Shatners bassoons

Thought for the day

2007-06-22T09:00:00.000-07:00

What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly.
Thomas Paine
US patriot & political philosopher (1737 - 1809)

Works on so many levels.

Google alerts Marriot

2007-06-15T08:48:00.001-07:00

Of course, I really wanted to track 'British Airwaves'...

Google trends displays the web searches for two specified terms. In this case I've picked Hilton and Marriott. The handy built-in news item flag shows us that the bulk of web traffic is not significantly affected by business news around the brand. I'm sure if some wannabe rock star had trashed a Marriott hotel room it would be a different story.

Looking at other services on Netvibes (BBC RSS feeds, Google Alerts, Alexa web traffic, Blog search and Flickr), the key noise this week

1. Travel and Terror
Lots of noise in from traditional news stories about the suicide bomber in a Pakistan Marriot. Traditional news discusses the effect on business (business volumes still reported to be down post 9/11) and the blogosphere is strangely quiet on the subject, despite specific searches. Time will tell as to whether business will be hit again.

2. Read it, don't risk it
Web 2.0 has blown apart the traditional information-seeking pre-holiday behaviour. Now people can check out real reports from real people about the county, the locale and even the accommodation that they're considering. This points to the importance of cultivating volume of chat around your brand. The more there is, the greater the 'normalisation' - don't only want the extremely aggrieved or oddly ecstatic talking about your brand. And if you promote chat, it'll get linked to by independent blogs

3. Luxury vs. budget.
Marrior is acquiring star hotels. It looks like the hotel industry is polarising - luxury hotels doing very well, as are the super-budget hotels. Two different travel mindsets being catered for, or different customer groups?

Gun control, Houston style

2007-05-09T09:06:00.000-07:00

Great letter from gun-ho Texan in the Economist last week:

SIR – While agreeing that people sometimes misuse guns, the same can be said for knives, baseball bats and cars. Gun control has been tried in the past. The Nazis took away a right to weapons in Germany and then led millions to the slaughterhouse. That is why I support the private ownership of guns without any regulation including, especially including, registration of the weapons. My idea of gun control is: breathe, aim, squeeze.

David Bush

Houston

Like the guy for his 'lack of guns leads to ethnic cleansing logic'; love him for his last line. Wish I could do the accent.

That russian download site is dead, love live that russian download site

2007-05-04T02:52:00.000-07:00

The pay system for allofmp3.com is now well and truly dead, shut down by some spiky music industry execs, no doubt. This has cast many of us to into a painful world of paying full prices for music.

However, salvation from honesty is at hand. Those lovable russian rogues have given us a fully working, credit-card-taking $1.40 an album music site. Rejoice and go forth to fill that back catalogue.

www.mp3sale.ru

Real-world avatars?

2007-05-01T04:55:00.000-07:00

Intersting story in the Guardian last week.

It talks to the creator of a robot that is designed to be a perfect body double for its creator. The theory is that if the robot looks lifelike, people will react to it naturally. When the creator has full control over movement and speech, he or she can effectively be in two places at once. With sensors increasing in sophisticaton, they can even have the full sensory experience of being elsewhere.

What if, rather than the robot being a perfect reproduction of the user, it was a representation of who they wanted to be; A real physical-world avatar. It's kind of the ultimate plastic surgery. Your old, boring, physical body stays home wired up. You, with all senses firing, are out into the world in your new body. Of the sex, appearance and dress of your choosing. You could even have different bodies for different days, or occasions....or partners.

Maybe, in fifty years or so, this will be so sophisticated and commonplace that we really won't think of it as any different to slipping on a new pair of jeans. Or, a bit more permanently, changing your name?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,2065580,00.html

I thought you booked it?

2007-05-01T04:05:00.000-07:00

The perils of running ad campaigns without checking the URL is booked first...

(report nicked from b3ta.com)
Graffiti promoting a new film included a URL
that the ad agency forgot to register. Or had
they? We linked it last week, and reader Mark
Laughlin got in touch and gave us the real
story.

"It was me that registered it and, yes, that
really was a complete balls-up on the part of
the ad agency.

"I saw the stencils last Friday just off
Tottenham Court Road whilst on me lunch. Got
back and tried the URL - and good lord it was
unregistered. So 8 quid later and 20 minutes of
pissing about I've got a site up and running
and started my game of 'wait and see'.

"They spent the earlier part of this week
getting narky with me and generally panicking
before offering to buy the domain for the same
price I bought it for... After the word spread
across the internets on Friday they got rather
more desperate and way keener to settle it
quickly.

"I could have been a brat and held out for a
lot more, but I elected to take the quick win
before inevitably Fox and the bigger guns got
involved.

"I'm not telling how much they wound up having
to pay me. It's almost certainly less than you
think. Let's say - enough for a nice holiday or
a shiny new telly (and considerably more than
the £8.99 I paid for it)

"PS. Ad agency in question was "The Creative
Partnership'"

So there you have it. Unless, you know, he's a
marketing agency plant.

EXTREMELY VIOLENT ice hockey fight

2007-04-25T14:49:00.000-07:00

Not even going to try and describe it. Very funny.

Simple pleasures, like a nice relaxing cycle.

2007-04-25T14:03:00.000-07:00

Why is cycling like a nutter through traffic so much fun?

Every day I take my bike to work I end up riding, racing and ultimately grinning like a maniac. It's indecently, childishly entertaining. It makes me feel like I'm fifteen and off to do stuff I shouldn't. Which surely isn't a bad state of mind to come into work in.

It's not a bit like this though. NYC couriers make our British cycle couriers look pretty woosy. The whole sub-culture of cycle couriers is pretty appealing. They've got cool clothes, a fuck you attitude and an oddly intense worship of human power fused with ultra-paired down but trick technology. I suppose that's why the cyber punk man/machine/future thing is so connected with the scene.

Atheist door-to-door evangelist

2007-04-19T15:28:00.000-07:00

An amusingly ranty New Zealander loses it after one too many early Saturday morning Mormom wake-up calls. Much comedic venting of spleen and and a door-to-door revenge trip to Salt Lake City, the Mormon capital of the USA, ensues.