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Mainstream media still doesn't get geek culture

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I can't believe I'm defending a line of people about to buy the iphone 3g, but the reporter in this video sums up the general stinking attitude the mainstream media has for geek culture. It stinks and I'm glad someone asked called the reporter out on how childish his questioning and reason for being there was. It would be great to have something which re-addresses the balance but without going all play-school. News night for geeks?

The Pacemaker is more than a match for the ipodmixer

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Saw this article in the independent the other day, although its dated back to June it was in my aggregator for so long. Hopefully my python based APML project might help with this in the future. Anyway I think its a fair article pointing out the weaknesses of using the pacemaker being battery life and flat out snobbery. Actually on that I found this forum which I was dying to reply to, but couldn't be arse'd to convince these bunch of morons otherwise. Anyhow, here's some nice quotes from the independent article...

"We could see young, affluent consumers becoming more proactive with media, making their own music, film and editorial," Sars says. "We saw the door of portability kicked down by the iPod, which taught consumers that you can take all your music everywhere. We wanted to move both things a step further."

The idea of sharing, whether it's in the pub, on the beach, at a club or online, was the driving force of the project," Sars says. "If you have a party at home and everyone loves the music, you can take the music you've mixed, save it on the device, then upload it to the online community via Pacemaker Editor. Then you can just email everyone and tell them, 'Here's my music from Friday night.'"

"We are not out to substitute professional DJing," Sars says. "We're coming to the market with a complementary product, a new way of viewing music. It's about having a go anywhere, anytime. Genre doesn't matter – just mash it up. If you look at the fresh, intelligent young generation of people today, that's how they view media. You don't have to follow one genre; as long as you love it and go for it, you can be totally unafraid."

I've been doing a lot of mixes and I actually need to upload them. Including a mix from the south pier of blackpool one late night. I can't believe I was djing in cold winds till gone 11pm. Crazy eh? Some people did come up and ask about the weird device I was playing with and I would explain and actually quite a few people were interested. But some loser said I should check out the ipodmixer. So I did and I think he totally missed the point of the pacemaker.

The Definitive History Of UK Dance Music?

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Ok I should I really be pointing my finger at another part of the BBC? Yes because they will never learn if someone does not say something, even if its going to be a moan and groan. BBC Radio 2 have been running a season of programming around dance music, so I checked it out and was for most of it pretty happy with what I heard. I mean these guys went way back, back to the northern soul, disco and casino era. It was good to hear this because all the other documentatries about dance music have made it out like it totally came from America and we just adopted it. Nope you can certainly see how everything was being put in place including the soul weekenders. Anyway slowly we get into the warehouse scene and lots of talk about where the music was coming from. At once again for the first time, finally we hear it wasn't just from a bunch of djs going to Ibiza and trying to create the same vibe in England. So I'm thinking wow, this might actually live up to the name of The Definitive History Of UK Dance Music. Then we hit 88 and 89... Things get a little hazy in the reporting and acid house is mentioned but not as much as I thought they would have. Hey at least they played Acid Trax by Phuture (the first acid record). The reporting picks up again and there on the ball again about things like the free parties, criminal justice bill, etc. But 1993 comes and there is a mention that hardcore split into many genres but you know what. Happy Hardcore never gets mentioned! Instead theres lots of talk about Jungle, Garage (funny enough not much about Drum & Bass). And on the other side lots of talk about House, Progressive House and techno but once again nothing about Happy Hardcore. You could say they tried to mix it in with techno but Carl Cox and Derek May doesn't play happy hardcore and would be the wrong people to talk about it. Thinking about it Gabba and European Techno influenced music (think TTF, Scott Brown, Bass Generator), didn't get a mention either, which is strange because it seemed so popular up in Scotland with massive rave events like Rezerection. Actually from the Rez website.

New Years Eve 1993 proved to be a watershed event for Rezerection, as 1994 saw the demise for the traditional London style breakbeat sound favoured by the regular Rez DJs like Grooverider, SS and Seduction. The new Rez sound was heavily influenced by the Dutch and German hardcore scenes and the likes of Westbam, Tanith, Dye Witness and GTO took over from Grooverider, SS and N-Joi as hard trance, bouncy techno and gabba dominated the Scottish scene.

