I’ve not been blogging much while on vacation.The 4th is,apart from companies that want to trade of the ideals of America, much like the currenty incumbent of the Whitehouse while not actually engaging them.Trying to get a US customer service experience while eating is so far from the norm that I will just have to get used to it.I have to eat after all.

The UK has exceeded the US for nanny-state BS in a way that seemed to be decades off in the USA.I’m sure we’re into years,or even months,at this stage.Here’s some progression http://booksbikesboomsticks.blogspot.com/2009/07/happy-fourth-of-july.html 

More in a bit. When we actually go out and do things.

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Around 0430. View from the window,
originally uploaded by haltse.

Does this explain where my messiness comes from?

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It’s amazing that the genius of Pixar’s use of technology can by waylaid by such a dogmatic adherence to treating their customers as pirates via by way of Disney’s distribution .I’m referring to the digital copies,that we pay extra for, not  coming with the requisite codes to enable us to use them. From what I’ve read online we have to prov that we bought the disk,mess around with the mail , yes the real mail with stamps and white van, and wait for them to decide if we’re believable or not before graciously allowing us to use that which we paid for.

We’ve bought every Pixar movie on release date, seen every movie on release date and have spent an embarrassing amount of money on Cars , and other movie, memorabilia for our son. This  bullshit has sufficiently damaged my view of things Disney to the point that Kennedy Space Center rather than Disneyworld is looking like the preferred destination for our son’s 4th birthday.

Irony?  They think we’re thieves yet we paid for an item that’s not present and in a sane world circumstances wouldn’t the company responsible for the error apologize for the oversight rather than make the public jump through a pile of hoops?  

Amazon.com: Customer Discussions: Wall-e missing digital copy code!!!

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Zadi Diaz,new media producer and more erudite than most at explaining what she does,posted several interesting theses, little short of Cluetrain’s 95,but not a million miles away in spirit when dealing with those that buy eyeballs for people that appear to still be conducting business from back in the 1960’s.

Zadi Diaz – Home – Advertising is FAIL. Communication is WIN.

3. STOP calling people consumers!
People are not mindless drones waiting to consume. We are all people hoping to
connect and you are hopefully facilitators of conversation. As soon as
we change the language we will change the action.

I’m wondering if we are missing out on a large part of the problem here,and that’s with those “consumers” Oh hell I’m being contradictory
but if you can give me a few seconds to work out my confusion I’m sure it’s all going to be OK in the end.

There clearly are consumers, though not self-identifying and maybe it’s better to remove this learned behavior at the source? Would it not be more useful inoculating those on the receiving end of the advertiser’s missives, at least giving a framework for understanding what’s going on would be a start?

Take iPhone3Gs and Video as an example. Youtube saw a huge increase in videos that were posted. Does this strike anyone as creatives all having a new tool or the marketed-to masses waiting to be told that video online is indeed cool and they have Apple’s permission? What was stopping them before? 

In other words are people using what’s fed to them?

Yes it’s an issue complicated by data plans and that most decent phones for video,aren’t subsidized but it’s not been hard to avail yourself of expression via video in the last two years but even that didn’t appear to be easy enough. Seriously most of the article makes very good points for trying to sell to those whose lives are interwoven with the net, but as long as there’s more and more people from the old-school getting on line I fear we’re stuck with this until it’s no  longer a viable audience to talk at rather than talk with.

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Gavin Patterson, believes the need for his company to make money from the efforts of another company entitles him to use the police powers of the state so that he can resale television? This is about as immoral as it gets. The mafia at least have the decency to solve their own issues

Sky TV built the market for satellite TV in the UK, ass punched the woefully lacking BSB and merged with them. Then they made a mistake, getting big. See the UK spirit isn’t that of Dunkirk and stoicism under pressure  any more than the majority of the US is of freedom loving  don’t tread on me types.  It’s wanting other people to give you things for free and acting like a mob the moment it doesn’t go your way.

BBC NEWS | Business | Sky may have to share TV channels

The proposal to force Sky to wholesale its content is welcome, but we now need Ofcom to step up the pace and to enforce this rigorously,” said Gavin Patterson, chief executive of BT Retail.

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I really need to get my browser to display  “anonymous coward” whenever it quotes  those paid by a state,with public funds,that wont use their real name while they go about their day protecting their investment, er consumers especially when they spout crap like this.

“The essential point of our case is consumer choice,” said the spokesman. “

Really?

I never had an issue changing the browser, adding different grips to a gun, upgrading the lighting on my vehicle etc. There is no choice in which nanny superstate you live in, other thanby  leaving  which I didn’t find that hard to though it was a lot harder than swapping IE for Opera.

I wish MS had gone further and just told Europe to sit on a  Mac/ Penguin or come up with it’s own OS?   You can’t win a war of appeasement with anyone that sets themselves up as a monopoly on competitive practices.The one part of mercantilism via corporation that annoys me is their acquiesence rather than withdrawal from hostile markets.

It’s the old joke

Why is there only one Monopolies Commission?

