at all is a new one, as well as (were it a controlled leak) giving an actual device into the public to be dissected and meticulously examined doesn’t play well for them should their competitors get wind of anything particularly groundbreaking (which I don’t think there is) and rush to answer back.

The leap of faith they must’ve had to take, also, that this would fall into the right hands to get plastered across the geek kingdom is perhaps too big for them to feasibly have taken, with only a slim chance that someone would recognise this as something new. After that you get into the territory of paying off bar staff, Powell or even Gizmodo, to explode the story but that’d be an expensive feat and feels a lot like overkill just to get a bit of attention, with no obvious financial benefit – previous “leaks” have been mere pictures and much cheaper with an almost identical effect.

Gizmodo’s reasons for feeling smug about besting Apple at their own game hinges mainly on their own experiences with Apple’s PR – a generally secretive affair – but makes the point that their secrecy over the years would be completely upended if they were to “leak” working prototypes significantly early before an announcement (generally “leaks” occur days, if not hours, beforehand).

Time, as it always does, will tell – I’m looking forward to Jobs’ demeaneour when he announces it to the suprise of no-one. Knowing Jobsy he’ll either be really coy about it, make a joke or won’t show up at all. What’s the point of being on an endlessly repeated clip announcing a new chapter in the iPhone saga if the crowd’s reaction will be so underwhelmed?

Kicking Corpses in the Balls

Despite the recent activity on this blog suggesting otherwise, one of the topics I sometimes cover is books. At the moment I’m worming my way through “The Hell of it All” by Charlie Brooker, a delightfully despondent columnist and TV critic for The Guardian and presenter of BBC Four shows that end in ‘wipe’ – cases in point, screenwipe, newswipe and gameswipe. His books generally consist 300 pages of his regurgitated publishings of the past few years, the one I am reading at the moment covers TV and other topics that Brooker has written about over since 2007 and I am attempting to blend some of his sardonic humour and insults into my own writings, though I’m probably failing……..you prick. In any case, Brooker’s Channel 4 show ‘You Have Been Watching’ returns tonight at 10pm on the aforementioned channel, I highly recommend it.

Are there no ideas any more? I can’t help being a little put out hearing about each and every latest smash hit TV show or book without being disappointed at how similar they all are to old film or television concepts, or worse yet classic literature. A quick example is Glee, a show which I love, but is so much like High School Musical, which is in turn simply a modern reimagining and Frankenstein-esque merging of Grease and Footloose, that I keep expecting them to announce some weird crossover.

At the moment, vampires are the main source for balls-out rippoffery, I have been subjected to both Twilight films – which use the concept of vampires but, in a feat of deformity worthy of the Saw franchise, twist them to fit the mould of the modern drama. Firstly, I know Twilight is originally a book series, but as far as I can reason (albeit by making the bold assertion that the themes of the books have been accurately portrayed on screen) the Twilight series, in all it’s forms, is simply seeding the shallow, generic childhood fantasies into another generation o young girls by a combination of “white horse” stereotypes and familiar backdrops, with a female protagonist so passive Emily Davison must be spinning in her grave, who was killed by a horse if anyone’s interested in dark symbolism. Twilight is offensive to men on every level, apart from it perpetuating a delusion about romantic encounters onto young women, each film (and, from narrative, each book) lack any satisfactory conclusion: there are practically no action scenes or nudity, the two things men want from a film (and any man who says otherwise is a lying bastard) – upon mentioning this (the lack of action sequences, at least) to the people I saw it with, they (the girls anyway) insisted that it was part of the setup for the next film…

No. When Sherlock Holmes heard the name Moriarty, that was setting up for the next film. When Commissioner Gordon hands Batman the Joker playing card, that was setting up for the next film. When Harry Osbourne found his late father’s Green Goblin gear, THAT was setting up for the next film. All of these were preceded by a whole other storyline that came to a close after a FUCKING BATTLE! Having a pissy little vision of the future and the film’s antagonist letting them go does not count as a set up, it’s not even a cop out. It’s nothing. What’s worse is that, having skimmed the Wikipedia plot summaries of the books that haven’t yet been made into films, there is no final battle sequence – and the antagonists simply change their minds and go, there I’ve just saved you time otherwise wasted reading the books. Yeah, I’m a book fan advising you not to read something – what of it?

