Thursday, March 31, 2005

NO!!!!!!



It had to happen after 50 weeks of work they have Final said I am fit to go back to work on Monday, The only up side is I have spent the last 3 weeks crying poverty. We normally get paid a month behind but they are going to make a special effort to pay me this month :)

So I can live again, which means updates will probably only take place of an evening now :(

Two-thirds of world's resources 'used up'



"Human activity is putting such a strain on the natural functions of Earth that the ability of the planet's ecosystems to sustain future generations can no longer be taken for granted," it says.

When will we learn, that we live in a snow globe in the middle of a vacume, We only have one world.

Wednesday, March 30, 2005

David Byrne, Radio



A friend who relocated to California from NY said she missed hearing all the odd variety of music that was played around the office here. “I miss hearing what you all are listening to,” she wrote. This “radio” is my response. It will stream for a few hours and then it will recycle. Maybe it will run longer in the future. The artists played here are respectful of one another and gunplay is forbidden. Click on the player button below — a popup window will appear and the stream will begin. As songs play they will be identified, along with the artist — so if you like something you can see what and who it is. The song list will be updated periodically (how long is that really, in Earth time? Well, it depends on my listening habits.) As it reflects what I’m listening to, some songs will hang around longer while others will get dumped and replaced quickly.
Have been listing to this all day now, A case of the right thing at the right tiem. I have spent the last two days listing to The Lost In Translation OST (DVD) and The FullMetal Alchimist OST (Game)


-----

Edit

Added the link now, This post seemed to endup posting twice and messing every thing up .

Grokster Argument



MGM V Grokster is taking place right now in the USA, and could change the world, quit literally. As if the decision goes in favour of MGM, when every some on invents a new technology the 1st thing they will have to ask them selves is, can it be used to violate copyright?

The answer will most likely be yes, as let's face to days products have to be open for the user to do with what ever they wish, but this also allowe's them to violate copy right. Which altough just a by product of openness, would in the future if MGM wins make their product illegal in the USA.

Is this the direction we want the world to go in?

Is The Mac Back?



All the best hackers I know are gradually switching to Macs. My friend Robert said his whole research group at MIT recently bought themselves Powerbooks. These guys are not the graphic designers and grandmas who were buying Macs at Apple's low point in the mid 1990s. They're about as hardcore OS hackers as you can get.

The reason, of course, is OS X. Powerbooks are beautifully designed and run FreeBSD. What more do you need to know?
Are Mac's back? Are all the best Hackers moving over to Mac's?

How the hell would I know?

Paul Graham seams to think so, but then that is based on the fact that a few of his friends are switching back to Mac's, as for the rest of us we will just have to make up are own minds.

There is just one point I would like to make, Yes Mac's are back in the press and are trying to get into sight once more.

However this a Time when PC's are taking every shape and form imaginable and integrating into are phone's TV's and TiVo's. Are Mac's taking over or has the PC just reached the point where we take them for granted?

netdisaster.com



Five minutes of fun, and that is if you are lucky. Got a web site you hate then why not nuke it with Netdisaster, there are Nine different ways you can reek your revenge from Nuke's to alien invasion.

Tuesday, March 29, 2005

Dysfunctional Care Bear

Nihilist Bear
Nihilist Bear


Which Dysfunctional Care Bear Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

Ok now my distraction is over with back to nocking down the back wall :(

RIFIDKills.com



In a misguided attempt to make US passports more secure, the US Department of State plans to put radio frequency identification (RFID) chips in all new passports. This RFID chip will contain the same information currently on our passports, including the passport holder's name, date and place of birth, passport number and photograph.

In a dangerous world where Americans are targeted by thieves, kidnappers and terrorists, the RFID-chipped US passport will turn tourists into targets, and American business travelers will transmit their identities to kidnappers wherever they go, thanks to the US State Department.

Close up, the information broadcast from the RFID chip can be read by anyone with an inexpensive electronic reader. Farther away, the RFID chip can be activated enough to identify the passport holder as an American.

