thoughts, ideas, projects and musings
February 8, 2009 at 9:53 am · Filed under Featured, news
Watermark Project projection on Bristol building
Stumbled across this excellent project which serves to bring the subject of climate change to life.
(Note too my choice of words: Global Warming it might be for some, but others may see temperatures fall and here in Britain, it’s somewhat of an unknown which way it could fall).
So what if the ice melts eh? A few penguins cannot reproduce due to the lack of sea ice, hardly the end of the world. The reality for many of our cities is somewhat more striking in truth.
For millennia, we have been settling near seas and rivers due to the fertility of the soils, the wide availability of food and, in more recent centuries, due to the trading opportunities afforded. As a result, 1 in 10 of the world’s population lives within 30feet of sea level, two-thirds of us live within 100km of the coast.
Consider then these images of projections on buildings in my home town. Parochial certainly, but never the less striking.
Read more at watermarksproject.org
October 1, 2008 at 11:39 am · Filed under life
All too rarely do you see anyone coming out in favour of particular punctuation marks. With the obvious exception of the punctilious Lynne Truss, I’ve not seen a panegyrical prose to punctuation for a long while so in a bid to correct this injustice, I offer you my homage to the hyphen.
First up, let’s just look at this sign. What do they mean? Are they advertising that here, in this Canadian suburb, it’s possible to purchase rugs of enormous dimensions. Is it that the discounts available are huge, that the space available is large or that the range is fit for a persian King?
Had the sign had space, a hyphen would have made it all so much easier to understand. “Huge Rug-Sale” it would exclaim or even “Huge-Rug Sale” and we’d all know whether to expect floor coverings of the most preposterous proportions or simply a wide range of offerings at a discounted price.
Things are clearer, less ambiguous with a hyphen. Feel free to use one today, it’ll cost yer nothing.
Next week, “I love semi-colons” (reader, notice the hyphen?)
September 27, 2008 at 8:31 am · Filed under digital life, news
In hindsight, all the clues were there but I wonder how many of us would have seen the investment opportunity suggested in this early review of the Google search engine. All said, it’s hard to imagine that even Google’s founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin could imagine how their project might develop.
The article makes note of the fact that even then, Google had ambition. In 1998, they already had indexed 25million pages and were soon to up that to a massive 100million — compared to today’s 8-10 billion.
The interface came in for some criticism noting that it was in need of a facelift. Again, hindsight tells us that the simple, clean, white-focused homepage set the benchmark in usability. It’s said that the interface was so simple because Page and Brin never got round to working on it and the beta design just stuck. Tempting to believe that.
“Will Google go commercial” the founders were asked, “we’ve no objections” the future multi-billionaires responded. $1000 invested in the fledgling company back in 1998 would now be worth $250million.
Missed opportunity.
September 25, 2008 at 6:44 pm · Filed under news
After 10 years of planning, 3 years of building and countless months of expectation, they opened the Apple store today in my home town, just for me.
Surrounding my new Apple Store at Cabot Circus, the developers have helpfully built over a 100 new stores to keep other people entertained, such as Harvey Nichols, House of Fraser and other usual suspects. Honestly, they’ve done a wonderful job — it actually feels like a place I would tolerate shopping in.
But the new Church of Saint Steve Jobs is a lovely addition to my city and one that I and my bank balance may regret. Despite my not needing anything, I lust over small shiny Appley objects and I fear that shop is going to see a good few of my hard earned pounds over the next few years.
Oh dear.
[The image is of one of the 1000 t-shirts that the store gave away today. I didn't try and get there since it was during work hours and the crowds would have been stupid. When I go, I need peaceful solitude to saviour the shiney]
September 24, 2008 at 9:01 pm · Filed under news
It’s funny how memes spring up. My brother and I were chewing the cud on lightheaded frippery when he sent me a link to a website called graphjam.com. And then, just hours later, I stumbled (or was pushed towards) a facebook called entitled “Pop songs are best represented by graphs”. A picture tells a thousand words but a graph does seem to capture the essence of many a song — some truly brilliant work in here, wonderful creativity and humour.
I’ve added a couple of my own graphs too – sorry internet.
September 16, 2008 at 7:19 pm · Filed under life
As I drove on the Isle of Mull today, the memories of previous drivers of this piece of tarmac popped into my head. Mark, Ashley and Euan: three friends from University and beyond, drove here day in day out for 8 long weeks in the Summer of 1993, as part of our Geology degree.