REAL Vampire

Anybody see a fucking difference here!

Bite her fucking neck, Pattinson!

This is turning into a Twilight rant so I’ll make some comparisons, I am just starting Bram Stoker’s ‘Dracula’ – the best known fictional work involving the concept of Vampires, haemovoric creatures of folklore. A good comparison is the ability of Stephenie Meyer’s “vampires” to go out in daylight, providing they take sufficient measures to stop normal people noticing that their skin sparkles like a drunk tinkerbell. As far as my baffled comprehension of the Twilight series can tell, this makes the “vampires” essentially immortal, which makes me wonder why Meyer didn’t just kick Stoker’s corpse in the balls and have done with it. In “Dracula”, the fact that sunlight is lethal to the antagonist character is a revelation, it takes this previously powerful and apparentely indestructable character and unveils his flaws, a literary staple that prevents weak endings by authors who have made a villain too powerful to feasibly stop. Meyer is a terrible writer because she avoids this, spending all of her time building up these immensely powerful supernatural characters, leaving the characterisation and plot so desolate you can hear my imagination echoing in the wasteland. Hence we end up with these one-dimensional characters and pathetically weak endings to each book and the overarching series simply because Meyer spent all her time going “look at these vampires and these werewolves, aren’t they cool!” before hastily adding “oh and someone did a thing, the end” when the now too-powerful villains agrees to let them go, simply because Meyer spent too much time on the character’s power and romantic stereotypes and not enough on story.

A quick note to any trigger-happy commenters who are bound to say something about me not being in a position to comment on the Twilight series having never read the books in full – and that may be true. But then again, I’ve never shot myself in the head but I have a notion that it’s a pretty bad idea, maybe you should try it, let me know.

I love sounding angry in blog posts.

A Guide to Freeview HD…Any Questions?

Writing about technology news in a compelling, funny way isn’t easy (hence my posts end up being so crap) for one main reason – a lot of it is dull as fuck.

Take the introduction of Freeview HD boxes, something which fired up this week to deliver slightly clearer images of Matt Smith’s Frankenstein’s forehead to a plethora of the nation’s screens – misleading everyone to believe that getting HD is as easy as getting digital TV was when freeview first started by subtly failing to mention that it needs a HD-Ready TV and thus perturbing the occasional pensioner. To us modern, young folk the concept of Freeview HD isn’t hard to grasp – buy a box, plug it into your HD-TV and whack away (preferably when Karen Gillan appears on screen) – why do I always feel awkward writing in wank jokes? – so precisely how I was supposed to write an interesting post about something so tedious without slipping into a coma is tricky.

I’m currently working, at the pace of a Snail’s orgasm, on a post about the passing of the Digital Economy Bill last week, hindered in no small part by the fact that I’m about as interested in politics as Nick Griffin is open-minded – not at all. Another problem is that, like most political issues, it’s bogged-down in all manner of beauracratic bobbyknobs and humdrum constitutional hoojamacallits, grabbing my interest with as much force as Britney Spears reaching for a non-alcoholic beverage (har har aren’t celebrity gossips jokes funny, aren’t we so much better than them). It’s not quite enough, in a personal blog, to simply write down facts, but necessary to unload my tuppence of opinion to anyone sympathetic enough to have read this far, mainly to stop myself from mutating into a forum comment troll and shedding whatever remains of the social human in me and embracing the full nerd.

Rest assured, the post on the Digital Economy Bill is as thought provoking and funny as all my other posts aren’t – it just might take several caffeinated drinks to finish it – in fact, fuck the coffee, just pump caffeine into my veins, assuming nobody has any crack.

Computer Science is easy, fighting Daleks is hard

Having saved the world from a shapeshifting snake, which could easily be mistaken for the male equivalent of vagina dentata, using little more than a Blackberry Storm, a porn-laden laptop and a ginger – all three otherwise useless objects – Matt Smith’s Eleventh Doctor has well and truly ingratiated himself into David Tennant’s vacant spot as the incumbent Doctor Who. The BBC has wasted no time in announcing a series of downloadable video games, Doctor Who: The Adventure Games, with voices provided by Smith and token ginger Karen Gillan as Amy Pond, materialising in June (possibly just as the current series ends).

