A good friend of mine went to see Regina Spektor at Hyde Park last night. If you haven’t heard her stuff, check it out – it’s chilled, quirky and perfect for supplementing uber-chic TV ads like this.
Last night, however, it was her support act that was standing out. His name is Reggie Watts and he’s utilising music technology in an incredibly awesome, bodacious (insert superlative here) way.
Reggie uses a looping pedal – the clues in the name, but for all those tone-deaf, lyrically-challenged and musically-ignorant like myself, a looping pedal is a “digital sampler built into an easy-to-use footswitch-operated pedal of the kind most often used by guitarists to create looping layers of melody or texture during a live performance.” So it records sound….and loops it.
The below is Reggie’s interpretation of how to use this. And it rocks.
After moisturising today, I prepared for work by dreamily sipping a camomile tea in a dainty cup. National newspaper, The Sport, wants me to “Man the **** up!” according to its crude, vulgar and downright funny new promo video.
Or maybe not. No, I’m not a typical Sport reader, although this video did make me laugh, if not question my metrosexual mannerisms.
And it shows exactly how well this national daily understands its audience.
A couple of US students have been signed up by Penguin to write a book which will turn classics from writers such as Shakespeare and James Joyce into no more than twenty 140 character tweets. Aside from the fact that people younger than me are getting book deals (always a sore point), it’s caused quite the stir in the media, with the Telegraph and the Guardian covering it.
Making great works accessible to the masses or the epitome of the dumbing down of culture? Personally, I won’t be shelling out for a book of extended blurbs. However, there in lies the book’s potential. 20 x 140 characters is 2800 characters, twice the number used in this description of Ulysses. This tome of shortened great works could become a catalogue of extended product descriptions, something that publishers already produce as part of their sales and marketing collateral to tempt booksellers. Co-incidentally, Penguin does a nice line in modern classics (I’m currently reading one myself).
Perhaps this is the future of publishing. Producing books of twitterature, the publishers would be charging the consumer to view a catalogue of relevant work. Said consumer, if intrigued by what they’ve read, could then toddle off down the bookstore/login to Amazon, buy relevant book, and the publisher gets more money. This isn’t the end of high culture and the written word, this is the publishing industry making sure they get ROI from their marketing collateral.
Oh the shame. After years of booking tickets online, I have fallen for a fake website and the promise of a ticket to gig and given away 50 of my hard earned pounds to a crook in Budapest.
Last month, after an unexpected addition to our party going to see The Killers at Hard Rock Calling, I boastfully claimed I would be able find a ticket somewhere: “Don’t worry, I know some people that know some people.” This was obviously not true – my friends are all as useless as me when it comes to finding tickets for a sold-out concert. Rather than admit defeat so easily, I decided a to have a quick look online. Bingo – I stumbled across, Hyde Park Box Office – looks professional enough, with a decent url, and offering me tickets at face value. I snapped one up and told my friends, rather smugly, I had sorted the situation.
Fast forward a month, without a ticket the day before the event and with no response to my emails, I start to investigate. There is no contact number on the website. Alarm bells. Google hydeparkboxoffice – oh dear. Check credit card bill – money was taken by a company in Budapest. Oh dear, I’ve been scammed.
Lessons to be learnt: don’t leave the safety of ticketmaster and seetickets unless you really have to, a site you’ve never heard of is unlikely to be selling tickets to a sold out concert at face-value and perhaps most importantly don’t be a smart-arse.
He’s been doing it for a few years now (call me slow off the mark) but I was reading today about how Warren Buffett does this great auction for charity each year where he auctions off a lunch with him for a group of up to eight people. All the proceeds go to a charity called the Glide Foundation.
Now you may think “big deal, a lunch” but last year it sold for $2.11 million! The year before was a comparative steal at $650k. That’s a lot of money to a charity for one bloke just to turn up to a lunch for 3 hours – what a great idea.
If you want to have a stab at the next lunch you better hurry – at the time of posting, the auction on Ebay had only 1 day, 17 hours to go. Currently the bid stands at $300k…
Full piece on Bloomberg here – including a great quote from Buffett when asked what he discussed at the $2 million lunch.