Like I said its more a moan and groan than anything, but I remember growing not listening to BBC Radio 1 for this almost exact reason. There was no place for happy hardcore on radio 1. It was rejected then because it was seen as cheesy, too happy, etc. And obviously thats has carried on through because never mentioned in this definitive history of dance music...! I was also going to make the point that Trance also got very little attention in the documentary. I'm not sure why, but at least it got mentioned and I guess Underworld, Sasha, etc are pretty close to trance. Anyway so in wrapping up the whole documentary, they talked about things like UK only music like Grime, Big Beat (chemical beats or punk house), Bassline, etc. But once again no mention of Happy Hardcore's split into Freeform Hardcore, Hard Dance (or Future Dance) and NuEnergy which are all uniquely british. Don't get me wrong, I don't know too much about music genres but when it comes to Happy Hardcore, I know what I'm talking about even if I'm a trance head nowadays. It was left out of this documentary and never talked about, shame on you Radio 2!

Korg DS-10 synthesizer in your pocket

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Ok I was catching up with the 1up show and they had a segment on the Korg DS-10.

Finally, one of the most powerful new drugs to hit the market is introduced for the very first time outside of Japan by Korg scientists Kazuhito Inoue and Masanao Hayashi. The DS-10 is set to out-perform even its predecessor, the mighty MS-10 thanks in part to its much smaller size, which leading musicology experts Torrey Walker and Ryan O'Donnell have declared to be "almost swallow-able!" Side-effects of the DS-10 include: overwhelming desire to create electronic music on-the-go and to quit one's job in a misguided quest to become a star performer. Oh, and to buy a metallic-pink DS.

Basiclly its a full synthesizer on your DS which can use the wifi feature to link more that one together. Not only that but the touchscreen and multiple screen displays make it very easy to play with. I even believe you can record tracks and play them later. Wow! This awesome, don't get me wrong I still prefer my pacemaker but anything to make the barrier lower and for people to get back into remixing and making music is a good thing in my book. You know stop us from being just consumers. Actually why would you even bother with a ipod now a days, when you have things like this and pacemaker?

I was on the train the other day coming back from London via Shefield and there was this woman sitting next to me. She must have been about 40ish and she asked me what the thing was I kept fiddling with. I explained it was like 2 ipods but I can dj/remix live on them (my usual response for people asking now). She seemed to understand but just ended up saying, she thought it was a new type of mobile phone or games device. I was going to ask if she wanted to have a try but she didn't seem like she was that interested. Maybe next time I'll get some club chick instead.

Technorati Tags: ds, nintendods, korg, synthesizer, pocket, music, remix, make

Spent the last few hours listening to old skool tunes

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I can't remember exactly how I found the site but oldskoolanthemz.com is taking me all the way back. In the site is a section where you can listen in full to tracks from as early as 87 to almost the current day which are self-described as old skool. There's roughly over 2000 tunes and there all there ondemand. The only thing which I wish they would support is a Mpeg3 download store. I would be lighter of 100 pounds by now if they supported that. Instead they have a place where you can buy the Vinyl or CDs via Amazon, they've missed the trick. I'm sure its not as simple as that, a lot of old skool stuff came out under multiple labels and people and so tracing the copyright owners back will be a nightmare. Anyway, if your into old skool and never checked out these great resource, take a couple of hours out and do. I can hardly pull myself away from it. For example in the last few moments I just found - Frequency - Kiss The Sky, I mean you can get any more classic than that?

Engineers unveil .MT9 format, I think .XM or .MOD

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Found via Diggnation and Neowin

Korean computer engineers are introducing a new digital music format that has a six-channel audio equalizer and separate controls on the sound volume for each musical instrument, such as guitar, drum, base and voice. The new format, which has a file extension format of MT9 and a commercial title of "Music 2.0", is poised to replace the popular MP3 file format as the de-facto standard of the digital music source, its inventors say.

The MT9 technology was selected as a candidate item for the new digital music standard at the last regular meeting of Motion Picture Experts Group (MPEG), the international body of the digital music and video industry.