The Doctor and Amy emerge from the TARDIS

From what the BBC has said, these are not video games as much as they are “interactive episodes” something which is not unheard of in Who-fandom since David Tennant presented the 2005 Red-Button game Attack of the Graske. The classic series also felt the lure of the polygon with their attempt to reignite interest in the show ahead of the TV Movie in the video game Destiny of the Doctors. By the sounds of it, however, the Beeb is keen to mention how this is to promote computer literacy among young children because, you know, once you’ve shot a Dalek with a Sonic Screwdriver using a keyboard, programming’s a snap.

Details of the game themselves, written by current Who-writers Phil Ford (co-writer of The Waters of Mars) and James Moran (The Fires of Pompeii and various work on Torchwood) and developed by Sumo Digital and Broken Sword creator Charles Cecil, are relatively lacking. The nature of the games remains a complete mystery save a few choice action-shots of the CGI Doctor and Amy peering around a war-torn city and missing the point of black cabs…

The Doctor and Amy push a car - for some reason

…Here’s hoping that they’ll be on the same video-game worthy level as modern console releases rather than tedious puzzle games, though the indication that they’ll be downloadable (and most likely free) suggests that these will be far from big-bugdet productions.

If they’re just piss-easy puzzle games with a few seconds of flashy CGI – I want my license fee back.

Just to clarify, I won’t be posting a review of every episode of the Doctor Who series currently airing, unless there’s a really awesome episode, though I will likely write a series review once it’s over and I will, of course, review these games.

iPhone OS 4.0 – Better Spam Integration

As if we needed any more evidence that Apple’s flagship smartphone, iPhone, was severely lacking in the most basic features – Steve Jobs has held another media-frenzy of press launch to announce a minor upgrade to the phone operating system – Version 4.0 – with over 100 new features. Mock them, though I do, for holding an entire press event for something so minor, I admit that I am going to propagate that by reviewing it, when I didn’t do so with my own phone’s OS upgrade last week – ho hum.

iPhone OS 4.0 Features

One of the very first things Apple have addressed is multi-tasking, with Jobs giving a piss-poor explanation about how they’ve developed their own way to do multi-tasking that doesn’t drain battery life – unfortunately their way is exactly the same way as the Palm Pre has done multi-tasking since it came out more than a year ago. In any case, the iPhone’s multi-tasking features simply involves allowing multiple applications to run at the same time, except when their exited they no longer function or update, which can be adapted using their new API to work with, for example, playing music while the app is open but not active. Double-pressing the home button brings up a list of running apps and will likely involve some sort of functionality within that list of each app, such as the list showing music controls on running music apps and so on. The Palm Pre does much the same, and always has, running multiple apps in a “deck of cards” fashion that allows you to scroll through running apps much like pressing the Windows Key and Tab does in Vista, except linearly, saving on battery life by having the applications stop updating themselves or running at full pelt when they’re not the foreground app, until the user specifically elects to close the app. The difference is that Palm have had this for a year, and haven’t had the device out for three years of development – so when Steve Jobs says they were working on this “So that’s what took so long” – I can all too quickly call bullshit.

As if Apple’s baffling desire to tout the iPod Touch as a gaming device rather than what it is, a music player, wasn’t bad enough, now the iPhone is getting a “Game Center” to turn the games in the app store into a socially competitive time-killer. Simply put, this involves better network play, leaderboards and acheivements, something already present in the games themselves quite often, but something Apple wants to usurp for themselves. The upcoming Windows 7 Phone will include integration with XBox Live, which will undoubtedly trump this attempt by Apple for serious gamers because the latter option actually has a high-end console rather than a pissy little handheld alone.

In a shameless display of lazy, ball-scratching capitalisation, the new iPhone OS comes, like it or not, with built-in spam by third parties, giving Apple a cool 40% of the revenue generated. “iAd” sticks adverts into apps which include interactive elements (as in those godawful shoot 5 iPads to win one) and videos – of course, none of these ads, as they do on the web, will run in Flash, instead his holiness has decreed that no ad shall enter his kingdom unless they are scripted in HTML5, which Jobs weirdly claimed was “industry standard”……..no Steve, no it’s not.

