albumbyyear

I've moved!

Tue, 31 Mar 2009 12:36:05 +0100

- To blogger.com

albumbyyear.blogspot.com

Who's idea was this pub crawl!?

Sat, 28 Mar 2009 13:08:00 +0000

The pub crawl went well! Despite breaking the cardinal rule of never having more than one drink per pub (which me and Dan succeeded in doing in the um, first pub) we managed to visit eight or nine places before finishing off in Guildfords finest homosexual establishment that used to be called Platform 9 and who’s new name I was too drunk to remember.

The more internet based side of it wasn’t quite as successful. Although the individual pub updates did yield a few comedy gems such as:

“The Star - Most banterous barmaid of the night. Also Tony: “I’d like a dick in my beer please””

The actual GPS feed provided by Brightkite didn’t work as well as I’d hoped. Almost all of the links provided to my Twitter feed put us in a town just outside of Guildford called Shalford. Although in their defence this location was based on cell tower triangulation as all of the updates were done inside the pubs themselves, not outside where I could get a proper GPS signal.

In retrospect it was a great night and the only failures with regard to the technology side were, as I’ve alluded to before on this blog, down to the drunken humans using it.

Drinking and the Internet

Thu, 26 Mar 2009 11:49:00 +0000

Hello! Today I’m going to take part in my first web 2.0 pub crawl. To be fair, it’s actually my first ever pub crawl, but being the geek I am I’m trying to incorporate as much technology into it as I can. The route itself has been traced out using Google Maps:

View Larger Map

And I’ll also be using a brightkite.com iPhone app which is linked to my Twitter feed to give real time updates on how far along we’ve got - possibly with comment on the pubs we’re in but I’m assuming that as I get progressively more drunk the comments will degenerate into mindless swearing and eventually become unintelligible. So I’ll probably just reflect on how well that went during tomorrow afternoons hangover.

To make an educated guess, initially I’d go with “very fucking badly” but in amongst the dross some comedy gold may turn up so it’s worth trying it at least.

So heres to technology and alcohol. Two of mankinds greatest achievements. By the end of today I’ll know how well they work together, and I’ll also have a kebab.

Cheers!

Battery failure or USER ERROR?

Thu, 19 Mar 2009 11:54:26 +0000

I found out the other day how much I depend on technology. Specifically my iPhone.

On Monday I was sent over to Fleet to cover as someone had called in sick. Normally I’d drive but on this particular occasion I decided that I’d take the train - didn’t particularly fancy attempting to go down the M3 for 30 miles during rush hour. The journey there was fine, apart from missing my connecting train which made me half an hour late.

Upon arriving in town I remembered that it was quite a distance from the station to the town centre so I used the Google mapping software on my phone to figure out how long it’d take to walk. 20 minutes. I got the company to pay for a taxi. Plus I wasn’t knackered. Happy Days.

The day went well, checked my Facebook, updated my Twitter, watched videos of people falling down trapdoors on YouTube. The usual, until it was time to go home. I downloaded some podcasts and texted my mum asking for a lift home from the train station, all the while marvelling at how well my phones battery was holding up - until I got onto the train and my battery died. It seemed that for some reason the battery indicator wasn’t displaying the actual life left in the phone.

I arrived at Walton station after THE MOST BORING JOURNEY EVER hoping that my ride would be there. It wasn’t.

Seeing as the station is 4 miles away from my house walking was out of the question, and I fucking hate buses. I figured I needed to find some way of calling my mum to see if she was picking me up so I thought I’d search for a payphone.

“Ah! I can find one on Google maps on my phone” I thought - Until I realised that seeing as I couldn’t make any calls with my phone, it was unlikely that I could use it to search for a payphone. Or bring up my mums number to call anyway. I couldn’t even check Ray Mears’ website to see what he would do. Essentially I was a bit fucked.

Anyway after ten minutes my lift turned up and everything was cool. But it really demonstrated how reliant I am on this one piece of technology and how wrong things can go if it packs up.

A normal person would say it wouldn’t have happened at all if the battery indicator had worked - however we all know that Apple stuff never goes wrong and in some bizarre way that I haven’t figured out yet the whole ordeal was entirely my fault.

Broken TV NOT caused by errant Wii controller!

Wed, 11 Mar 2009 11:50:15 +0000

As some of you may know, I’ve been without a TV for about two weeks. Essentially it turns out that my kid brothers five foot tall guitar amp and the massive magnets inside it have, according to Samsung “fucked up your TV way hardcore”

Its fine, my new one arrives later today courtesy of John Lewis’ complimentary 5 year warranty.