From identity theft to identity death, an RFID-chipped US passport means good news for the bad guys.


now all we need is some RFID guided missile, and some one could do some real damage. Then again they could only do so much damage as only 10% of Americans have a passport and less than that have left the USA.

Monday, March 28, 2005

Flickr Tag Search



Flick "Tag Browser" is a nice little ap that will search flickr for photos with they same tag, don't be confused by the slanty screen. I was leaning over the side of my chair as it loaded and was quite stuck for a minting think that they had some how seen me leaning over and adjusted the screen to match, Silly me.

The Credit Card Prank Two




Have you ever noticed how no one looks are you Signature any more, Well John Hargrave decided to see how far he could take it.

Every time you make a credit card purchase, they're supposed to match your signature against the one on the back of your card. Nobody seems to check anymore, so I tried to see how far I could push it with wacky signatures like "Mariah Carey" and "Zeus," which you can read in the original Credit Card Prank.

"The Credit Card Prank" took on a life of its own, vaulting ZUG into the national consciousness. Since then, some thirty million people have read that article -- some of them, it turns out, from the credit card companies themselves. Surely, then, they must have learned their lesson. Right?

Don't Fuck With Ovid



This morning, I found out that thousands of dollars of charges had been made on two of my credit cards in the past two days. Now, the identity thieves are sitting in jail. This is how it happened. It involves identity theft, a careless thief, one pissed-off Ovid and lots of luck.
This is cool you can read the blow by blow account of how he court the thieves, A great good news peace. It's down to luck and criminal stupidity than any thing else.

Saturday, March 26, 2005

XP To Mac



Where to begin, A while ago a messed around with Windowsblinds and to change the way my PC looked. I was happy with the results but one day XP died and I had to do a full reinstall and I never bothered to install it all again.

That was till last night when I came across this article on Engadet, on how to make XP look like a MAC. I thought I would give it ago, Here's what I learned so you don't make the same mistakes.

1st Off lets start with the required software,


  • StyleXP or WindowBlinds (skins the Graphical User Interface of your operating system)
  • ObjectBar (the white Finder bar on the top of Mac's; has File, Edit, View, etc. on it.)
  • ObjectDock, YzDock (discontinued), or MobyDock (The dock on the bottom of a Mac that contains icons and shortcuts to programs)
  • Trillian (chat program that can be skinned to resemble iChat)
  • YzToolbar (skins the toolbar icons in your Windows windows)
  • YzShadow (puts a lovely drop shadow under your windows á la Mac OS X)
  • Rainlendar (popular skinable desktop calendar)
  • Rainmeter (skinnable desktop system statistics)
  • Samurize (like Konfabulator for the Mac; can display just about anything, such as clocks, uptime, and the weather)
  • iTunes for Windows (self-explanatory)
  • Icons (The pretty little pictures on your desktop that point you somewhere. There are millions out there, but try the link provided for over a 1,000 lifted from Mac OS X 10.3 aka Panther)


Ok So it says you can use Style Xp or WindowBlinds, You can not use window blinds, I tired and ended up with this,




Full Size

Now as you can see it look's like a Mac but an old MAC, The Engadget how to recommends the use of the Panther theme by crni’s, Infact it recommends quite a few things by him but does not give one link to his web site.

The Panther theme however does not work with WindowBlinds, So don't bother. This is the point where you uninstall WindowBlinds and install StyleXp, which even comes with the panther theme as the default setting (If you chose the male install) and will install it for you as soon as you install the program.

(Wish I had known that before I spent 4 hours trying to get it to work with WindowBlinds. Not that there is anything wrong with WindowBlinds I had used it quit happily the 1st time I changed my GUI, It just will not work for what we want on this occasion.)



Full Size

You can see the difference StyleXP made, Altought I should point out that I already had ObjectDock installed, which I will talk about next.

ObjectDock is easy to install and work, just some simple words of warning to stop you from making some mistakes I did.