When asked if any of the devices in what I’ve just named Apple’s iRange will ever support Java or Flash, Jobs’ reply was a flat “No”.

iPhone OS 4.0

Other notable features include allowing background location apps to use triangulation instead of battery-behemoth GPS, which I hope will be an optional feature – some people are pedants for an exact location, something which bouncing signals randomly around nearby cell towers to give a vague idea of where you are can’t do – so that running things like FourSquare doesn’t kill your battery and making an available idea of your location ironically important as you have no battery left to call anyone if you need a lift.

Menu screen wallpapers, app grouping, unified e-mail inbox, bluetooth keyboard support and a feast of other new features paled into obscurity in the face of the announcement that the new iPhone OS will be able to run iBooks – Apple’s eBook store that was created around the announcement of the iPad and it’s eReader functionality. Tellingly, an update to my Palm Pre last week to allow support for paid apps saw the appearance of thousands of eBooks – none of which I have bought specifically for the reason that, if trying to read a book on an OLED screen wasn’t bad enough (*cough*iPad*cough*), reading on a screen so small would be insufferable – which renders the integration of iBooks on the iPhone completely pointless. Some will try, and they will suffer.

iPhone OS 4.0 will come to the iPhone 3GS and 3rd-Gen iPod Touch in the summer and to the iPad in the autumn. So far, no announcement has been made about the cost, if any, of this update but there’s been no indication that the update will come out for the original iPhone or the 3G – meaning there’s now an actual reason to buy a 3GS – Steve Jobs, you cunning fox!

The ‘Need It’ Theory

I have a theory about the link between technology geeks, such as myself, and the coverage of gadget releases called the “Need It” Theory.

iPad - We can't see the point either

Like it or totally indifferent to it, tablet computers, that were first demonstrated by the greasy showmen at CES 2010 in January, have arrived in earnest. Leading the foray, as ever, was Apple’s take on how they think a tablet computer should be and, as ever, the device has been ejaculated on by fanboys and had the piss ripped out of it by everyone else. Other tablet’s are coming up to their release dates, a preview of which can be read at my CES 2010 post. The most vocal competitor to Apple’s iPhone Jumbo at the time of writing is HP with their “Slate”, due for release very soon – this post is not to discuss the various merits of either device, which will come as soon as both are released and sufficientely reliable reviews have been written and/or I somehow manage to get hold of a review model.

I am writing to consider one major aspect of technology, having been interesting in consumer electronics for so long, and having only recentely turned that interest into a creative outlet, such as this blog, I found myself ferventely reviewing every minor detail, every review and everything possible about the iPad and the Slate to decide which one I would buy. I found myself going through the normal motions that one does before a significant purchase, including considering the price and even checking my own bank account to see how it would fair £500ish lighter. It wasn’t until I had thoroughly considered it that I remembered that I have absolutely no intention of buying a tablet computer either way, indeed I had absolutely no clear use for a tablet computer whatsoever. So why was I so meticulous in my scrounge for every last detail………journalistic thoroughness? Perhaps, if I am going to advise people on the best gadgets I better know my friggin facts – but I couldn’t shake the idea that it went deeper than that, hence the inception of my ‘Need It’ Theory.

I am not, despite how it may sound, awarding myself some sort of intelligent credence for voicing something so painfully obvious, but as far as I know there’s no eloquentely put description of this tendency. Newton’s Laws were, however, known in every long-lived human in a practical sense, everyone took care when disembarking a boat lest the opposite push of the boat leave them falling in the drink. However, Newton’s Third Law, and all his other laws for that matter, took what was noticed in humans and explained them using the science – which has been tremendous in the advancement of the human species. On a mediocre, nobody really gives a fuck, level this is what I am doing – taking something noticable and known and doing my level-best, albeit probably failing, to explain this articulately.