What I’m writing about though is the fact that I haven’t really missed having a TV. I just watch everything via my laptop. All the programming I’m interested in is available online, my podcasts are tucked away in iTunes and when it comes to serialised stuff like Peep Show/24 etc I generally buy those on dvd anyway. Mainly this is down to the fact that I’m one of those people who has to watch the next episode straight after the old one otherwise I’ll forget what the hell is going on. That does apply more to 24 than Peep Show though, just to clarify.

Despite my earlier post about the new COD being rubbish, I do miss gaming, my PS3 hasn’t been on in over a week and I really wanna play the new HD Street Fighter. I’ve been unable to watch blu-rays since the TV has been away, but that in itself isn’t a massive problem - if I didn’t have a TV in the first place I’d just have bought the films on dvd instead.

The whole episode has really got me thinking about whether a TV is necessary these days. If you’re a console gamer or you want HD content and you don’t have a laptop that’ll play blu-rays then yeah you need a TV. But if you don’t then maybe you should pass on owning one. You won’t need to pay a television licence (probably) and it frees up loads more space in the room for that coffee table you’ve been thinking of buying but have nowhere to put.

On the flipside, owning a TV is very much like owning a penis. Even if you hardly use it you still want to have a bigger one than the next guy.

It's finally happened.

Tue, 03 Mar 2009 12:27:00 +0000

Yes thats right, the long arm of the legal divisons of the American music industry has finally penetrated my genteel Surrey home.

A few days ago in homage to the new Notorious B.I.G. film I knocked together a trailer for a film called Furious F.A.Z. about a friend of mine who’s known for having a bit of a temper when he’s had a few too many drinks. As background music I used a song by a chap called “Flo Rida” to emphasise Faz’s gangsa-ness. I uploaded it to Facebook, got a wonderful response from everyone and did a little dance cos I was getting attention. It’s the stuff that web 2.0 dreams are made of.

I logged into Facebook today and noticed this ever so subtle message from the friendly sounding “Facebook Team”

Now I appreciate that no, I don’t own the copyright to the song or have any claim whatsoever over it but seriously? I used it in a trailer for a pretend film that no one is ever going to see, let alone make any money from so what is the harm in using it?

I’d understand if I was charging $5 a pop to watch it and was using that money to fund terrorism or the RSPCA but I’m simply not. It’s just. for. fun.

I’m not mad at Facebook, they’re only doing what they’re told to by their lawyers. But the irony is that although the video and it’s offending song are no longer on FB where they can only be seen or more importantly in this case, heard by a select group of mine or Faz’s friends, it’s now on YouTube where EVERYONE IN THE WORLD can watch it.

Madness.

Geolocate this postPosted with LifeCast

Sun, 15 Feb 2009 15:59:08 +0000

Geolocate this post

Posted with LifeCast

Shoot Shoot Shoot. Hide. Shoot.

Tue, 03 Feb 2009 12:02:08 +0000

Just before Christmas I bought myself a copy of Call of Duty: World at War. I hesitate to use the word reluctantly, but it’s probably the most accurate. Obviously like everyone else who owns any kind of gaming platform I absolutely adored COD: 4 and knew full well that going back to World War 2 for the sequel wasn’t going to be anywhere near as interesting as the modern setting. Hence the reluctance.

I still bought it, thinking something along the lines of “Well considering COD: 4 was so incredibly good, this will still be ok, I guess” and to an extent I was right. It is ok. Average. If I’m honest, kinda boring.

Bizarrely, I’m sure that if COD:4 never came out that I’d be incredibly impressed with World at War, but when playing it there’s always that niggling feeling that as lovely as shooting people in yet another ruined European town with a crappy bolt action rifle is, it just doesn’t compare to clearing a TV studio full of insurgents with a fully automatic assault rifle whilst receiving air support from a Cobra Gunship. The irony of this though, is that if COD:4 hadn’t come out I wouldn’t have bought World at War at all.

Gheyy.

Kickass.

Like I said however. I was fully expecting not to enjoy World at War as much as the previous game so when it turned out that I didn’t I merely shrugged and went back to finishing my Carphone Warehouse level in LittleBigPlanet.

What did surprise me is that on Christmas day I was given a copy of Resistance 2 and upon playing it I still found myself unfavorably comparing it to COD: 4

Resistance 2 is good, the concept is brilliant and I really enjoyed the first game. It’s better than the first one by miles but I just don’t find myself being really compelled to play it as I did with COD:4 and the thing that really gets me is I don’t know why. World at War has gay weapons, thats fine. But there is just something about Resistance 2 that makes running around a spaceship shooting aliens with lasers less fun than going to a hot country and shooting foreigners.

I’ll update later when I figure it out.

In honour of Tony Hart...

Mon, 26 Jan 2009 00:45:16 +0000

Tony Flaton - 22 - Fleet, Hampshire

Xmas slump...

Mon, 26 Jan 2009 00:36:13 +0000

Increasingly good times at work!