1st of To get ObjectDock to give me a transparent back ground I used a Mac theme I found on their site (I wont link to it as it did me more harm than good), bear in mind at this point in my install I had already moved all my Icons off my Desktop and on to the ObjectDock.

When I installed the theme it changed the look for me but also deleted all the icons I had put on it, here is the tricky part. The only (When I say only I mean lazy easy way) to configure objectdock is to click the config option, which the theme removed. You add Icons to ObjectDock by dragging them on and off, this ability was also removed.

You can make the dock background 100% transparent using the options, I suggest you do this rather than try and use a theme unless you know it works. Also once you have all you icons on the dock, I suggest you lock it, other wise every time you click on an icon you will end up dragging it of the doc which will delete it. As the Dock works on one click not two but you will find you self making the background opaque every time you want to make some changes this can be a pain..

Also the ObjectDock does not start up automatically, you can turn this on however in the options.

All in all ObjectDock is not bad I would still recommend it, Just beware of what you are doing, as always when installing other people's home made add on's or theme's.

    • YzToolbar (skins the toolbar icons in your Windows windows)
    • YzShadow (puts a lovely drop shadow under your windows á la Mac OS X)
Ok both of these programs are easy to install, just download them unzip, them. Then create a directory in your C: drive for them something like C:\Program Files\Yz\YzToolBar and C:\Program Files\Yz\YzShadow. Nether of the two of these auto start, as far as I can tell So you will have to make a shortcut for them and then place it in the Startup folder.

Again the Engadget Article provides no link for Y'ZToolBar, So here is site where you can get both the Y'ZToolbar and Y'ZShadow.

AS far as these three go....

  • Rainlendar (popular skinable desktop calendar)
  • Rainmeter (skinnable desktop system statistics)
  • Samurize (like Konfabulator for the Mac; can display just about anything, such as clocks, uptime, and the weather)

I did not bother with them so cannot comment on them. As the point for me was to clean up my Desktop not fill it with crap.

  • iTunes for Windows (self-explanatory)
  • Icons (The pretty little pictures on your desktop that point you somewhere. There are millions out there, but try the link provided for over a 1,000 lifted from Mac OS X 10.3 aka Panther)
As far as Itunes goes, I don't like it all my MP3's are sorted in folders with Winamp play lists just the way I like it. If there was some way these could be imported into Itunes I would consider using it. I only have it installed because I was forced to, to get the latest QuickTime plugin.

There is however an option for Winamp users who want to go the whole hog, this Winamp plug in makes Winamp look like an Ipod.



Now as far as the icons go they are perfect "Apple design", my only complaints about these are who ever named them gave them the most long winded names they could.

System.Library.Components.Ink.component.Contents.SharedSupport.InkServer.app.Contents.Resources.cmd_locked

The whole thing,



Full Size

Annotated Flickr

In the end I think it worked out well. One thing I have noticed is that one you lock the windows task bar inplace the Blue line disappears from under it.

Friday, March 25, 2005

Freebiemp3



Ok so I just want something for nothing, This time it's with Freebiemp3.co.uk, There is however a lot more choice with Freebiemp3.

You can chooses from £30, £50 or £100 in cash into a paypall account, or a 512 or 1gig Ipod Shuffle, or Ipod min, Creative Zen Touch, Gmini XS200 20GB and a creative labs offering.

Each offer requires a different amount of referrals starting at 5 and going up to 10 referrals, This time I have gone for the Cash option £100.

Offers you can chose to sign up for are a little limited but are different from all the over free ipod sites enabling you to do both.

freeipodshuffleuk



While waiting for my Free ipod Mini I thought I may as well sign up for FreeipodShuffleuk, It works like freeipoduk only you only have to do one offer, thought the offers are not as varied as the ipod mini offers and infact are the same as most of the ipod mini offers.

I suspect the offers are fun by the same people, If you are only going to do one I would go for the ipod mini offer but if you greedy like me then why not try and get ipod shuffle too.

