Hmm interesting. I wouldn’t have known you updated this specific post without the link to LJ. The rss feed doesn’t seem to alert me to an update on this post……

In other news,

Thanks you so much for the munchkin’s present mate, you are very silly and din’t need to go to that expense but thank you all the same.

Are you up for the weekend dude? I’ll fill you in with times and places later once I know them myself

Yep I’ll be one of those equally geeky people on your list

I don’t tend to “tweet” all that much myself but I do enjoy reading other’s posts.

We do tend to use it to promote the live broadcasts of our podcast “http://www.dumbeddownlife.com” though.

(Shamless pluge but meh, what’s a guy to do lol)

you have a number of things wrong here. firstly Sky and 4oD preceded iPlayer by quite some time. secondly, although you have to register for 4oD most (the vast majority) of the content in free. There is no ’subscription’. The non-free stuff (usually because the rights owners charge Channel 4 for it and wont allow them to just give it away) is all available on pay per view basis. for catching up on the last 7 days programming you can use the catch-up service on the channel 4 website. This doesnt require a client application download.

Ugggh! Who’s pint did ducky end up in?

Nice, intelligent, balanced review that being a fellow UK Zune owner, I totally agree with.

I see you’ve even managed to get your Zune Card registering plays and are therefore able to use the Zune Marketplace for podcasts too.

Imagine when we can actually buy music, video and exclusive content here! As you say, roll on deployment in the UK.

Welcome to Microsoft, Ben!

Hmm, Did vista get the kicking it deserved……sorry did it deserve the kicking it got?

From a purely user based and non technical viewpoint, Vista introduced some nice touches. In particular I liked the tagging option of files and images etc. Being the most disorganised person in the world it has helped me find stuff quickly but it’s not a new concept for anyone using social networking. New for an O.S. yes but not innovative.

I tried out the voice control system and found that it worked very well indeed but as a practical way to control you desktop I think it would be next to useless in an office environment, nice touch but not needed or fully realised yet.

My biggest issue was the compatibility of older software. Even using the “Run As option” many of my games (my biggest use of my home machine) either didn’t run or ran for a while then crashed out. There are modern versions of the games I play but I don’t want to buy more games just because the O.S. makes me.

There was just something with Vista that felt unfinished, I can’t put my finger on what but that’s the impression I got. It was like Microsoft had an idea and never got around to fully forming that idea, or that it was a bridge from XP to the next version but not a full product in it’s own right.

I have now reverted back to XP and I am quite happy to have done so.

As for image and the media, I think the media really does have a massive impact on the success of a product. The negative reviews of Vista coupled with apples aggressive marketing campaign playing on the “coolness” of the Mac against the “stuffyness” of Windows damaged Vista massively.

Having used it and made a personal choice to go back to XP is one thing but in an office environment I think Vista would be a perfectly acceptable O.S. to use, but due to poor marketing on Microsoft’s part and good marketing on apple’s part, coupled with the negative reviews, many companies wouldn’t give it the chance to prove itself.

Plus It’s not Vista’s fault it was produced but the currently perceived bad guys of tech, micro$oft. That in itself put’s it on the back foot already as the once posterboys of computing have become the company to beat with a big stick just because of who they are.

Had Google released Vista, would it have received so much negative press……..?

It was a great talk, Ben – really thought provoking. Loved the advice you gave me on having a very ordinary name and just using a consistent personal descriptor to help separate from the others out there..
I do it all the time for clients, but had never thought of me as a ‘brand’ before.
Thank you

Great post. I really enjoyed my first gay geek dinner last November. Met some fantastic people and had a great time.

I know not too much to do with article, but do you think the Daily Mail yet realise how that cannot criticise Uganda Government and Church people becuase this article:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1220756/A-strange-lonely-troubling-death–.html

in effect makes them feel this new law has support in the UK?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1232081/Gordon-Brown-caught-gay-rights-storm-Uganda-debates-death-penalty-homosexuals.html

How can jounalists in the UK argue agaisnt this horrible thing after such a UK article,.

Up date, On trying to get the hashtag #rdgpol up and running, one local Cllr has agreed, one has decided not to – suggesting twitter etiquette is enough, one has ridiculed people complaining about it.

Interested to see if any others react to it.

Naive request perhaps, but Ben can you let me know – point me in the direction of what is the actual or percieved Twitter etiquette around use of hashtags.

Many thanks

I also totally agree! I myself have been to several game conventions, at Eurogamer expo people would just ask you what you thought of the game etc, its a quickly developing social activity now! We hold small LAN parties every now and then, they couldn’t be more fun! A mixture of games, movies and singing on LIPS of course, who couldn’t go to a party without Karaoke right? Great post in all!!

Being an old geek, who was told by my careers teacher that ‘there is no future in computing’, I have no experience at all of how IT is taught in schools. It wasn’t on the curriculum, or the horizon, when I were a lad

Anyway, it surprises me to think that ICT is *not* a subject intended to cover the logic and development aspects of IT. That is what I would naively have expected. I can see that basic word processing, graphics, spreadsheets and presentation skills could be in this part of the curriculum, but surely that isn’t all of it?

