A mush up of thoughts

sometimes you are walking down the street or sitting on a bus/tram/train/car/plane and the strangest things go through your head that in some cases may feel profound to you or perhaps (more commonly with me) downright stupid. You continue on your journey and the thoughts have gone, usually for ever. I decided to invest in an iPhone recently and one of the things that I realised immediately is that I no longer have to loose some of these musings, so here they are!

Her Morning elegance / Oren Lavie

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January 30, 2009

What a lovely video. Well made and I love the music.

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eHow's 'Writer's Paradise': Where Dreams Go to Die (Slowly and Painfully)

February 04, 2009

Ah, the internet, a vast expanse of opportunities for aspiring wordsmiths to showcase their talents, make a living, and change the world, one carefully crafted sentence at a time. Or, if you're feeling particularly adventurous, you could sign up with eHow, the self-proclaimed haven for writers seeking quick cash and exposure. Don't let the sunshine-and-rainbows exterior fool you; a deep dive into their contractual labyrinth reveals a dystopian landscape where creativity goes to wither and die, all while eHow maintains a smile as wide as the Grand Canyon. Let's start with the illusion of ownership. Sure, eHow graciously allows you to "retain ownership" of your intellectual property. But hold on a second, there's a catch - a rather large, gaping one, at that. They also grant themselves non-exclusive rights to do pretty much whatever they please with your work. It's like owning a car but letting your neighbor borrow it whenever they feel like it, maybe even r...

Top surveilance societies

January 23, 2009

I came across this article on wired magazine that lists the World's top surveilance societies. I was very impressed to see that Greece is the only country in the world that has adequate safeguards, on paper at least, compared to the likes of Canada, Germany, Argentina, Italy and a couple of other new states that offer some safeguards but weakened protection. This comes from Privacy international, a UK based group, and the US based Electronic privacy information centre. I was also interested to see the UK and the US, the champions of democratic freedom, being lumped together with Russia, China, Myanmar and a few others as endemic surveilance societies. Some additional facts of interest to me were: ...an increasing trend amongst governments to archive data on the geographic, communications and financial records of all their citizens and residents. This trend leads to the conclusion that all citizens, regardless of legal status, are under suspicion. ...the emergence of a profitable su...

Ted Carson on design

January 22, 2009

I subscribe to the TED talks podcast so I see quite a few of them when I am on the go. This was one that I watched today and apart from the fact that Ted Carson has a very easy and funny way of communicating. What I found most interesting in this talk was his impression of People magazines coverage of the 9/11 event and how on a double spread you would see an image of firemen carrying a body and on the other side a young kid modelling jeans, or a crying woman being comforted and on the facing page a full page coke advert with a logo along the lines "He knows how to give me goosebumps". The thing about the ads he was talking about was that from a graphic design perspective the images really did fit, so I am sure that someone actually took the time to make sure that the correct distressing picture was placed next to each ad rather then the other way around. I know I am a cynic, but some of these pictures fit in too well with each other, and it really is a sad reflection, isn...