If Apple Made A Victrola



Is and experiment in design by Todd Daniele using Apple styling to create a Victrola.

Creative Commons Search BETA




Yahoo has launch a Creative Commons Search (BETA),

This Yahoo! Search service finds content across the Web that has a Creative Commons license. While most stuff you find on the web has a full copyright, this search helps you find content published by authors that want you to share or reuse it, under certain conditions
The search has two extra options of ""
and " "

Code Help



1st of thanks to Mike for fixing my image for me, now I have to move on to my second problem understanding how this blogger code works.

The best I have managed to do so far is to create the mish mash that is the pic above.

If any one can figure out what I need to change to get he image to display any help would be appreciated.

The code for the site.....

Thursday, March 24, 2005

Free online TV



Years ago I used to have a program that let you watch over 50 TV channels from around the world but eventually they upgraded it to a pay model, It was Chinese peace of software so I have no clue as to what there web site was.

I used to love to watch Japanese MTV, some of the music videos where stunning and they seem to put a lot of effort into them.

Well no help is at hand while looking at the populicio.us a Del.icio.us based site that list new sites bookmarked in the last 24 and 48 hours by popularity, I found this little gem.

Americafree.tv

Ok so they have a limited show range but I happily watch the snowboarding video for about an hour before it started to loop.

They how ever link to Beelinetv.com which has a selection of on line channel from around the world. Most of the ones in English are American news channels, If you try some of the Dutch TV there is an MTV style channel in their.

No Jpop thou :( If any one has a link for Jpop leave it in a comment, I direct link to the stream if pos as I don't read Japanese.

Star Wars 1337t



Bloodmobile.





Has to be one of the best home made animation videos I have seen, who would have thought blood was so interesting. Very simple animation but it works well, nice and clean, ties in well with the audio too.

Boing Boing

Bunny Rap



Can any one say Hip Hop?

Transparent Screens



Cool or what, The desktop background images are digital photographs, taken to give the effect that the laptops have transparent screens. The effect how ever is ofcurse broken as soon as you move the laptop.

Charles Darwin



Charles Darwin Needs you!

In this backward age where many in America have decided to turn their backs on science and technology and try and stem progress.

Many in the Christian right seize upon the fact the dawns Theroy of evolution is called Theroy only because that was it's original title. All scientific Studies are called Theroy's to begin with, until they can be verified by other scientists.

Darwin's Theroy of evolution is FACT, and is considered so in the rest of the 1st world, not that any world out side of the USA matters to the 97% of Americans who only consider America to be the world.

With this in mind Swarhmore Collage has launched a ranger of stickers and bookmarks aimed at gathering popular support for Darwin.




So don't live in the dark age, and let your lives be ruled by 2000 year old book. Come join the rest of us in the 21st Century.

Wednesday, March 23, 2005

Photo Shop, Help!

I have been trying to make a new logo for the site for ages now, but without success I must admit my photshop skills are nill.

I started with this image I found on Flickr,




I resized it and flipped it to make it more of a banner shape,




I then managed to make this, which is far to gothey,



I while messing about I noticed that when you highlighted the text you could make this effect,




Which I think fits in a lot better with the image I want for the site.

I have been told the filter is just one to highlight text and I have yet to find away to apply the green filter to the whole image.

If there is any one out there who can recreate this effect and modify one of the source images in this post, I would appreciate it greatly.

Ipod Imaginings



Business2.0 has some ipod imaginings of what future ipod's might look like, incorporated into various items such as phones and cameras.

The one above is the new ipod, I love it. My only complaint is the little grey bar with the brown lanyard. I feel it total destroys the sleek black image of the new ipod.

If you where to get rid of that bar I would go out and buy one tomorrow, never mind waiting around for a free ipod off the net.

