Fucking cool shit I can do with technology

Ok so here's the thing: I can do some awesome stuff with technology.
No suprise hey, everyone can, yeh I know that too. But lets take a
minute here to ponder those fucking cool things.
•BASICS
sattelite communications: you can talk to anyone anywhere in the
world. View television LIVE from anywhere if you wish, to quote the
cable guy play mortal combat agai st a friend in china. Awesome.
•read ebooks anywhere: might not seem astonishing until you realise
the kindle is using epaper. A screen developed to work like paper,
viewable in high and low lighting with no backlight, yeh it's refresh
rate sucks (links and reasons after the break) but it's fucking cool.
•email / blog / tweet from anywhere: case in point, I'm emailing this
entry from my iPhone. Fuck yes.
ADVANCED SHIT.
Ok more about super cool technology hacks/stuff I do ^_^
•use a PSP as a second / third screen on you pc...wirelessly: using
pspdisp driver and a custom psp you can get a small screen. Useful for
system info / monitoring whilst in game / video.
• use conductive fabric and paint to implement technology into almost
anything: oh yeah there is graffiti with led's built in, circuit
boards built into clothes. This shit is amazing.

There are millions of other cool things I do and you can,
Free your mind at:
Www.hackaday.com home of most of my inspiration
Www.instructables.com holiday home of my insipration

Short one today. Not too much going on being POETS day I'm shattered
from work. (piss off early tomorrow Saturday)
They may go early I have to fix their stuff so they can.

Sent from my iPhone even any spelling mistakes!

Why people don't use twitter

And why I think they should…

 

So here’s the deal, I use twitter, I use it a lot. Not as much as some others but I do use it a lot. As thus I can say that I understand the power of this micro blogging site, the ponderous things that this “Social enabling” site does for us. I have tracked the progress of my favourite geeks throughout the San Diego comi-con this year without actually being there, I have been given up to the minute updates for this year’s Shift Happens and I have experienced the thoughts and feuds between Will Wheaton (Wesley crusher for the uncultured….) and his cat.

 

Things that Twitter has done for the world

 

I figure I should put forward some good things to come out of the twitter-verse, and some of them really are good. It has standardised most civilised comment threads, before you might see this.

 

Well hamface223 I think you are incorrect. And….*wall of text*

 

This, whilst serving a purpose, is sometimes completely lost on the intended user, unless sent as a direct response or email alerts spam your account every time someone posts another comment, but thanks to twitter we now have the @. OK well we had it before, it has been a convention of email since nigh on the beginning, but using it as a reference to a username makes it so much easier to read conversations, and if necessary interject with your own ravings. Basically the @ makes it easier to see responses when scanning through, it’s not too intrusive and gives a more direct response to proceedings.

 

Ok so there are better examples (Tweetups / Twitter meet-ups, tweeps (twitter peeps) moving on injustice; namely Adam Savage from myth busters and AT&T not really injustice but showed potential power of thousands of followers) but I stand by it Twitter has given us a lot without a lot of people realising it.

 

So Why don’t you use twitter??

 

I don’t have enough friends to follow me.

 

Ok this is a common one, people think that you need droves of people to follow you on twitter to see it as a viable platform. This is not true, your tweets show up all over the place, in searches in trends everywhere, people see what’s going on in the “twitterverse” and you are contributing, ok so it’s not live interaction ala Friend-Feed (See later post about collaborative communication on the internet) but it is part of something larger. Heck if your interesting enough people will find you.

 

It’s not as good as Facebook / beebo…etc

 

Ok let’s kill this one off nice and quickly, Twitter is nothing like Facebook, it is nowhere near. Yes unfortunately they are grouped in the social networking websites umbrella but they just aren’t the same beast at all. And Facebook is a beast, a foul beast of unimaginable horror and disgust, but if you use it you already know this. FB (Facebook) is a incredibly Narcissistic platform, it is completely “look at me look at me!” in its approach to social networking. It used to be that it was simplified, easy to use and a stripped out version of the then bloated, useless spam riddled MySpace, and now it is the new bloated, useless and spam riddled Facebook; filled with badges of social distinction (via www.twitter.com/hannahnicklin  @hannahnicklin) and essentially the “News Feed” is a group of people shouting at each other. I used to love the aspect of being able to track my social life in one website, but now I rarely use the full version of Facebook, checking only my messages on the iPhone or my email.

 

I don’t see the point. Isn’t it a little me me me?

 

Well it is if you use it for the purpose they intended…ok this one might be a little odd but here we go. Twitter is not all about the “What are you doing now?” question, I mean Yeh that’s the opening gambit and for a while you will use it for that, but it can be so much more. For example, again my good tweep and real life friend @hannahnicklin essentially summed up the Shift Happens conference this year, tweeting directly from the floor (and abusing her battery at the same time) I have gained a cult following from posting bizarre pictures of my friend @bearpiglett, and people such as @documentally posting somewhat cryptic messages about his chainsaw with sufficiently creepy videos too…oh and being somewhat of a tech buff so I am told! But yea this still might seem a little me me me. But it is not just that.

 

As I stated before Twitter is a collaborative space, people update and blog on twitter, and you choose to follow them, you don’t have to read all of the posts, I do because I am like that, but you don’t have to. It’s selective, and as many people have said the shift in media is towards the selective, the collaborative and the user generated / driven. The iPlayer from the BBC is a good example of this. People choose what to watch and when to watch it, for free. They select the television they like, it is huge and it is so successful that other media companies are trying to shut it down, but they won’t. The other great contender is Spotify, a legal completely free music service (if you don’t mind the Ads, and I don’t) it has user generated playlists you can share, and the ability to reach millions of people. This is what Twitter is part of it is more than the sum of its social networking components it is something more, something intangible, something I feel passionately enough to write about.

 

Something that has bored the pants off of you…

 

 

Links and apologies

Ok well I have to apologise for the last post, it was a gritty story of plot holes and spelling mistakes!

Told ya the phone was a poor platform for me personally i work too fast. Anyhow links!

www.twitter.com/documentally A tech micro blogger of great acclaim so i hear!
www.twitter.com/hannahnicklin A close friend of mine involved deeply with Theatre and technology.
www.hackaday.com My usual haunt for technology hacking
www.hannahnicklin.com Hannah's website full of good stuff and links to her blog.

just a couple of things i think you should check out really.

Take care out there.

What's it all about?

So this is the first blog entry I am writing from my iPhone, and may I
say it is a wonderful thing. The only problem I perceive is my la k of
ability to spell and the iPhones not so intuitive spelling checker. So
far it missed my I before e fail in perceive, and attempted to
undermine me with thong instead of thing.

So what is this blog all about? Well lets see...

•it's an experminet: I am terrblle at rememebering to update blogs
etc so I am seeing if I can keep this one up.
•it's about technology: I love technology and as many of my peers are
heavily involved in technology (links after the break) or scientists
of sone sort I figured I should join the ranks and blog about it in a
light hearted way.
•it's about choice: people choose their own media these days, they
pull content from the Internet, just look at the BBC iplayer and hulu.com
! So this is about giving people more choice in their reading.
•it's about humour: yep I'm English just look at that surropticious U
in humoUr!

So stick with me and I will try and keep you updated on my world of
tech and a guide to the Internets and real life.

Sent from my iPhone with pride!