First Mark was dropped off, at or around the letterbox on the Loch Buie road. He would then clamber up the hills and over the headland to get to his bit of this fair isle. I’ve passed that letterbox countless times since and it always reminds me of Mark and especially the day that, sick of the rain and basalt, he caught a lift home with the postman.
Next drop was for Ashley and myself at the memorial at Loch Buie. Ashley would head West and I to the East to our respective outcrops. Just once we worked together, but the misery of horizontal rain kept us from the rocks and we sought shelter in a cave. We always met up a few minutes before our evening rendezvous so we could dissect our day — this bit of basalt blah, that dyke bosh.
But my thoughts today were especially with Euan who had the furthest to go each day and whose journey took in this wonderful bridge. Today, despite the rain, the colours were spectacular and warm, framed by the mountains in Glen More.
But Euan did not appreciate the view. For Euan was on a mission to map Carsaig — Mission reasonably accomplished.
I remember those 8 weeks very fondly. Despite our occasional fallings out over midges, socks, food, farting, sleeping arrnangements, washing, car breakdowns, long journeys, poor driving abilities, caravans and basalt, I was a lucky soul to be surrounded by such wonderful company. They were and remain good mates.
September 14, 2008 at 9:31 pm · Filed under life
I first visited Calgary Bay, Isle of Mull, when I was 18 months old. I own a photo taken that day — I’m dressed in a white arran jumper, blue wellington boots and I’ve got my Dad’s binoculars hanging round my neck (… and given they were my Dad’s, they were bashing my knees as I walked).
Every few years, I come back to this beach. Its shape has changed over the years, but it remains a white expanse of sand with gentle, cold waters. On previous visits, I’ve swum here but today was never that kind of day.
Today was the first day I was able to take my daughter Clara to Calgary. She’s 7 months old, a year younger than I was for my first visit and so not able to recreate the photo of her father — that’ll wait for another year. Wonderful place.
I threw a ball for this dog for a while. We both enjoyed it.
September 13, 2008 at 10:39 pm · Filed under news
We’ve just arrived on the Isle of Mull for a week of Hebridean rest, but given where we are on the project at work, I’ll not be able to wind down completely and avoid the beck and call of conference calls and emails.
It’s very lovely to be back again — I lose count of the number of weeks I’ve spent here and I’m reminded just how beautiful this country really is. I’m sure that beauty is is due to the quality of light here. From where I sit, with the island’s largest town a mile away, there is very little light pollution and the stars are incredibly bright. The moonrise tonight was spectacular.
Two small projecst to complete this week : Become Patrick Bossert and learn how to complete the Rubik’s Cube (I’ve had 23 years to learn and I feel somewhat lazy). The other is to practice some long exposure photos of running water to see if I can’t get that smooth, silky look. Watch out for examples soon!
Impossibly, it’s also 5 years today since my Mum died. She’s greatly missed.
September 9, 2008 at 11:39 am · Filed under news
I used to have a boss who’s voicemail message read “If you’ve got a problem, or indeed an opportunity, please leave your details after the tone”. I guess it goes without saying that he really wasn’t too interested in the problems, but that’s what comes with sales roles.
What I do find though is that there are people who’d rather focus on what the problem is rather than look for the solution. Some seem to revel in it and it just pains me to see valuable time and energy put into exhaustive postmortems. We’d all like to figure out what went wrong — but how’s about we do that once we’ve solved the immediate issue eh?
It comes down to personal responsibility. Some people are happy to point the finger and make accusations of failed communications and broken processes. Take responsibility. Fix it. Life is much less stressful.
September 7, 2008 at 6:01 pm · Filed under news
If you regularly upload photos to Flickr like I do (and you have a pro account), take a look at your photo stats. It’s fascinating!
Predictably, the most popular of my photos are of my daughter as friends and family rushed to take a look at the wee bundle of joy. However, the most popular non-Clara picture is this one of ‘Nipper’, the HMV/RCA dog statue in Bristol, viewed over 100 times this year.
However, in breaking news, I’m delighted to say that one of my photos has been chosen for a calendar of Bristol which means that I’m a professional photographer! And yes, you betcha, ‘course it’s going to be added to my CV!
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