Ya' know, I never had any great urge to use twitter. It all seems kind of pointless. Hey, I'm doing my laundry right now. 10 minutes ago, was at the grocery store.

Boring...

But I thought that it could be kind of fun if you got creative with it. Try plugging some of these into the twitter engine:

• He tried to scream, but after his head was chopped off, it just went 'gurgle, gurgle'.
• This is why you shouldn't buy Chinese detonators...
• Luckily we got past airport security
• Typing this on the paramedic's cell phone. Mine was destroyed in the crash.
• 62 sleeping pills and a bottle of scotch. Oops.

See what I mean? Create your own twitters and have some fun. 

Come to find out that our favorite Hogwarts senior wizard - one Prof. Dumbledore; prefers genital contact with his own gender. How do you go about explaining this to a kid? Couldn't we have been spared this knowledge?

 

 

Dodi bought $19,000 ring for Diana

 

...cheap bastard

 

I spend a non-trivial amount of time keeping up with the latest and greatest in web development. In particular, I often find myself on websites where somebody is discussing Web2.0, social networking, etc. - and I often make comments. Many of these folks are downright hostile about me adding my viewpoint to the discussion, especially if it doesn't match their own viewpoint. (And don't dare write anything negative about Google.)  

Which made me look a bit closer. And most of these so-called web-2.0 'experts' are writing about the latest web technologies on a blogger or wordpress single-user weblog; otherwise known as a soapbox. Their formidable experience in social technology is limited to obtaining a facebook or myspace account. Few if any of them have ever actually written code.

So as always, when evaluating the opinions of experts, consider the source and determine the level of real expertise. There are a lot of so-called experts out there these days. Installing a WP blog and obtaining a MySpace account are not in themselves qualifications about anything more than an ability to install a software package and register for free accounts.

[As for my own qualifications, I don't claim to be an expert at anything.] 

The fire season is off to a roaring start. There's currently a big blaze in the bush just a few kilometers away. Can't actually see it because the wind is blowing the other way, but there's a bit of a smell of burning eucalyptus in the air - along with the steady thunder of helicopters as they head south to fill their water buckets.

It's interesting to track though, because the bushland extends all the way to the university - with only a few houses in between, and these are under heavy foliage.  

But all of this is just a distraction as the main event is trying to shut down a hack attack on one of the school websites I'm responsible for.

Summer is here.  

After a couple of beers I was contemplating this whole global warming thing and potential business opportunities. What are we going to need a few years from now?

Around here, most folks have a big water storage tank next to the house. I'd be getting these manufacturers ramped up for export. In the states, a few enviro-conscious folks have water barrels to catch rain. But I'm talking tanks - as in thousands of liters, up to millions of liters. We've got 'em. Just have to start shipping them out of the country.

Other product trends to invest in: hip waders, paddleboats. 

There are occasions when having IP location checking is a good thing. For instance Google notices that I'm in Australia (by mapping my IP address), and gives me the option to search for something in 'Australia only', or 'Search the web'.

I've noticed more and more software that is location aware. For instance a lot of the large electronic manufacturers do this to quickly point you to products for your local supply voltage and also to direct you to the nearest retailer that stocks their products. Software download sites often use it to choose 'mirrors' of the software that you can download without your data packets traversing multiple continents and oceans. 

Technically, it's not hard. I've done it myself. You just need to link to a Geo <-> IP database.

Sometime in the last 48 hours, it looks as if CNN became location aware. This is enough to make me protest. I'm presented with a new header bar that gives me Sydney weather info, so I know what's going on.  What I fear, is that I'll no longer be able to get U.S. news - which is my only reason for visiting CNN. Not that CNN is the best distributor of information. But it's the principal of the thing. Now that I know that they know where I am in the world, I cannot shake the feeling that I'll never know if the news page that I'm presented with represents actual US news, or some localized version of the news that was molded and massaged to suit the political and social leanings of the local population. You know why they do this of course. China. Now they can honor the Chinese government requests to subdue information that is ultimately going to China. So I feel like a Chinese dissident. In order to get American news - from America; I'm going to have to connect anonymously via a proxy server somewhere in the continental U.S.