BBC NEWS | Technology | Windows 7 pricing gets unveiled

A Commission spokesman dismissed Microsoft’s claim that it was taking the action to comply with European laws.

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Over the past months I have made fewer posts than usual.There are several reasons for this but mostly it’s been negative reinforcement that anything that I write only gathers negative comments based on the formatting,length and typos rather than on the merits of the ideas contained within.
Via Robert Anton Wilson’s creations “Hagbard Celine” I believe truth often comes from fictional sources, cartoons and even cereal packets,is the belief that communication is only possible between equals and is contained within the explanation of  his second law
  "Accurate communication is only possible in a non-punishing situation."

How many situations like that arise? 
That may explain the planet a  little better but it’s not helping me.  The question that I would like to have answered is this.At which point do I benefit from everyone else’s communication skills? E.G.; it seems like addressing the correct audience is a one-way-street.
In other words I [...]

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Douglas Rushkoff takes a look at how training consumers doesn’t always work out the way you planned.
Apple’s Army of Whiners – Page 1 – The Daily Beast
No it’s not just for the title ,which I like, it’s an interesting reflection on many of the “old” Apple sticker-ed cars of activists I see that excoriate corporations but can’t seem to apply it to those that make their pc. It’s double-think different with those infinitely loopy types

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No sex-talk please we’re American.

Since it’s unlikely any of your mails stay within the same state the Fed Gov , aka TSOG ,as Robert Anton Wilson called them, have a nice new stick with which to beat you. Please don’t get sexually aroused at the thought of being beaten otherwise you’ll make felons of both of us. The idea that a crime “committed” against imaginary people, be they adult,child or a kitten that solves sudoko puzzles, is a crime is retarded.   Sex thought crime is on the rise here. You can be a child pornographer by taking a self portrait of your 17 year old self.  Children are no longer children. A child can be a drawing, story or they can be real people that appear to be younger than they are. None of the former can be cross examined in court as to the nature of their damage. The latter is a good thing for the prosecution as the answer is NONE because there’s no victim, ergo no crime. 

This should get appealed into oblivion but in the meantime I’d start worrying in case it doesn’t.  Encryption may be your best friend.

Circuit court: Emailing sexual fantasies to consenting adults a crime – Don’t Tase Me, Bro!

Sharing an obscene sexual fantasy over e-mail is a federal crime that enjoys no protection under the First Amendment, a federal appeals court said Monday, in a decision that drew sharp dissent from one judge and potentially set the stage for a Supreme Court appeal.

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Trying out a new theme. Apart from a double gravatar in the comment section all “seems” well.

Please let me know if you see anything weird!

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Why would this make depressing reading for some? For some reason the left leaning always assume a person that doesn’t use,own or even have a desire to do either. Health care is another such ‘must-have’  regardless of the wishes of those that have it thrust upon them.
Being online is not a requirement for a happy life and the thought of millions of new,uncared for computers dropping hazardous waste in terms of viruses,trojans and other mal-ware onto the net just fills me with joy. 
The internet doesn’t have to look like a computer and if the idea of getting people online is so that they are more efficient citizens, wait a minute aren’t we meant to be in charge of those expense-forging vermin? It would make sense to approach the issue by either using some kind of inbuilt device to a phone or TV either that or cheaper to wait for [...]

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You can read all about the new iPhone 3gs on other fine sites such as MobileCrunch. New phone, same old network.  I love the iPhone but  it’s a co-dependent relationship that I’m ready to move on from.
The big news?  While some have touted the ability to buy or rent movies over the air this is hardly worth noting.Oh ok note away.  Using an iPhone to watch movies designed for the large screen is something I just can’t do. Hell I believe we should divide up society by those that buy  pan and scanned ( e.g., full-screen) movies and the rest of us.  
Video creation is by far the most interesting addition,that and a the removal of the POS lens / imager they’ve had the balls to call a camera in the current incarnation.  iPhone is the most popular source of images on Flickr and it’s likely that we’re likely [...]

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You Tube XL,  the merging of the living room set with the  Oh wait, that’s  not at all what it is. It’s a skin that looks pretty when shown on a large screen.  Yes it shows You Tube content on a large screen, like having a really big monitor.  
Shame the compressed video and even worse audio depredations on most of the content make this a non starter.  Small crap x screen size = larger crap.
The digital TV transition has been “traumatic” enough for people but I’d like to see it go further.There’s a lot of spectrum going to waste,off hours, 24-7 on religious channels,  and I am wondering why we can’t use that as a channel to record our programs in advance for later watching. Yep it’s Tivo but not as we know it.Seems odd to limit the transmission to real time recording for most content that really [...]

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MY god it’s full of  douchebags! </Dave>   Social marketing types anyway. That’s the fate the below entry from the Readwriteweb blog posits as being the likely result of our aggregate life-stream data.
Web 3.0 Might Be Really Stupid
The patterns of activity in that data offer a unique opportunity to learn about ourselves – individually, in groups and as a society. Unfortunately, that opportunity may not be taken advantage of. A better title of this post might be If Web 3.0 Is Poetry, Will Anyone But Marketers Read It?
Oh we’ll be taken advantage of , as much as we allow anyway, for the chance to stick yet another piece of bling on our profile.Yet the “good” use of this aggregation as a kind of  silicon mirror of introspection poses larger questions.
I want software that will tell me: “On Wednesdays you tend to post
messages a lot in the morning, despite the [...]