Over the last two months or so I’ve found myself increasingly demotivated at work. Hardly any of the incentives or ideas I bought to the store were working, we weren’t increasing accessory sales or insurance. Maybe it was bad timing what with the economy going down the pan and so on, but still, it didn’t make for an impressive start at the store.

The other downside of this was that while concentrating on helping the team sell more stuff, I was hardly selling anything.

This essentially made me the most miserable assistant manager in the whole of Carphone Warehouse over the Xmas period and only recently has it been remedied.

How? I hear you ask…

I’ve given up on doing anything managerial and gone back to purely selling. The only difference being my name badge looks slightly mincier. The result? The store figures appear to be on the up.

Its early days yet, and now I’ve posted this and its been picked up by Googles search bots and archived for time eternal I’m sure it’ll prove to be disastrously wrong. But heres hoping!

Obligatory Obama post...

Tue, 20 Jan 2009 18:21:00 +0000

I’ve just finished watching the inauguration speech. It was fucking awesome.

It was one of those times where you realise that although they’ve had a bad eight years, America is still one of the greatest countries on Earth. Despite the relative youth of their country, they’ve contributed so much to the world in the shape of technology, science, culture and most importantly, the sacrifices they made in securing the freedom of Western Europe at least three times. And the iPhone.

I was so impressed with the mention of putting science back on the map and investing money into stuff like broadband availability. Two things that really have been neglected under George Bush. Especially stem cell research or anything else that offends the Church.

- In the words of Peter Griffin: “Why aren’t we funding this?!”

However I can’t help feeling like I’ll miss old George. He did the best job he could under incredibly difficult circumstances and I’ll challenge anyone to say that they could do a better job. Because you probably fucking couldn’t.

Obama mentioning the use of “soft power” to win people over, saying that from the biggest capitols to the smallest villages, America will be their friend was also an awesome point. Coupling that with the whole “however, if you do try and destroy our way of life we will fuck you up” part was a great way of saying that although diplomacy is the primary option he isn’t gonna shy away from parking a Carrier Battle Group off of your coast.

“We will outlast you” - Brilliant.

Courtesy of Flickr user:

jw corley

Been away for a while!

Wed, 14 Jan 2009 16:10:12 +0000

I had a thought the other day.

We look back at old-school pirates now so fondly. Jack Sparrow, yo-ho-ho and so on when at the time they were considered to be as much of a threat to world harmony as modern day terrorists.

It got me wondering if in say, 200 years time we’ll all be watching films about the crazy high-jinks of old Osama Bin Laden and his band of merry men. Reminiscing about the good old days when terrorists weren’t bad people per se, just trying to make a bit of money on the side while blowing your shit up.

Drinking buddies?

Rubber Band Gun.

Sun, 28 Sep 2008 18:16:11 +0100

WANT.

Amazing idea from Channel 4

Fri, 26 Sep 2008 19:39:51 +0100

Dear Barack Obama,

Sun, 21 Sep 2008 22:43:00 +0100

aja:

GET ANGRIER! Call them liars, because that’s what they are. Sarah Palin didn’t say “thanks but no thanks” to the Bridge to Nowhere. She just said “Thanks.” You were raised by a single mother on food stamps — where does a guy with eight houses who was legacied into Annapolis get off calling you an elitist?

And by the way, if you do nothing else, take that word back. Elite is a good word, it means well above average. I’d ask them what their problem is with excellence. While you’re at it, I want the word “patriot” back. McCain can say that the transcendent issue of our time is the spread of Islamic fanaticism or he can choose a running mate who doesn’t know the Bush doctrine from the Monroe Doctrine, but he can’t do both at the same time and call it patriotic. They have to lie — the truth isn’t their friend right now.

Get angry. Mock them mercilessly; they’ve earned it. McCain decried agents of intolerance, then chose a running mate who had to ask if she was allowed to ban books from a public library. It’s not bad enough she thinks the planet Earth was created in six days 6,000 years ago complete with a man, a woman and a talking snake, she wants schools to teach the rest of our kids to deny geology, anthropology, archaeology and common sense too? It’s not bad enough she’s forcing her own daughter into a loveless marriage to a teenage hood, she wants the rest of us to guide our daughters in that direction too? It’s not enough that a woman shouldn’t have the right to choose, it should be the law of the land that she has to carry and deliver her rapist’s baby too? I don’t know whether or not Governor Palin has the tenacity of a pit bull, but I know for sure she’s got the qualifications of one.

And you’re worried about seeming angry? You could eat their lunch, make them cry and tell their mamas about it and God himself would call it restrained.

There are times when you are simply required to be impolite. There are times when condescension is called for.

— Aaron Sorkin, as Jed Bartlet via modiddy / mikehudack

- I’m genuinely considering contributing money to Barack Obamas campaign.