Gary Pratt came into the 2005 Ashes a promising young batsmen and ended it a legend. In one of the greatest moments of the series (just behind Glenn McGrath’s self induced foot injury from standing on a stray ball), Pratt, who had taken to the field to cover for the injured Simon Jones, ran out Aussie captain Ricky Ponting in a stunning piece of fielding. What made the moment even more spectacular was the Aussie’s whinging reaction. There was not a ‘fair dinkum mate’ to be heard as Ponting aimed an irate, expletive filled rant at the England balcony as he walked off. Many say it was then that England knew they had won the Ashes.
Later Ponting claimed England’s habit of giving fast bowlers a breather was “a disgrace”, but Michael Vaughan, with the kind of Churchillian oratory which made him one of the all time greatest England captains, warned: “We will continue to do what we have been doing – we have not broken any rules. If someone needs to go to the toilet during a session of play, I’m sure he will be allowed to do so.”
With admirable modesty Pratt later gave his own account of the incident:”My feet are on the ground and I’m just concentrating on getting in the Durham side,” Pratt told BBC Sport. “It was just a normal, everyday thing you do – pick a ball up and throw it.”
Ponting: no oil painting
In true Ashes spirit, Pratt explains that Ponting later swallowed his rage and congratulated his victor: “There were no hard feelings. I even got him to sign a photo of me and him and he gave me a couple of his pairs of boots and a shirt. I’ve got great respect for him for reacting like that but I must admit the photo’s still in my drawer. I don’t think my missus would like it on the mantelpiece.”
Pratt gained hero status for his achievements, even being invited aboard the open bus parade through the streets of London after the series victory was wrapped up. Sadly however his cricketing career took a nose-dive after THAT run out, and after a few years scratching a living in the lower cricket leagues he now manages a self-storage company in Bishop Auckland.
Despite having five kids and two wives (my real wife and my job), I still find time to watch TV I’ve downloaded to my trusty iPhone. Recently a friend introduced me to Battlestar Galactica.
Holy Cow! It’s totally different from the 70s feel good drivel I watched when I was a kid. It’s hard core and that’s not to mention the intentional similarities between the current political climate and the rest of the world.
The re-imagining is set 20 year or so after the events of the old series. The humans have settled new planets. The human’s mortal enemy, the Cylons, have new upgraded centurions (or Toasters) and get this: they also have a breed of cylons that look and feel like humans (or ‘Skin-jobs)’. This appears to be a perfect recipe for human ass kicking and a cliff hanger.
Within the first 5 minutes of the new BSG series, an innocent baby is spared (by mercy killing) the (almost) annihilation of the planet’s population (ethnic cleansing?). The survivors scarper looking for ‘Earth’, whilst the ‘toasters’ clean up the mess and claim it as their own – now where have I seen this before?
Just finished season three. It’s addictive. DAMMIT! I need to know who the next skin-job is!
With the Ashes now only weeks away it is time to start revving up the troops so Hod, Rutters and yours truly will be taking a look back and profiling some of the true heroes who have made the Ashes mean what it does today. The men whose amazing deeds in the battle for the urn have excited us all. Men with slightly large waistlines, questionable facial hair and not always meeting the description of an “elite athlete”. But men around whom legends have been born.
The Ashes starts here.
Ashes Heroes Profile #1 – David Clarence Boon MBE
Where to start with the ultimate Australian Ashes hero? Where the man became a legend.
It’s 1989 and a 28 year old David Boon boards the plane in Australia to fly to London to reclaim the Ashes back from England. Rather than relax on the 22 hour flight to London, a thirsty Boonie had decided to have a beer. Or two. Or three, four….. and then it was on – he was going to have a crack at Rod Marsh’s record of 45 beers consumed between Sydney to London.
Boonie was a good candidate to have a crack at the title, having strong form. In 1988 he famously came in to bat during a one day game after a huge night on the sauce and after a few minutes in the middle (and couple of scampering runs between the wickets) felt the beers from the night before on the way back up. After a quick relieving vomit in front of a live TV audience of millions he went on to score 122 and win Man of the Match. I digress – back to that flight.
