I’ve decided to try and support the UK companies that annouce they will not offshore services. This is tricky as no doubt some companies will lie in their advertising or at least withhold the whole truth. Statements like “We will not offshore our call centre staff” probably means they will offshore everything else. My first… Continue reading Offshoring
Blame it on the provider
The music industry today revealed its latest cunning plan to quash the evil music sharers. In this article a group calling themselves The Association of Independent Music annouced they are campaigning to make ISP’s middle men in delivering music to their users, whilst ensuring that the music industry gets its cut. David Ferguson, chairman of… Continue reading Blame it on the provider
World Cup 2006
England just got knocked out of yet another World Cup following a penalty shoot-out. This time England only scored 1 out of 4 which is a poor result even for a team that are hopeless at penalties. Of the World Cup matches I’ve watched, the actual football and the footballers seem to only be partially… Continue reading World Cup 2006
Telemarketing
Today my phone has rung a few times and stopped before I could pick it up. The calling number was 0800 0641081 so I thought I’d ring it and find out who the idiot is who calls and instantly hangs up. Turns out the number belongs to a company called LBM. From their website: LBM… Continue reading Telemarketing
Need a new Television
Move to new house is less than a week away now and there are so many things we need to buy. Near the top of my list is a decent LCD television. I looked at a few in Comet and Currys today and based on asthetics I like the LG and Sony products. Sony models… Continue reading Need a new Television
The keyboard is mightier than the sword
Today The Register has this article on a woman suing MySpace because her daughter was sexually assaulted after using their services to talk to a man. I hate cases like this where a free service is being charged due to the actions of one of its users. The girl in question is 14 years old,… Continue reading The keyboard is mightier than the sword
Postfix can do anything, (providing I know how to configure it).
I have issues with my current Mixmaster remailer configuration and I’m struggling for a solution. Currently the remailer sends messages via smtp relay through a VPN tunnel to a Postfix MTA in another country. This is good because it seperates the actual remailer from its exit-point and abuse reports go where I want them to… Continue reading Postfix can do anything, (providing I know how to configure it).
Homeplug – First impressions
My Devolo 85Mb/s starter kit arrived this morning. Everything was nicely packaged and the two supplied cables are good quality shielded cat5e. I know it’s silly but little things like that impress me. The instructions come as a PDF file and I had no trouble skipping most of the blurb and getting straight to the… Continue reading Homeplug – First impressions
Alan Connor
Alan Connor is a Usenet junkie who appears to have little understanding about anything except how to work an SLRN score file. As this is designed to be user-friendly, working it hardly seems a notable accomplishment, but Alan brags about it in virtually every posting he makes. Why am I so irritated by this guy?… Continue reading Alan Connor
Television Licensing
Here in the UK we are required to hold a TV license if we operate a receiver. The actual wording on the TV Licensing website is: If you use a TV or any other device to receive or record TV programmes (for example, a VCR, set-top box, DVD recorder or PC with a broadcast card)… Continue reading Television Licensing
Homeplug
My blog is turning into a shopping list! Next on the agenda is a HomePlug networking kit. The walls in the new house are much too thick for effective wireless connections, especially the run to the garage if I decide to stick my server out there to begin with. Homeplug allows me to network machines… Continue reading Homeplug
Microwave Oven
We need a new microwave before we move to St Mellion. The old one at Lou’s is rusting out at the top and it’s never worth moving something that heavy if it’s on the verge of falling apart. If we start off with a decent combination oven, there’s a chance we might decide not to… Continue reading Microwave Oven
Mortgage Offer
Nationwide made us a mortgage offer last Saturday. Everything looks reasonable on it and I’ve contacted the solicitors who also seem to think there’s nothing to worry about. There was a charge of £717 which I phoned Nationwide to query. Turns out this is nothing to worry about, it’s because they don’t take a payment… Continue reading Mortgage Offer
Hauppauge WinTV Nova-T-USB2
I bought one of these gadgets last week. Installing it under Windows was a doddle and the Linux set up wasn’t much harder, although it did need a kernel compile. The result is a lovely clear picture on my LCD monitor and a good choice of channels. There is however one fairly serious oddity: Approx… Continue reading Hauppauge WinTV Nova-T-USB2
Ogg Vorbis Tagging
Having decided to try out allofmp3.com following all the recent hype about it. I was delighted to discover they allow me to download songs in Ogg Vorbis format. As a free software advocate, this is much more desirable than MP3 as it’s an Open Source format. The only problem was that the songs didn’t include… Continue reading Ogg Vorbis Tagging
Headlines for allofmp3.com
Following up to my previous blog on the BPI throwing their toys out of the pram about allofmp3.com, today the story made the headlines with Matt Phillips being interviewed on BBC News 24. I was surprised to see he’s a young guy in a t-shirt, not some stuffy twat in a suit. Obviously the BPI… Continue reading Headlines for allofmp3.com
Premiership football from abroad
I’ve never been much of a football fan, it strikes me as an elitist sport where the richest side wins and the supporters don’t give a damn that their team consists of nothing but foreign players. That’s my personal opinion, but I can understand the passion that some people have for the game and can’t… Continue reading Premiership football from abroad
Paid for your music download? Not enough!
Quoted from this article: Britons using bargain music download website allofmp3.com have been warned that they are breaking the law. Record industry trade association the BPI said consumers were breaking UK copyright law because allofmp3.com was not licensed to sell recordings. The Russia-based site, which offers albums to download for as little as £1, claims… Continue reading Paid for your music download? Not enough!
Empower Systems
Empower Systems are the only company I know of that are targeting me by name with Spam. Every message I get from these people has a Subject prefixed with my surname, something that annoys me intensely. I’m tempted to submit a request under the Data Protection Act to find out exactly what information they hold… Continue reading Empower Systems
IPTF on Piratebay
The IPTF (International Federation of the Phonographic Industry) have this to say on the subject of Piratebay. The international recording industry today hailed action by the Swedish police to shut down The Pirate Bay, which claims to be the world’s largest BitTorrent search index and a huge source of internet piracy globally. Today’s action saw… Continue reading IPTF on Piratebay