Finally.. a post window arrives

Jeez. I don’t know what Google are doing over at Blogger with their gazillions of dollars, but they sure as heck ain’t keeping the servers fast that serve up a ‘create new post’ page turn up. Kinda sucks, Blogger used to be super-fast and painless, and now every other post ends up being a half hour epic (assuming I don’t get bored). Anyhoo, guess that means it’s time to find another bloggin engine…

Anyhoo, on with the post: just been pointed towards the Pandora music recommendation site (“Friends who liked recommendation technology also liked…”), and gosh darn it ain’t it a doozy! I was tinkering around with last.fm for a bit, but that constantly seemed to suggest crappy music, with Pandora I dropped in Lamb (the artist) and seconds later I’m listening to some great ambient electronica. Why? Well, they tell you:

"Based on what you've told us so far, we're playing this track because it features electronic influences, mild rhythmic syncopation, minor key tonality, prominent use of synth and many other similarities identified in the music genome project"

Hmm.. not only did that teach me some new words (I always like to be learned something by the interweb) but it’s also spot on. Wow.

This is a great example of a good fitting taxonomy to describe an information space. These days it’s harder and harder to place bands into genres, and genres themselves are hard to understand, so why not cut the crap and get straight to descriptions of the music itself rather than try and pigeon hole it as you would do down at your local music store. Web-2.0-tastic I say! Go check it out.

There’s only green waps from here

Apparently Google’s having an off day today. In a recent search on ‘wap compatibility‘ to find a site on, strangely enough, compatibility tests for wap (that’s mobile phone web for non-techies), the top result came back as my own current fave songter – Tom Vek. Not quite sure why that is. There’s a screenshot of it here if the search has been fixed.

On another Google related matter. What gives with Blogger these days? My fave and only ‘blog service always used to be so reliable, but recently it seems to take a fair few minutes to log on then seems to stall. Sometimes I can’t log in at all. Not that that’s the reason for my crapulent posting rate at the moment. That’s pure laziness.

Sofarific

Today is one of those days that I really really really wish my apartment had a sofa as I’m in the process of recovering from a hella-fun weekend. M was down and for her early birthday present we went to see Dirty Rotten Scoundrels which was great, luckily catching John Lithgow on his last weekend in the lead. This was followed by too many nights of late night partying at Supreme Trading and misshapes where Tom Vek was DJ’ing. Lots of dancing to be had by all. Hence the desire for comfy sofa to wrap up on and hide from the bitter winter weather that’s arrived today.. brr.

ps, I apologise for the incrapily bad writing above – I can’t seem to form a single good sentence today. If you feel like something more creatively stimulating go rummage around Kozyndan’s illustration archive – I love those guys.

Listening: Annie Nightingale’s 13th February radio1 show. Bouncey ‘n fun as always

This year..

Some great photos from last year’s Burning Man. Maybe this year I’ll actually get along myself, especially since there’s no Glastonbury happening.

The strike is dead, long live the strike

It’s nice to be back in New York after Christmas back home with my family with no further distruption from strikes on the MTA. The week before I left the distruption was intense, getting from Greenpoint into town was practically impossible. Even after the strike finished I almost missed my flight home due to the crazy bad traffic on the roads (55 minutes before take off I got rushed through thankfully).

So why is it that, even without a strike I can’t get into town on the subway? The L line from Bedford Avenue into town is down all weekend. Again. Great. If this was a rare occurence then maybe it wouldn’t matter, but since I first moved to Williamsburg in 2000 the L is either down or on reduced service pretty much every weekend. In summary, what the fuck is up with that MTA? Sigh.

It’s the end of the year as we know it

Well this time last year I was getting up and preparing for our first major SMS campaign – the Times Square SMS jukebox. Luckily this year I don’t have to work on the biggest drinking night of the year, huzah!

Looking back it is, yet again, amazing that another year has passed. We’re now well into the new millenium, seems like only yesterday when we were over at Chris’ house in Camden welcoming it in (not that I really remember that too well) and now it’s 5 years later and I’m partying away at Chris’ house in Highbury Islington. Blimey how things change.

Highlights of the year: another nephew (Benedict), my first nephew Nathanael sill super-awesome, Miette, Montreal, John & Sinead’s wedding, Andy & Sarah’s wedding, successfully carrying out some of the biggest SMS campaigns in the US, managing to do a handstand (albeit only one all year) & Miette.

Lowlights of the year: the tsunami (although that’s strictly speaking 2004), the earthquake in Kashmir, not scuba diving at all, my Canon S30 dying and the replacement S70 not giving me the same buzz, getting really unfit and the erratic heating in my apartment!

A joyful and prosperous 2006 to you all!

Merry Holidaymasween!

All joy of the season to everyfolk and suchlike. May your log be yuled to the max*, your nog be egged and your mistle towed.

* After eating all that turkey there is a pretty good chance of that