Jeff Weise

On Monday, 17-year-old Jeff Weise went on a rampage, shooting to death his grandfather and the grandfather's companion, then invading his school on the Red Lake Indian Reservation. Armed with two pistols and a shotgun, he killed nine people and wounded seven before shooting himself to death in the nation's bloodiest school shooting since Columbine High in Colorado six years ago.
First of all I would like to extend my sympathies to all those involved in this terrible incident.

A long time school friend of mine has just sent me the following email, It contains links to a film, Jeff Weise made and posted on the internet as he states in the email the film is very graphic and in the circumstances, I would go as far to say autobiographical.

If you or any member of your family has been touched by the tragedy I would NOT recommend you watch the film.


No doubt you’ve all heard the tragic news of yet another teenage shooting rampage in the US.

Well it turns out that he used to post regularly on www.Homepageofthedead.com a website that I used visit on a regular basis. I actually have spoken to his kid in the chat room supported by the site. I've never doubted that there are some strange people on the site... a lot of far right wing nutters attracted by the survivalist image of zombie films.

It seems he had a rather unhappy life… the sites owner brought up some of his old P.Ms (private messages). I was going to attach them to this message but I thought it was a little unethical (if you want to read them visit the site). Suffice to say it is the all too frequent story of abusive and alcoholic parents, lack of friends and the general feeling of being a loner.

It’s quite disturbing reading them… knowing what happened… and while I'll never be able to understand what would drive someone to taking other people lives I could see why he would have wanted to end his own.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=605013&page=1

While this article does not mention HPOTD directly it does mention some other zombie sites.

If you want to see something really disturbing follow this link http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/195194 it is a flash animation by Jeff Weise/Blades11. I will warn you now, it’s not very nice.

There have been a bunch of people signing up to the site, a few people claiming to be reporters wanting information…



If you would like to read some of his personal messages to others on the Homepage of the dead forum they can be read here.

------
Edit

The personal messages from the homepage of the dead have now been taken down due to intense media intrest, Here is a copy.....

Author Message
Neil
Administrator


Subscribed Member
Location: London, UK
Joined: 28-Oct-2001
Posts: 12820

Subject: I've backed up recent/old forums/PMs... Date: Today 02:54:03

His posts on the forum I could find were always straight laced etc...

However, if you look at this article - http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=605013&page=1

It states:-
In one posting, he criticized interracial mixing on the reservation and slammed fellow Indian teens for listening to rap music. "We have kids my age killing each other over things as simple as a fight, and it's because of the rap influence," he wrote.

Checking thru his details, he used an email address of "fukrap666@hotmail.com" once...

Looks like he had a really f***ed up childhood. Here are a few comments he made in PMs:-




I have friends, but I'm basically a loner inside a group of loners. Most of my friends don't know the real me, I've never shared my past with anyone, and I've never talked about it with anyone. I'm excluded from anything and everything they do, I'm never invited, I don't even know why they consider me a friend or I them...



My mom used to abuse me alot when I was little. She would hit me with anything she could get her hands on, she used to drink excessively too. She would tell me I was a mistake, and she would say so many things that its hard to deal with them or think of them without crying.



My mom got drunk one night and wrecked her car and had to relearn how to tie her shoes, I was too young to fight back or too young to stick up for myself without getting struck down when this was happening.





However, nothing can justify the pain and suffering he has put others though.
----

Jef Weise also had a blog with livejournal, However it only contains three entries.

Solution For Saw Eye's



If like me you find that after the 1st six or seven hours on the computer each day you eye's start to tire, then hope may be on the way. Even if it is in a limited way.

Over on the Design desk, they take a 1st look at Microsoft's new fonts decided to make long reading spells on the computer more tolerable.

Bill Gates wants computer users, well, Microsoft users, to have a more enjoyable on-screen reading experience -- so much so that he made improving reading on the screen one of his top five priorities.

Beginning in 2006, Microsoft says it will ship with its operating system and other software products six brand new typefaces created especially for extended on-screen reading.
For a full description and examples of the new fonts from Microsoft you can read them here.