As strange as that may sound to you, it sounds equally as strange to me. I live in the UK. I’ve never had any desire to give any money to a British political party, and often wondered what it is about either the politician or the party that makes people take the time to donate their money in the first place.

Yet I’m toying with financing the campaign of a politician in another country who although on the world stage will make decisions that may slightly affect me or the UK, won’t change anything with regards to how much council tax I pay, when my bins are emptied or how much funding the NHS gets. The day to day things that genuinely influence my life.

The final question about why I want to donate money can me summed up by asking “is it my respect for Barack Obama or my absolute terror about Sarah Palin getting into power that’s driving me to reach for my bank details?”

Just when you thought it was safe to turn on the radio...

Fri, 19 Sep 2008 20:36:00 +0100

This happens:

http://blog.wired.com/music/2008/09/products-placed.html

Courtesy of Wired.com

Its not that I’m shocked or anything. Just amazed that it’s actually been proved.

Fall Out Boy’s last US tour was sponsored by Honda. Thats fine, it lowered ticket prices for everyone and we all knew full well that the band themselves don’t drive Hondas as everyone in a rock band clearly has a Ferrari parked next to their guitar shaped swimming pool. Even drummers.

I can just about cope with touring bands being sponsored by car firms, festivals being sponsored by energy drinks/beer/mobile phone networks etc, and I’d always suspected that 50 Cents penchant for Crystal champagne was down to how much of it he got free as opposed to its ability to get you shitfaced. But to have it actually laid out infront of me that “aspirational” brands pay record labels to insert their product into a song just kills any remaining sympathy I have for both the brand itself and the label. Let alone the artist that actually agrees to it.

I hate the music industry sometimes.

On the flipside, I had one of those moments this evening. I was travelling home listening to The Gaslight Anthem wearing my aviators, cresting the brow of a hill driving into the autumn sunlight as the chorus of “The Patient Ferris Wheel” kicks in. Amazing.

A tip of the hat to... Matt Damon?

Thu, 18 Sep 2008 19:51:34 +0100

Another political post for you all to savour.

The more I hear and read about Sarah Palin the more worried I get that she’ll actually be elected as the Vice President, or God forbid, McCain dies and she becomes the leader all 51 States of America. (Great Britain being the 51st)

Ironically I actually quite like George Bush. The man clearly isn’t as stupid as we all make him out to be, the prime evidence of this is that he is the most powerful man in the world. The rest of us aren’t. Are we?

However, things in the world aren’t quite as they should be. Major American banks are declaring bankruptcy, the Chinese hold most of Americas debt and the rest of the world kinda hates everything American that isn’t a Big Mac or made by Apple. So it stands to reason that its probably time for a change of government.

John McCain seems like a sensible chap. Former POW, he’s gonna be fairly grounded and although he has a few questionable beliefs like being anti stem cell research and Christian he’d probably do ok as President. My problem lies with Sarah Palin. The fucking retard of a woman wants to teach fucking CREATIONISM in schools. Thats like fucking teaching “Jack and Jill Went Up the Hill” in History class!

I will stop there though as someone has completely condensed what I’m trying to say into one fairly scathing rant about her. And that person?

Matt Damon. What a fucking hero.

Testing?

Sat, 13 Sep 2008 00:41:39 +0100

Test.

..icles.

Out of my way! I'm a motorist!

Wed, 10 Sep 2008 01:03:35 +0100

In starting this blog I generally thought the topics I’d be writing about would mostly be music related. Alas, as I’m sure you’ve guessed by the title of this post this one it isn’t going to contain any spoilers for the new Metallica album or complete songs from “Chinese Democracy” Unfortunately I’ve been beaten to the punch on that one anyway.

So I’ll apologise in advance for anyone searching for music posts on a blog called Albumbyyear, but honestly were you genuinely thinking this would have anything to do with music? Hmm??

Anyway.

Over the past few days I’ve literally encountered EVERY furious motorist in the south of England. Even today I’m there pootling along in the fast lane with a car infront of me doing 70 and lo and behold, inches from my rear bumper is some dude in a massive 4x4 going ballistic because I’m not getting out of his way.

Now three things annoy me about this. Firstly I can’t go any faster because of the chap infront. Secondly he got even more angry when I brake tested him and finally, he looked like the single most boring bastard I’ve ever seen. Genuinely I would bet my iPhone on him being in a massive rush just so he could get home, microwave a pizza for one and get World of Warcraft fired up so he can finally get that sword with an extra hitpoint.

Its fine being in a rush, as long as you actually have SOMETHING to do when you get home apart from cracking one out.

Bastards.

The iPhone just got pwned...

Wed, 27 Aug 2008 00:26:51 +0100

There isn’t really anything more you can say really.

Except of course that I really fucking want one…