The story is a long one (and well worth reading here) but to move this blog post along, in an amazing feat that has never been surpassed, Boonie guzzled 52 cans of beer before disembarking (without assistance) at Heathrow. Team coach Bob Simpson was livid apparently, and Boonie almost got sent home.
Boonie unpacks his luggage upon arrival home from the 1993 series
Simmo said the story couldn’t leave the dressing room. But it was too late – Merv Hughes (who also had “several” beers on the flight) had already done four or five radio interviews on the successful record attempt…
Mercifully, Boonie wasn’t sent home and went on to score 442 runs at an average of 55.25 as the Aussies reclaimed the Ashes in a 4-0 series win. Boonie had always been a favourite with the Aussie fans but following the new record set on the flight over he was now elevated to cult figure.
Boonie’s career zoomed into the stratosphere following the ’89 series as he put bowling attacks around the world to the sword. When England turned up in 1990-91 to try to get the Ashes back, “The Keg on Legs” was having none of it. He was England’s nemesis – scoring a series high 530 runs and averaging 75.71 for the series, including a sparkling 121 in Adelaide.
Boonie wasn’t done there in tormenting England’s pathetic bowling attack and when he arrived back on English soil in 1993, he made sure the Ashes stayed in Australian hands with another dominant display – 555 runs (most in the series) at an average of 69.37. He scored a century in the first three tests at Lord’s, Trent Bridge and Headingly (the biggest being 164 not out). He was named Wisden Cricketer of the Year in 1994.
Boonie enjoys a beer with some English prat
Boonie’s form began to wane by the 1994-95 series (despite smashing 131 in one match and taking a gem of a catch for Shane Warne’s only ever international hat-trick) but of course, Australia won the series again. He retired with a career average of 45 against England and seven centuries.
So despite the fact that the prevailing opinion from my Twitter contacts and friends alike was that I should wait for the Kindle to grace the shores of the UK, the holiday in Denmark with three bulky paperbacks squeezed into a too-cramped rucksack and the impending implosion of my bookshelves into some minor singularity broke me, and I picked up a Sony PRS 505 from Play.com about two weeks ago. I’d seen my friend Rob with one and had a pretty good idea it would be decent, which its proving to be, and I had a feeling that the Kindle would be some time coming…
Here’s what’s good about it:
1) It stores lots of book in a sleek, elegant casing. I’ve shoved a 1GB SD card (at a cost of a not so princely £4) in there, which will cover me for at least 1000 books but potentially as many as 3000 – which is probably more than I’ll need on there
2) It works well with the open source Calibre, even under Windows7 RC1 64bit, which is something of a relief (as I gather the Sony software is its usual bag of decaying tripe)
3) The screen is amazing. E-Ink works like an etch-a-sketch, so reads well in any light. It also makes for…
4) …awesome battery life. Due to the etch-a-sketch nature of the device, it only draws power when turning pages. So one charge (by USB cable), will give you room for about 4000 page turns
5) You can get books. Waterstones has many, even if Amazon is probably banking on the arrival of the Kindle in the UK at some stage.
The not-so-good
1) I’ve already mentioned Sony’s software… the navigation on the device itself is not brilliant, no way to go directly to a page (that I’ve found as yet), not until you’ve made bookmarks (although it remembers what page you were last reading), and there’s no search functionality, ability to make notes etc. I’m also having some fiddling with page alignment (page numbers in middle of page, NBSPs, etc)
2) There’s no wireless connectivity – hence awesome battery life, but hey, if I want wireless, well, that’s what the iPhone I’m planning on getting will do…
3) The page-turning is not that speedy, although its not terrible
All in all, it’s up there with my Netbook in all-time useful purchases. I carry it around daily, have got through two novels on it in two weeks and will probably maintain close to that rate, saving valuable bookshelf real-estate, holiday packing and being stuck on the bus in between books…
Here’s a quick video demo from some dude on Youtube:
We're a bunch of likeminded PR consultants working at a London based agency talking about stuff we like on the web. 'Chivalry House' was our first office, back in 2000.
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