Ipod Restore



Honest there is an ipod in that pic ;)

Just been reading about Ipod Restore, A New venture in the Us that will fix you broken ipod do upgrades and other technical stuff like hard drive upgrades. Best of all they operate world wide, you can just pop you ipod in the post and they will give you quote if you don't like it they will send it back for free.

For those of you who care for your iPod more than your own liver, TechRestore has launched their iPodRestore program. For $29, you can select the Full-Restore plan and wait as a specially designed box is sent your way for you to ship your iPod in. It includes overnight shipping both ways, and an estimate. There’s also the Self-Restore option if you know how to work a roll of packaging tape for only $10, but you have to supply your own materials. After they receive your iPod, a technician will contact you within 24 hours with a diagnosis and repair price. You can elect to have them fix your Pod or send it back at no additional cost. They specialize in battery upgrades, screen replacement and audio jack repair, so this may be the perfect solution if your iPod is beginning to show its age but don’t want to drop $300 on a new unit. (They also offer hard drive upgrades.)
Gizmodo

Bananas



BANANAS NATURALLY DIVIDE INTO 3 PERFECT WEDGES.

2005 PhotoBloggies




The voting has now started for the PhotoBloggies of 2005, So why not head over and lend your support to your favorite photo blog. Also you never no what little gems you will find amongst the nominations.

Tuesday, March 22, 2005

Bit The Bullet......



Now any of my friends will tell you that I am tighter than a "9 bob note", but I have grown to love flickr. So much so that I just had to download the upload tools, as I had so many pics to up load.

Then the most dreaded thing in the world happened, I used up all my free upload bandwidth!

So I took the plunge and went Flickr Pro which any one I know will tell you I don't spend my cash easily, but Flickr has changed the way I use my Photo's before they where archived along with every thing else. Not to be looked at not to be shared, not to be linked too or emailed.

My poor unloved pictures :(, That was until I got into the habit of using Flickr to share my pics. With out a word of lie I have used Flickr every day for the last month, It has brought photos back to life.

So with that in mind I got out my CC and took the plunge and spent the £22.50 ($41.77) after all I have spent more in night on vodka. Plus with the USD being so weak the was never a better time.

So here's to Flickr!

Desktop Inspiration.



I always like to look at other people desktops, Inpart I like to see what they are using as the background, but more so I like to see what icons take pride of place on their desktops.

As of today Flickr has launched a new service "Hottag's"

Every wondered what's H.O.T. on Flickr today? Well, here's the very first sneak peek at that! Now when you visit the main tags page on Flickr, you'll see a breakdown of hot tags over the last 24 hours, and the last week (from the time you're looking).

This is a list based more on frequency of use than photo volume, so it changes all the time. As you'll see, it's just a teeny taste of the new features we'll be introducing to help you discover cool photos on Flickr.

One of the new "HotTag's" is desktopshowandtell This now allows me to indulge my self and look at new desktops :)

Chemical Brothers Remixed



Not content with the unprecedented international success of their last remix project, the team behind "Always Outsiders, Never Outdone", the unofficial Prodigy Remixed album, have only gone and done it again. This time the Chemical Brothers latest album "Push the Button" gets the remix treatment.

The DJs behind "Flip the Switch" see the remix album as a natural part of the evolution of UK dance music. In a recent interview, Ed was quoted as saying "We used to make cut-ups or DJ mixes for ourselves to play. Bootleg culture isn't a new thing. It's something people do - take snatches from other people's records and make a DJ mix."



You can download the album for free here, all they ask is that you make a small donation to charity.

You can also their previous work Always Outsiders here.

