The tech world is tuning into what TechRepublic calls, in a somewhat hand-wringing fashion, the fragmentation of Android. This refers to the multiple flavours of the Google open-source operating system that has become a somewhat hyped darling of the mobile world. Each manufacturer has taken a version and modified it for its own hardware, frequently tying the user to their particular Android build. One might feel this spawns instant frustration for the owner but this rapid differentiation of the operating system is not necessarily “a bad thing”. Any open source product is open to re-working such that different development streams occur. With most such software of course, the user is traditionally more tech-savvy and will select their optimal version with a degree of awareness, often re-compiling the version from the source code with possibly their own tweaks and customisations. For phone and tablet consumers, this is not an option; however technically competent they may be. The key is that they still gain access to homogeneous applications via Android Market – any differentiation where such apps are no longer genuinely portable will quickly kill that particular branch. The variation in Android versions is usually to take advantage of a specific manufacturer’s hardware. Manufacturers do make the re-vamped source code available – see HTC’s development site – but realistically users of a particular piece of hardware are locked in.
Around the World in 90 Minutes – Every 90 minutes, astronauts aboard the International Space Station experience just that. Recently, crew members took a series of light-sensitive videos looking down at night that have been digitally fused to produce the above time-lapse video. Many wonders of the land and sky are visible in the eighteen sequences, including red aurora above green aurora, lights from many major cities, and stars in the background. Looming at the top of the frame is usually part of the space station itself, sometimes seen re-orienting solar panels.
Worth checking the NASA site regularly as there are frequent postings of similar beauty
The New York Times is reporting on results from a German tool which has been measuring ISP performance globally. Its fascinating, if unsurprising, results show that European customers suffer most from throttling of bandwidth by ISPs. The UK is the worst market for this and the Max Planck Institute singles out British Telecom – BT plc – as the major offender. No shock really to those of us who have endured BT’s variable network performance for the last decade. Traffic shaping is one thing – having defended BT’s productisation of a full Content Delivery Network in the past – but what appears to be a deliberate attempt by the former PTT to limit its backhaul capacity and related costs by ripping off its customers should be a scandal. How sad then that Ofcom has so far made no response. Another triumph for the insipid regulator in the wake of its less-than-glorious enforcement of ‘guidelines’ on misleading claims of capped versus uncapped internet access plans and labelling of speeds in advertising for broadband services in the UK.
The New Zealand All Blacks - Rugby World Champions 2011 Image via Wikipedia
A nail-biting finish to this year’s Rugby World Cup saw the All Blacks hold off a determined French side to secure the 2011 Championship – their first since the inaugural competition back in 1987. The final in Auckland was a fitting climax to a wonderfully executed and exemplary tournament from the Kiwis. It never ceases to amaze how friendly Rugby crowds are – and never more so than in New Zealand for this competition. From smaller, provincial stadia such as Rotorua to the iconic Eden Park, fans of every nation mixed with humour, respect and friendship. The organisers went to great lengths to involve the locals in the build-up for the games and fostered support for all the incoming nations as local schools and clubs ‘adopted’ countries. Some feat given the depth of feeling here for the All Blacks, and a real testament to New Zealand hospitality. A significant (European and Asian) ex-pat community obviously helps but you could see everything from polite encouragement to overt banners, make-up and kit for all of the teams, with especial cheering given to the smaller nations such as Tonga. It remains to be seen whether the tournament was an economic success for New Zealand (apparently, the IRB – owners of the global Rugby Union ‘brand’ – have coined it in already !) but, apart from the opening night hiccup and its transport chaos in downtown Auckland, RWC2011 has run like clockwork.
It may seem a daft idea in these straightened times but there is a group working hard to bring Concorde back to life. The aircraft – or more properly the original project to create a supersonic transport, or SST – represents possibly the financial and political equivalent in the 70′s of the Suez crisis in the 50′s. Born from an occasionally grumpy and grudging trans-manche alliance – bettered only by the Chunnel – it came of age during a worsening global economic outlook. Poo-pooed by the Americans and challenged by the Soviets, it remains a wonder how this political hot-potato ever took flight. Since its demise in 2003, the current global financial meltdown is a singularly bad time to be talking about putting money into its resurrection. Concorde is certainly the least eco-friendly transportation system ever launched, accessible only by the privileged and an economic failure. However, a dedicated group of engineers, pilots, celebs and plain old enthusiasts are working to preserve and even to fly one of the remaining 12 airframes. It is a tall order. Most were brutally decommissioned and left rotting outside. Read the rest of this story »
Yay ! Hell Pizza have responded (again) to the original New Zealand Herald article about their ‘missing’ donation to the KidsCan charity and the nasty, snotty outpourings of one of its directors – the charming Warren Powell. It has taken 3 weeks to get the latest version of the originally released response – which was pulled within an hour of publication – edited for public consumption. This latest release is a much watered-down version. No apology for Powell’s original (“… these dorks …”) email. No glowing tribute to the work of KidsCan. Still, they have coughed up as originally committed – it took a public shaming and pressure but, hey, PR makes the world go round.