The ‘Need It’ Theory is simply that people who are technology enthusiasts, writers or magpies (like shiny things) spend so much time following the releases of new products onto the gadget market, observing their competitors and in some way expressing opinions, at least for the writers, tend to make the assumption that they need this product. Founded, perhaps, on the idea that if one was to advise somebody on the best product in a certain field, for the sake of arguement let’s say tablet computers, they should put themselves in their shoes. However, the effect, subconciously, overreaches itself and the subjects come to believe that they need to buy these products. The effect is horribly visible, a lot of tech shows I watch have had their (apparentely well-paid) presenters asking one another which tablet computer they’re going to buy, forgoing the normal procedure of deciding if you need a type of product before deciding which specific product to buy.

Of course, for companies selling these products, that’s the entire point. Apple, in a show of balls-out ‘Need It’-ness, have developed their entire following around the central idea that theirs are products you need to have, that somehow this is the product you never knew you wanted, until you buy it and, having dropped anywhere between five-hundred to several thousand pounds, realise that you don’t need it. It’s easy for Apple, they have such a cult following and fanboys who, before I quote the Kevin Rose survey for the billionth time, would buy this product regardless of….well….anything. For Apple, it is quite literally a case of, to paraphrase ‘Field of Dreams’, “if you build it, they will come”.

Going back to Newton’s Third Law of Motion, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction, and that’s certainly observable here as well. As loud and obsessive as the Apple fanboy crowd are, there’s an equally as vehement, though significantly smaller, anti-Apple crowd who will do literally anything to avoid buying an Apple product and, for no discernible reason, omit the half-eaten fruit logo option of anything in their search when looking for a type of gadget. These people would buy something that isn’t Apple simply as an act of defiant AT Apple, something which their competitors know all to well – they leave Apple to get people talking about a type of product and leisurely bring out their rivals, *insert Apple product name*-killers, to stand as the “Apple-alternative” which people will also buy in droves, believing that this is a product they need, but not wanting to buy into an Apple product.

I have written, often, about the long-standing rumours of Apple’s tablet computer and, as an outside observer, it hinders on conspiracy. Collectively, every tech company with tablet aspirations, noticed these frequent rumours and began developing, in full public view, i.e. CES, their own tablets, Apple – possibly fearing someone was going to get their first – sent out their press invitations, at rather short notice I might add, and unveiled the iPad. Now that Apple had people sufficientely talking about the iPad, they can finish up their competitors and release them to market; safe in the knowledge that, though a match for Apple they may not be, they at least have a chance to claim those buyers who would rather do squats on a pinecone than buy Apple, all of whom believe that this type of product is a type of product that they NEED to buy.

Make of that what you will.

Fuck Google Analytics

This sign was put up outside the SXSW in Austin, Texas last month, the annual show included a live episode of Diggnation at a local bar Stubbs. Evidentely, they reached capacity and a lot of jumped up little geeks were name/blog-dropping, feeling that this would impact enough on the bouncer to let them in. Louis showed me this last week when we were filming an episode of Tech-Squared, but they just covered it on Diggnation as well so, given it’s apparent coverage, I feel it’s something I have to say for my fellow bloggers.

Now then, I’m a blogger – that’s a fact, but I am also an aspiring writer. The line between blogger and writer is contentious but here’s my take on it: bloggers are people who write about personal things (i.e. an inane commentary on their comings and goings which only show that they have a boring and repetitive life) and people who give opinions on news relating to a certain topic, usually under a domain of their own name, like me. In early posts I mingled tech news with personal shit and, after realising this wasn’t what would interest people in my writing, made a cardinal rule to myself never to write anything personal and keep it closely stuck to the topics I write about. I consider myself a blogger specifically because I fit into the latter of the two types of blogger, but I also consider myself a writer because I do other things, such as writing for my Uni newspaper, technical writing and so on which allow me to practise writing in a serious capacity and will hopefully serve me well for a career as a writer. If I were writing my blog alone, I wouldn’t be, nor would consider myself to be, a writer – I would be a blogger. Being a blogger carries no shame in it, it simply means that one shouldn’t assume some sort of literary prowess from being able to sign up to WordPress.