Ashes And Snow





Ashes and Snow will be displayed in the Nomadic Museum, a 45,000-square-foot temporary structure designed by renowned architect Shigeru Ban and hosted by the Hudson River Park’s Pier 54 at West 13th Street in New York City. The first of its kind in the world, the Nomadic Museum building is composed largely of recyclable and reusable materials—used shipping containers for the walls and paper tubing for the roof and columns—demonstrating sustainable practices and an innovative architectural approach within a post-industrial environment. The museum will provide a transitory environment that evokes the journey of the exhibition.
Ashes and Snow is organized by the Bianimale Foundation, a non-profit arts and nature conservation organization based in the United States. The New York opening marks the U.S. premiere of Ashes and Snow, Colbert’s 13-year personal and artistic odyssey.

Colbert’s one-hour 35mm film, edited by two-time Academy Award-winner Pietro Scalia and narrated by acclaimed actor Laurence Fishburne, will be continuously projected on a wall in a column-free theater at the far end of the museum.

About the Artist
Canadian-born artist Gregory Colbert began his career in Paris making documentary films about social issues. Filmmaking led to his work as a fine arts photographer, and the first public exhibitions of his work were held in 1992 at the Musée de l’Elysée in Switzerland and the Parco Galleries in Japan. In 2002, he launched the Ashes and Snow exhibition in Italy at the Venice Arsenale, a 125,000-square-foot 15th-century shipyard owned by the Italian Navy.

It was the largest solo exhibition ever mounted in Italy, and more than 100,000 people attended during the three-month run of the show. For the Venice exhibition he collaborated with Asian elephants, manatees, sperm and humpback whales, Royal Eagles, gyr falcons, antigone cranes, Sacred Ibis, Harris Hawks, and Loggerhead Tortoises. The New York exhibition will include works of his most recent collaborations with King penguins, elephant seals, cheetahs, leopards, zebras, elands, wild dogs, meerkats, and African elephants. Colbert continues his expeditions and the development of Ashes and Snow.



A Coder in Courierland



Ever thought about getting out of that crappy job? Sick of being stuck in door's all day long? Feedup of looking at PC screens all day long?

Haven't got a clue what to do?

A Coder in Courierland could be the inspiration you have been looking for, an open an frank discussion of one mans decision to change from programmer to a bike Courier in Canada.


Not the job change that would come first to my mind not with the British weather.

Ourmedia

Share your videos, audio files, photos, text or software - for free - with a global community of creative individuals.

Ourmedia.org has just entered alpha, basically they are a storage/hosting facility only you can put videos and other file types up for other to look at you are not just limited to photo's like with flickr.

They have a cool music video on the homepage at the moment, it worth visiting the site just to see it. Which is probably why it is up there to get people to go see the site.

At the moment signup appears to free, so now might be the time to grab a free account before the pay model is introduced.

-------------------------------
EDIT

You can read the blog of one of the creators here.

Monday, March 21, 2005

Incredibles

cover

Is out on DVD, I know it came out on the 18th but I have only just seen it. I have to say it's worth getting for the Jack Jack attack bonus feature never mind the film it's self.

FireFox




Found this on the blogdex, It looks like student add for FireFox, I can see the points it's trying to get across but it does not do it for me, It comes across a series of points but into one place rather than a complete argument for changing to Firefox.

Loonatics



SteamBoy




From the creators of Akira comes Steamboy....


A retro science-fiction epic set in Victorian England, Steamboy features an inventor prodigy named Ray Steam who receives a mysterious metal ball containing a new form of energy capable of powering an entire nation. This young boy must use it to fight evil, redeem his family, and save London from destruction. The lush Victorian interiors and the elegance of the era's mechanical design allows Otomo to create dazzling visual backgrounds and machines for this film. With more than 180,000 drawing and 400 CG cuts, Steamboy is sure to be one of the most elaborate animated features of 2004.
Nice to see some anime set in the GB for once, there is a trailer on the site that is in English as well as 3 short clips in Japanese with English subs.

the one thing that strikes me thou, is could they have picked a worse place to go to war, I know all the good nice civilians will hide from the evil genius in a glass building.

while he rains down fire on it with his army of tanks, not the best thought out plan in the world.