Interesting but not really... I instantly thought it sounded like .XM, .MOD and .S3M. Although there is a question about how much people will actually use such a format and how the bands will feel about such a format. To be honest, who cares what the bands think?

The apprentice, goodbye to the ice queens

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There was something in I think episode 1 and 3 which made me feel uneasy about the two Jennifers (Jennifer Maguire and Jenny Celerier). They ganged up and no douht bullied Lucinda. Serious you could see how upset she was and other housemates did little to help her. I think there was a point when even Sara, turned her back because she knew it wasn't possible to get a word in between the two Jennys. Anyway, when Sir Alan Sugar changed the teams Lucinda showed what she was capable of, and boy oh boy did she do a amazing job. So good that Lee was singing her praises. She made management look easy and she did in a way which wasn't aggressive or bullying. There's no doubt her management and style was different but in a good way. Shes always colorful and her honesty is unlike anything else I've ever seen.

Anyway, so this week both Jenny's got sacked, which was great to see. They both deserved to go and I'm surprised Sir Alan didn't sack Micheal too. The *uckup over Kosher chicken was beyond laughable. The turning point was when Sir Alan noticed the way both Jenny's used his words against the other housemates. The turn around meant goodbye.

Yes I know Lucinda, isn't going to be hired by Sir Alan, but no one deserves to be bullied and no I don't think shes like Katie from last year.

The two sides of Vigin Media

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Thanks Sheila for this link, ISP To Voluntarily Disconnect File-Sharers, Offers Free Usenet.

Virgin Media in the UK has announced that it is working with the music industry to chase down its file-sharing customers and disconnect them from the internet. At the same time, it will offer an enhanced service which will see its customers get free Usenet binaries access, untraceable by the music industry.

I like it...very sneaky. I have been thinking about switching to Virgin Media for a while, fibre to the home (fibre optic) speeds is very attractive. I do however wonder what their download limits are? I'm still doing about 140 gig a month.

Finally a dance download store I like

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So I finally bought some tunes legally for the first time in a long time. I checked out a service called Audiojelly.com which has a huge back story and did a quick scan through my Tunes to get list and picked up quite a few of them. Obviously all 320k Mpeg3's with no DRM. In the end I bought...

• apologies (original mix)conrad s
• cause you know (nic chagall remix) markus schulz feat. departure
• frozen (original mix) dogzilla
• heaven scent (greg downey remix)bedrock
• how long? (original mix)aly & fila vs. fkn feat. jahala
• in the dark (tiesto trance mix) tiesto
• industry (original mix)the green martian
• kalopsia (monogato's filth remix) the blizzard
• lost in moonshine infinity (original mix) planisphere
• s.o.s. (message in a bottle) (sander van doorn remix) filterfunk
• the fall (richard durand remix) way out west

I found Audiojelly really simple and quick to add and buy tracks. They also seemed to do everything correctly, for example I added loads of tunes into my playlist before even signing up. I only needed to signup when I wanted to buy them and even then everything was smooth. The price of the songs isn't as cheap as elsewhere but for dance music they seem to have a wide selection. Maybe not as many as beatport but its not as painful to use as beatport. The only bit of Flash on the page was the playlist and that worked well the rest of the site. You can do stuff like embed, bookmark and even send a chunk to a friend for their approval or something.

I think I'm going to get more into mixing. I've checked out a couple other dj applications for ubuntu but its a area which is in need of much more voices and effort. I would like to think my pacemaker will do away with the need for switching back to Windows to run Virtual DJ but it looks a long way off at the moment. I don't talk to me about virtualisation, it works but that split second difference is killer when mixing live.

Technorati Tags: virtualdj, mixing, tunes, audiojelly, downloadstore, musicstore

Cloverfield what a nice suprise

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So I watched Cloverfield one night while in Hamburg and it suprised me. I actually enjoyed it and liked the rough camcorder style of the whole film. But I really wanted to watch it big and in the cinema. So I did at my local Odeon in Greenwich and enjoyed it even more. I'm no saying this is the best film ever made or anything but if you just sit down and enjoy it, you certainly will. Its also not a turn your brain off movie either, its got some clever bits to go with the physiological horror of not know what the thing is or what its capable of. Thumbs up from me, but go see it in cinemas before watching it at home, this movie was made for the large sceen only.