I’ve certainly never considered my blog as something meaningful in technology news because, let’s face it – it isn’t. My Google Analytics results are not something to be impressed by. Even if I was gaining a significant number of hits, I would never consider something like that to be in any way impressive – I don’t include this blog on my CV specifically because it’s a cliché, every geek or wannabe writer mentions a blog or gives a URL in the vain hope that this will seem impressive but we all know perfectly well that it doesn’t. My other undertakings in the field of writing allow me to practise writing, blogging also allows me to practise writing – but practise is no substitute for the real thing – until I have something meaningful published, I am simply an aspiring writer.

I like to think that most bloggers don’t consider themselves writers, and certainly don’t believe that they can gain any sort of status from this fact. Some do and that’s, in a word, hilarious – plus it’s stirred me to write a long brewing post on blogging, even better.

REVIEW: Doctor Who – The Eleventh Hour

Well, that was quite an episode. Lots to say so let’s start, as many things do, at the beginning.

Opening scene, always good to see a TARDIS crashing sequence, I’m glad that just because so much is changing they haven’t just cut off from the previous episode and continued straight on with the old interior exploding and back-references. I thought too much was made of The Doctor’s meeting with Amy as a child – that sequence could’ve been cut down a bit, allowing more time for action. The Doctor has a tendency to be inactive for a while after his regeneration, usually through him sleeping for most of an episode before having a heroic reappearance at the end, though this was not the case here, it was almost worse that our first real look at the Eleventh Doctor was of him sitting in a dowdy kitchen with a child trying different foods, I’d rather he were unconcious.

Opening sequence wasn’t what I expected, the thunder cuts into the theme tune which I dislike, it’s quite dark (which I suppose fits in with Moffat’s reimagining of the show but still) and I’d heard abundant rumours that we were going to see Smith’s face in the titles like in the days of old, but no. In all honesty, it really isn’t that different, which was a bit disappointing but only a minor detail so not a massive fault. Most of the first half hour was a bit boring really, it was quite predictable what was going to happen during that time, like The Doctor overshooting his return, the “policewoman” turning out to be Amy, etc. etc. What was up with that weird eye thing The Doctor did, good for the plot I suppose but I really hope it doesn’t become a staple feature, the sheer noise of it makes my ears ache.

Characters were a mixed bag, I don’t like that we’ve got yet another Mickey, in the form of Rory, playing the hapless comic relief boyfriend of the companion. Amy, perhaps the first character with father issues projected onto The Doctor, is a good change of pace from “fiesty Londoner” that every main companion since the revival has been. Other than that, a delightful cameo by Patrick Moore, a lot of funny characters but none that appear as though they will be influential to the show in any way. Matt Smith, as The Doctor, was absolutely sublime. He was a bit haggard at first by the slow-moving plot dealing with Amy’s issues, settling into his new body and so on, but when the “20 minutes” thing started, The Doctor, and I think Smith as an actor, was in his element and became a charismatic, witty blur of plan-making machine. There was something very Doctor about this sequence but also something different that Smith has bought to the role, I can’t quite put my finger on it (which is why I don’t try to make a career out of TV reviews), it was definetely The Doctor, just not as we know him.

I wish we’d seen more of the new Sonic Screwdriver, there was a lot of old Sonic action and we saw it blow up, but I wish we’d seen more of it. I’m also a bit annoyed that the TARDIS rebuilt itself rather than The Doctor repairing it, mostly because I would’ve loved to see a montage sequence of The Doctor building a new Sonic and then using it to repair the TARDIS. The interior was definitely NOT what I was expecting – it’s so much biggger and the console itself is quite a distance from the door that, compared to all previous interiors it was odd. I like that they’ve bought back the screen hanging from the ceiling of the TV Movie and just how intricate the console is, plus the layers and the prospect of seeing different rooms with the cavernous doors is appealing. My earlier mention of expecting it to be fairly similar, owing to how relatively seldom the set is used per episode has been completely thrown out judging by just how much money they must’ve spent on that (half of it looks CGI as it is) so I expect (and really hope) that there’s a lot of inner-TARDIS action.