Of course the building is the one used for the Victorian Festival Of Britain marking the 100th anniversary of the Great Exhibition, in the Victorian pleasure gardens. Thou for the life of me I can not remember what the Exhibition hall was called.

O well when Steamboy comes out over here on DVD (or a lot more likely of the net) I am sure it will be worth seeing.

Birmingham Rhapsody



Bohemian Rhapsody in pictures.....

Joke Time

I have had these two sitting in my inbox for a couple days so I thought I would share them with you.

A woman walks into her doctor's office, scared of the strange

development recent to the inside of her thighs... a green spot on

the inside of each. They won't wash off, they won't scrape off, and

they seem to be getting worse.



The doctor assures her he'll get to the bottom of this, and that she

needn't worry until tests come back. He sends her home. A few days

later, the woman's phone rings. Much to her relief, it's the doctor.

She immediately begs to know what's going on with these spots?



"You're perfectly healthy--there's no problem. But I'm wondering: is

your husband a chav?" the doctor asks.



"Yes--how did you know?"

"Tell him his earrings aren't real gold."


and this one,

The Ferrari Formula 1 Team fired their entire pit crew yesterday.

The announcement followed Ferrari's decision to take advantage of the Government's Youth Opportunity scheme and employ people from Liverpool.

The decision to hire them was brought on by a documentary on how unemployed youths from Liverpool were able to remove a set of wheels in less than 6 seconds without proper equipment, whereas Ferrari's existing crew can only do it in 8 seconds with millions of euros worth of high tech equipment.

Tony Blair went on record as saying this was a bold move by Ferrari management, which demonstrated the international recognition of the United Kingdom under New Labour. As most races are won and lost in the pits, Ferrari now has an advantage over every team. However, Ferrari may have got more than they bargained for.

At the crew's first practice session, the Liverpool pit crew successfully changed the tyres in under 6 seconds, and then within 12 seconds they had re-sprayed, re-badged and sold the vehicle to the McLaren team for 8 bottles of Stella, a kilogram of speed and some photos of Coulthard's girlfriend in the shower.

Start.com



Looks like Bill has decided to re use some of their old real estate, Start.com once used to advertise windows 95. Is now being used for a little experiment, It looks like MS is trying to take on Del.icio.us.

Admittedly is looks like they are not planning to use tags or let you see how many other people have booked marked a page at one point in time.

But most people don't need that sort of functionality, ok so right now you have copy a huge unwieldy URL every where with you to access you book marks but they are working on authentication now.

As far as I can see the aim of this new MS project is to create a new home page for IE, If you control where the sheep start browsing from you control their journey, with lots of pointers to MS site's, but also Google, Amazon and the BBC.

Not surprisingly at the moment there is no FireFox support at the moment...

We hear you: Firefox support is almost done!
And seriously, we're just messing around with some prototypes here.
Do let us know what you think, though!
Let see how long Firefox support takes.

Yahoo actually does acquire Flickr

We all new it was going to happen, It was the worst kept secret of the year,

What is going to happen to Flickr?

Flickr will be continuing on the path it's on -- to Flickr 1.0 and beyond. We'll be working with a bunch of people that Totally Get Flickr and want to preserve the community and the flavor of what is here. We're going to grow and change, but we're in it for the long haul, with the same management and same team.


The question is will yahoo really leave flickr alone to do it's thing?

Sunday, March 20, 2005

At last!



After a year my dad finally got round to ripping up the floor boards to lay the phone line under them.

For the last year my internet access has come vier a 30M extension cable running from one side of the house to the other.

The phone link in my room only went from my PC to the door and stopped under the floor boards and has been coiled there for well over a year now.

Now it goes all they way and I can final wave bye bye to tripping on the extension in the middle of the night :)

Posting should return to normal soon.

Friday, March 18, 2005

Odeo



Over on Make blog they have some screen shots of ODEO's new service for downloading Podcast's.

Every one is waiting to see if ODEO has the business model that will turn Podcasting in to £'s.