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Twitters
Worst
Ephemera
Emanates-from
The
Arseholes
Retweeting – the
Douchebags – of
Social media

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The title may be a little too strident.E.G.,close is 2010 until you realize just how long these jokers have taken to produce a copy of decades old tech.The Internet and GPS could possibly be too important to leave to the State?
At one time Europe was asked to back off making a GPS replacement for civilian use due to the USA’s need to be all snug and cozy even going as far as to say that they’d  down the birds if a hostile power was trying to use it. Europe went ahead with  Galileo and should be fully operational  in 2013. Russia and China have their own systems, GlONASS and COMPASS respectively, so it’s not like the world would end if the US one ceased being useful. I bet that just pisses a lot of people off.  
Most stories appear to neglect that there’s more than one solution available.. and [...]

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Baaaaah!!!!!

.

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I probably only learned one interesting thing at the Phoenix Social media club , before my distaste for the balance of people wanting to sell you on things outweighed those that don’t want to be sold too. I.E., those on my side of the fence.
That interesting thing was a statement as to the fragility of Google’s hegemony and the likely source of their decline.It’s not an other search engine but more a negation of the need to have a search site as a destination but we’d be utilizing the search features within our forums and online-communities.  While he did not single out Google specifically the bold phrase “search is dead” certainly didn’t sit well with the SEO crowd.  
What if I decide to follow someone on twitter or facebook who is a guru on the types of cars Im interested in buying ? Could I not just query them [...]

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Let’s just say that it’s nice seeing ideas come to fruition.Less so when it’s a third party.  Mid Hockey season I submitted this idea which gained as much traction as the Coyotes. On the bright side I do get to use it for free and see if it really was that good an idea.
iPhone users to walk and read at same time • The Register
iPhone users can now walk the streets safe in the knowledge that upcoming letter boxes, errant children or dogshit can be easily avoided, without interrupting the more important act of reading email.

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The porn-star name meme cometh.

That people like to help people and will give out all kinds of information that they shouldn’t is fairly well established. What’s not so well established, at least by the common usage of marketing and SMD types is the term “viral meme” which has been denigrated to include just about any tell a friend promotion or user generated content that’s been slapped together.

For once the term viral meme may be appropriate in the case of the porn star name meme that’s going the rounds on Twitter.

Security Alert: Twitter Porn Names Scam – PC World

It could be simple human error, but it’s also possible that this security hole is an example of truly sneaky social engineering.

In short people are being asked to provide  biographical data such as the name of the street they grew up on,your mother’s maiden name, place of birth or your favorite pet for the grand payoff of concatenating your porn star name for you to post proudly to Twitter, Facebook and anywhere else you think this ephemera will soon be forgotten. Except that it wont be.

A virus, ( let’s leave Mimi out of this for now) can’t reproduce itself and to survive it transmits it’s message  using the resources of the host cell or in this case the message that wraps it up.   Seriously would you just send that out onto the web if you had no payoff? 

Memes are ideas, concepts, beliefs and thoughts that are transmitted verbally or by repeated action and can move through a ‘culture’ in a manner similar to a virus.

Do you see why most items masquerading as “viral marketing” are bullshit?  You know what the marketer wants and are often better able to identify it than they are:) That’s not viral it’s an ugly bug that needs to be squashed once and for all.

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I didn’t need to get far into this article before I was annoyed enough to toss up a little blog spitball. The idea that programming is not a creative art and can be tossed at any person is far from reality, at least it is were I work.
The implied insult to Asia re being good for that kind of work further ruffled my fur.So much for the advancement of the human race it appears you have to be in the USA to really be the kind of wacky right brained story teller to get the big picture.
Then again this article from the same woman that gave a platform to anti-science nit wits like Jenny McCarthy which is about as far right brained as it gets. An appeal to get away from engineering and rational thought is probably not the best message to be spreading around but hey she’s [...]

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Dobh takes on the antiques roadshow,
originally uploaded by haltse.

The adorable and sweet child takes time out to avoid being photographed by posing. Weirdest thing.

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Now this is speculative “journalism”.
If Amazon announce a device, a large scale e-reader this would be defeated in the marketplace by Apple should they create a larger iPhone.  
I’m not sure that’s the case. Without some significant weight loss I wouldn’t like to have a device x3  the size of an iPhone hit me in the face if I feel asleep reading. The heat generated from illuminating that large a screen could be interesting too.  With Kindle if I leave the USA  it’s  pretty useless, heck move to Montana and it’s useless which is not the kind of behavior one wants from their reading material. This is one early adoption I think I’ll pass on.  
Large-Screen Kindle Won’t Mean Squat if Apple Tablet Arrives | GadgetLab

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