The alien antagonist was a nifty, but I think a little bit underplayed villain. I suppose the focus of the episode really isn’t the villain during a story like this so I got the feeling that Moffat avoided putting in an alien that would take up too much of the plot. The CG was…interesting… and, particularly during shots where Amy came face to face with the snake thing, looked a bit poorly done – I know there were budget issues so that’s probably why the villain spent most of it’s time inhabiting other bodies. The teeth of this alien are a testament to the rest of the series, Moffat’s known for writing seemingly-standard “scary” stuff and making it actually chilling – sharp teeth on a vicious alien is nothing new, but only Steven Moffat can do it in a way that could unnerve even a very masculine 19-year-old man such as myself *cough*. Also, twins from The Shining………….WHAT?

There was the obligatory scene where The Doctor, now fully stabilised after his regeneration, having picked out a new costume (hospital locker room again, love it!) and saved the day, confronts the alien and scares them off. A projection showed previous monsters and clips from the new and classic series, and there was the shot of each incarnation of The Doctor, which Smith steps through after we see David Tennant and says “Hello, I’m The Doctor” undoubtedly more to the audience than the giant eyeball he’s facing. I’m pretty sure we saw something like that quite recentely and it screws up Moffat’s proclamation that this series wouldn’t be mythology-heavy, but for a regeneration episode it’s pretty permissable.

Overall, an up and down episode, but the up parts were a fantastic introduction for The Eleventh Doctor and, for the down parts, even Smith looked a little bit bored during those scenes so he was forgiven. It’s hard not to love this Doctor, he reminds me of Sylvester McCoy in an odd way, but hopefully without the sharp decline in ratings and eventual cancellation this time.

Doctor Who: The Eleventh Hour, literally! (Spoiler Free Pre-Speculation)

Having exploded onto our screens, and managing to offend women, gingers and disabled people in the first two minutes, tonight we get to see the first full-length episode of Matt Smith in action as The Doctor in the latest episode, The Eleventh Hour (BBC One/HD).

The new TARDIS team 2010

I haven’t seen all that many preview clips (I generally try to avoid spoilers), but I maintain that Smith will play The Doctor very well. People often forget that most of the lines and direction come from the crew, the actors obviously have some input but it’s a bit unfair on Smith to have to take any and all heat if The Eleventh Doctor gets his arse handed to him by the fans, then again he’s likely to get most of the glory if all goes well. From what I gather the new Head Writer, Steven Moffat, is a hardcore old-Who fan so I imagine the new series will become a bit more classic Who but lacking the crappy Special Effects. Moffat’s predecessor, Russell T. Davies, is just as much of a Whovian but clearly had a very different direction he wanted to take the show than classic Who when he regenerated the show back in 2005. If my prediction is correct, then Moffat risks alienating new fans to the show unless the new interpretation is just as appealing as past five years – just as purist classic fans didn’t like the revival, some people are to accustomed to the show as we currently know it to accept an altered show.

Before he even appeared on the show, criticisms of Matt Smith have been of varying validity – firstly, his relatively unknown status means that most television fans have seen little of his acting ability, which is a foolish reason to condemn him prematurely. Secondly, his appearance (i.e. his self-proclaimed “face with elbows”) and the costume he is wearing is too much old-Doctors and not really as modern as his two predecessors – I think it’s a refreshing change of pace, particularly with such a young actor, to put The Doctor back into something older, retro is in these days. Personally, I think Matt Smith is a good choice and I like what I’ve seen of trailers and other preview clips – I reserve judgement either way until I’ve seen him on screen a bit more, but I’m optimistic (for once).

I like the new Sonic Screwdriver, and I haven’t seen the new TARDIS interior yet due to purposeful avoidance, but I don’t imagine it’s radically different, probably bordering between the classic and the previous appearance, for a set with a very clear purpose like that, being particularly different from how it’s been seems like superfluous given that for 80% of the series the set will be used to open an episode and not be used again until the end. There was recentely a competition to design a TARDIS console, the winner of which was announced in late January – suggesting that most, if not all, of the TARDIS interior scenes were done as pickups at the end of the shooting schedule – in which case we could have very little interaction with the TARDIS.

I’m procrastinating today, hence I was able to get these two posts out in the last hour, but I probably won’t have a review of the episode up until tomorrow – it’s Saturday night!