Does make sense that other subjects should cover the ‘use of IT’ as part of their remit, such as the way in which I was taught to write up experiments in a certain format for Physics and Biology, to do drawings from certain perspectives in Tech Drawing, and how to approach drawing and painting in Art (not something I was good at, tbh). As IT is how much of the work will now be done, the subjects should include their use of such supporting systems and technologies from a holistic view.

Those that are to go on with techie aspirations should be able to study more about computers, with some of the history being the theory and the practice being covered by more detail of ‘how computers work’ and ‘how to make them work for others’ (i.e. building things, putting in logic, user interfaces, logic, whatever). Problems will arise if trying to teach a particular version of a particular product or programming language, but a general – and proven – understanding is what is required. Isn’t it?

Some rambling comments, I know, but it seems to tie in with what you’ve posted. ICT should be about IT itself. Other curriculum subjects should define how, where, and if, the use of IT is relevant, so that the relevant skills can be taught *in context*.

I’m feeling a little bit of a conflict, and I think it comes from the use of the term “ICT”, and then “IT”, and then “Computing”.

There are (should be) two separate things – one is building the skills in students to be able to use technology to achieve a goal – business goal, personal goal, whatever. A bit like driving lessons. Knowing the appropriate way to use the device to help you do something else.
In my mind that’s “ICT”

And then there’s the bit about really knowing what’s going on inside the blackboxes/websites, and creating new blackboxes/websites.
In my mind that’s “IT” or “Computing”.

They are two separate (but related) things.

Ultimately there will always be a minority of students who do “Computing”, but everybody needs the skills to use technology to do their job/live their life.

And they need education to help them get there.

So although I agree with the thoughts and sentiments, I think to be fully informative, we need to clearly find a language to be able to describe the “user” versus the “developer” – which has always been about “ICT” versus “Computing”.

And I don’t agree with the idea that we need a new phrase to replace ICT (eg ILT – Information and Learning Technology), because that will only serve to confuse even more people.

Back to the car analogy – there’s two different sets of learning, for two different types of students:
- What do I need to know to drive my own car well
- What do I need to know to mend your car/build you a new one

The wrinklies in my life fall into two categories, those that are convinced I’ll never meet anyone because “I’m stuck behind my PC all the time” and those that love the RESULTS of technology.

The world is a smaller place because of twitter, facebook, good old fashioned email, if you can get across to people that they can use technology to communicate with people in far flung places (like Australia, the Americas, the north of England…) then very few people will turn their noses up at it and realise that it’s just the same as how they used to network – but different and hopefully better.

I enjoyed the day – the talks were great (I’ll leave others to judge the workshop session in the afternoon, as I was guilty of that bit!), providing a great range of experience and well thought out reasoning.
I think there are a couple of things which set the current tools apart from the “old ways” of doing the same things. Reach, Immediacy and Pervasiveness. OK, that’s three. I’ll come in again…

Reach comes in two flavours – global and breadth. The global nature of the modern tools means that there are many more types of culture which can be a part of your audience. This (as with all things) is both a strength and a potential difficulty. The breadth relates to the sheer numbers of people you can connect with at once – something which is also fairly new in terms of communication unless you used to work for the World Service.
The Immediacy means that you can rapidly get rumours or unsubstantiated claims being echoed around, which can gain a life of their own, but it also allows, for instance, news of events such as those in Haiti to reach us much more quickly. This shouldn’t be under-estimated, in my view.
The Pervasiveness is also a key issue for DI issues. As we point out in the materials the This Is Me project created (http://thisisme.reading.ac.uk) this is different to the old model. Although you might get something printed about you in a newspaper, information had a fairly short half-life. To be fair, the sheer volume of communications now may mean that even something deliciously scurrilous becomes mere data in a short time, but the detail of an argument can last much longer in an online debate than it ever would in a chat in a bar. And that can also be both good or bad, of course. It allows an appeal to what was actually said, but can also mean that if you acted the fool, it can be a matter of record.

So, yes, I agree that in many ways the tools we see now are nothing spectacularly new. On the other hand, some of the ways the ’system’ behaves might require a shift in world view.

Thanks Ben, nice example – though not for you at the time, I’m sure!

I used to know a teacher who had a birthday party with their family at a restaurant in town, and paid using a cheque (remember them? ). They were also in the phone book, and these two seemingly innocent details were used by one enterprising pupil of theirs, who happened to be in the restaurant on the occasion, to piece together enough information to be able to get away with making a “prank” call to the teacher’s bank. Fortunately they only asked for statements to be sent out. They got through the ever-so-secret-security-question (Mother’s maiden name) because they had overheard the teacher’s grandmother being introduced to another guest. No internet involved. Luckily the pupil liked the teacher, and there was no malice involved.

The internet can make this type of thing (and more sinister versions) much easier to execute, of course. But the underlying privacy issues have always been around for people to exploit unless you are careful with your information.

I always recommend, by the way, that you make up a set of details to give the bank as answers to security questions, rather than answering the default questions honestly. CVs need to be censored if placed on the Web, really – something I know I didn’t think to do in the early days of the Web!

Well done!

I knew you would get the job. It sounds like you have a tremendously exciting time ahead.

Congratulations

Congratulations Ben!

All the best in your new role. Really well done!