Technorati Tags: cloverfield, horror, drama, love, physiological, cinema, film

The Real Hustle goes stateside

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Not only have they decided to move the Real Hustle to Las Vegas (yes you can watch it now on iplayer) part 1 and part 2 but TruTV or as it use to be called CourtTV have bought the rights to do a american version of the popular UK show. Shame they got some Magician and actress to join Apollo Robbins whos actually good at what he does. Anyway you can watch most of the shows on the real hustle site.

Technorati Tags: realhustle, hustle, trutv, con, conartist, socialenginnering

Amazon please for goodness sake, stop teasing us and open the UK Mp3 music store already

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From ZDNet

Online retailer Amazon.com said Sunday it will begin an international roll-out this year of its digital music store that offers songs without copy-protection technology known as digital rights management. Amazon said it is the only retailer to offer DRM-free MP3s from all four major music labels as well as thousands of independent labels.

I'm actually considering getting a couple of tunes legally and I don't want a CD (believe it or not I've not a audio CD for over 10 years!). No I can't use iTunes because I'm on Linux and hey do I really want to give Apple any money? Napster, Rhapsody and iTunes don't have a great dance selection either. Beatport do have a great selection of dance music including but oh my goodness I hate that interface. Amazon please launch in the UK and kill off these bunch of pretenders.

Technorati Tags: mp3, amazon, musicstore

Some amazing TED talks recently

[ All media ] | Tags: David Gallo  JJ Abrams  Daniel Goleman  tedtalks  ted  videos 

Don't get me wrong, TED talks are always great but just recently there have been some simply un-missable ones, here's my top three.

Underwater astonishments: David Gallo on TED.com

David Gallo shows jaw-dropping footage of amazing sea creatures, including a shape-shifting cuttlefish, a pair of fighting squid, and a mesmerizing gallery of bioluminescent fish that light up the blackest depths of the ocean. Recorded March 2007 in Monterey, California. Duration: 5:21.)

The mystery box: J.J. Abrams on TED.com

Filmmaker J.J. Abrams traces his love of the unseen mystery -- the heart of Alias, Lost and the upcoming Cloverfield -- back to its own magical beginnings, which may or may not include an early obsession with magic, the love of a supportive grandfather, or his own unopened Mystery Box. Recorded March 2007 in Monterey, California. Duration: 18:02.)

Why aren't we all Good Samaritans? Daniel Goleman on TED.com

Daniel Goleman, author of Emotional Intelligence, asks why we aren’t more compassionate more of the time. Through psychological experiments and a story of the Santa Cruz Strangler, he shows how we are all born with the capacity for empathy -- but we sometimes choose to ignore it. Recorded March 2007 in Monterey, California. Duration: 13:13.)

Technorati Tags: ted, tedtalks, video

Life explained on film, Video Jug

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VideoJug: How To Clean A Laptop

Sheila showed me a site I've never seen before. Videojug.com, explains how to do things in real life. Its a simple concept and honestly when I first saw it, my first thought was so what? But then I started thinking, this is actually really good idea. Its like Sclipo but centred around those situations in life where you may or maynot know how to act, behave or start. I started watching "how to choose the right Television" just to see if the information was correct and upto date. And I got to say I was pretty impressed with the information and tips it gave in the short time.

To most of us the idea of using a web video to teach us how to cook a Rib Eye steak, check your prostate or even How To Fold Trousers Without Creases seems silly, but actually think about it. Where did you ever learn this stuff? School, College, Parents, Friends or even TV shows? Well he's a great site if you ever missed out or was ever too proud to admit you don't actually know.

I have to do my eight things you don't know about me post one day soon, and I was thinking about some really abstract ones. Well this is great because I can now throw some really weird ones in and link to them on Videojug. Nice!

Technorati Tags: learning, learn, videojug, video, web

Steal this film II

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Steal this film II is out but what's more interesting is the next project the League of Noble Peers are working on - The oil of the 21st Century

'Intellectual property', said Mark Getty, 'is the oil of the twenty first century'. Getty is chairman of Getty Images and one of the world's largest intellectual proprietors. His comment offers a unique perspective on the conflicts evolving around information as it penetrates and shapes every aspects of our lives -- from nutrition to medicine, from markets to civil liberties.