We can confirm that we have now contributed $10,000 to the KidsCan Charitable Trust. We would like to acknowledge that the plight of the youngsters who benefit from donations to KidsCan telethon far outweighs any misunderstanding that may have occurred between HELL’s Pizza and KidsCan. We apologise to KidsCan for delaying our donation as a result of our misunderstanding.
“Misunderstanding” it may have been but it is a bit rich of Hell Pizza to write that “we are pleased that [Kidscan] have agreed to use the money donated … to help relieve the pressure on those children who face each day without sufficient food or clothing”. Typical that they manage to snatch arrogance from what should have been a well-meaning apology. Oh well. Apparently, Hell Pizza have already given “more than $175,000 to the Canterbury earthquake recovery”. So that’s alright, then.
Held up by current political hissy fits over the US budget deficit, debate over the Commercial Felony Streaming Act (Bill Number S.978) has stalled. As soon as the fiscal log-jam is cleared, it is likely this bill will re-appear. According to a report in The Economist, its enactment would mean that anyone who streams copyright material over the internet without permission of the owners and for their own enrichment (draft says more than $2,500 would be the benchmark) would be committing a felony. This carries penalties of up to 5 years in prison. Seems a tad harsh but highly reminiscent of the absurd Digital Economy Act 2010 in the UK – not so much in its provisions but in its blunderbuss approach to appeasing the media companies.
These pieces of ill-advised legislation have been rushed in – certainly in the case of the UK Act which was championed by Peter Mandelson as Business Secretary. The departing Labour government of Gordon Brown whistled in the Act, despite significant opposition and learned comment from the industry, possibly as some kind of sop or political payback to the entertainment industry. The panic and shortsightedness from the industry are all too apparent. There are clear lessons to be learned from the cassette tape levy fiasco of the 1980′s and, more so, from the resistance to the digitising of music content. Experience showed that, not only was their resistance somewhat wasted, but that a burgeoning and revitalised music industry resulted. The only downside was the dominance of a few new players – such as Apple. With its ground-breaking iTunes service, Apple deserved to blitz the sleepy musos with its fun, simple and (relatively) inexpensive proposition. People were pissed off with being over-charged for records and CDs in the 80s and 90s – that is what prompted the rise of illegal download services such as Napster, as well as peer-to-peer file-sharing and informal swapping of media files online. iTunes, and to some extent DRM technologies which attempted to prevent copying, made it OK to distribute music online. DRM has since been shown to be pointless. However, because the music publishers failed to get on board, their only choice was to license their material to other companies to sell rather than take the opportunity to embrace a wonderfully cheap new distribution model that would increase their margins.
Hilarious stuff – the enterprising Raff Jones has cut “Withnail and I” dialogue/soundtrack into “Star Wars”. It’s a must-see and turning into a series on YouTube …..
No word from those not-so-terribly-nice chaps at Hell Pizza in New Zealand in response to claims they reneged on a charity donation. Despite suggesting via Twitter that a response would be forthcoming, it has all gone quiet – well, from the company at least. Articles and tweets on their tight-fistedness and the ever-present charm of director and scourge of “dorks” everywhere, Warren ‘Otis’ Powell, abound. Monday’s article here on Babble Talk remains the second most read feature on the site, after the UK mobile hacking story. The inevitable Facebook page has been spawned. If @HellPizza666 was expecting the story to simply die ………. ooops. Read the rest of this story »
Wonderful result for McLaren as Lewis Hamilton takes the German Grand Prix at the iconic Nurburgring, against the form card for the 9 earlier rounds. The first half of the race was superbly entertaining as Hamilton duelled (or trio’d ?) with Red Bull’s pole sitter Mark Webber and Ferrari pilot Fernando Alonso. This was a three-way race without Sebastian Vettel. Despite home turf, the championship leader had a terrible weekend and could not keep up with the leaders; demonstrating perhaps that Vettel’s mental game has been his strength as the performance improvement for McLaren from the colder circuit can’t explain the young German’s poor showing this weekend. Meanwhile Jensen Button had struggled to keep up with his McLaren team-mate but was coming back well when hydraulics pulled him out of the race on lap 36.
Real nip-and-tuck stuff from the leading trio in the first half before Hamilton pipped Alonso for the lead after pitting on lap 33, thereafter a procession with Lewis managing to eke out a lead. The last 9 laps generated a flurry of tyre changes to meet the rules with McLaren making the right choice and coming back to win, despite Red Bull and Ferrari looking clever. Hamilton’s second victory of the season was signalled by a confident yet measured qualifying; not the least bit fazed by Webber’s pole or Vettel sitting behind him on the grid. A good race for the fans although it is not completely clear whether it was mechanical/performance or his mindset which let down Red Bull’s Vettel. The team have the Constructors’ trophy wrapped up, and Vettel has an 87 point lead in the Drivers’ Championship, so beating the magical combination is still a major long-shot for McLaren/Hamilton and Ferrari/Alonso but it should be gripping stuff for the remainder of the season.