This film explores those conflicts. Established and developing economies wage war on each other through restriction and promulgation of information, with devastating consequences on lives and ways of life. Nations like Britain and the US, once information 'pirates' themselves, now support the rights of massive corporations to protect their pharmaceutical patents at the expense of lives in developing countries. Meanwhile, burgeoning Asian economies exploit difficulties with enforcement to create multi-billion dollar pirate industries that are increasingly seen as a real threat to Hollywood.

oh by the way I noticed the abstract blur was filmed at Ravensbourne College, I have thoughts who the blur could be but I'm not going to say in public.

Tiger Team a review

[ All media ] | Tags: tv  courttv  penterationtesting  intel  heist  spy  tigerteam  exploits  socialenginnering 

Ok I take it all back, I was wrong. Tiger team is great. I thought it would be all style and no substance or really boring. But actually its very short (less that 20mins a episode) cut together into a reasonable paced documentatry. Its split into 5 pieces including part 4 the heist (yes 2 members of the camera crew do follow them into the heist) and part 5 the debrief. Its actually all good stuff and you get a good balance of social enginnering and computer exploits. For example they use a USB trojan and some social engineering on a receptionist to gain access to the internal network. Theres some technical material details but not enough to bore most people and maybe not enough to really be used for copycats. For example they don't say which software there using or how they pick locks. There's alot more analysis on the show in the Schneier blog post about the series. I wonder what some of these people would say about the real hustle?

The first episode was good but the second one really good because you could really see that it was a real challenge and they almost got caught too, which adds to the suspense. I really don't hope they don't cancel this series before it plays out. More photos here and because its not available in the UK, links to the torrents.

Technorati Tags: tv, courttv, penterationtesting, intel, heist, spy, tigerteam, exploits, socialenginnering

Anywhere is possible...

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So I saw this trailer while browsing around my rss reader. Looks like a decent action film but what struck me was the concept seemed to remind me of a excellent William Sleator book titled Strange Attractors. From memory the book has a character who can teleport anywhere and ends up meeting a couple other people who can do the same. Those other people don't quite have the same ethics about teleportation and hence the start of a plot. Anyway it looks we will have to wait till the day after Valentines day to watch this in UK cinemas. Luckily thats only a day after most of the world.

Technorati Tags: cinemas, jumper, film, trailer, williamsleator, strangeattractors, teleportation, teleport

Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events

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Can I just say how excellent Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events is. When they going to get around to doing a few more films based on the follow on books? I considered a while ago buying the series on ebay as I love the darkness and wit involved in the books.

Technorati Tags: lemonysnicket, book, film, ebay

Penetration testing on TV?

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I've heard some strange ideas for TV shows but whoever thought up this one must be barking mad. First heard on a NPR podcast then later on the register

Tiger Team follows a group of elite freelance security consultants hired to test organisations' security by using social engineering, hacking, and physically defeating security mechanisms. So we expect to see our heroes picking locks and going through the trash to get clues all the while maintaining an uneasy relationship with their clients and law enforcement officials.

Even the register are sniffing out this show long term appeal.

The plot elements have appeared before in films such as Sneakers, starring Robert Redford. It's hard to see how a story arc strong enough to sustain interest over the course of a TV series can be sustained from these elements.

The first programme is due to screen at 11pm on Christmas Day on CourtTV, which is hardly a recipe for a large audience. On the plus side, those watching will be probably too sozzled to notice any plot holes or technical errors.

Technorati Tags: tigerteam, tv, media, courttv, theregister, Penetrationtesting, Penetration, testing, security

BitTorrent and PBS Pair up for Distribution

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Public Broadcast on a public tracker: BitTorrent, Inc. received an endorsement of sorts from the US government, as the subsidized television network PBS (Public Broadcasting System) has agreed to distribute shows on the BEN (BitTorrent Entertainment Network). The announcement made today will bring many of PBS' more popular shows to the online store.

Is there an arguement that every public broadcaster should be doing this with content they have 100% cleared? Hummm what happened to our deal with Zudeo/VuzeTribbler?