Christmas has been and gone, and as usual I’ve been terrible at keeping this blog up to date! Jess and I went to France for Christmas to see my parents. My dad celebrated his 70th birhday on the 24th, and Christmas Day was nice.
We’re now in Devon until the 6th of January, and looking forward to the New Year. We’re also hoping to see the new Chronicles of Narnia film at some point in the next few days.
Other than that, I’d say there’s been very little news here!
Microsofties always wonder why I dislike Microsoft so much. Some may even understand me, along with the thousands, if not millions, of other people who share the same dislike. But I’ve never really been able to put my finger on why until now…
This latest story is an account of how Microsoft managed to have edited a UN document, removing references to Free Software and changing the stance on DRM. I’ll let you make your own mind up by reading the story (it’s quite short): The Complete Story of the Vienna Conclusions by Georg C. F. Greve.
Since quite a few people have been asking me what I’d like for Christmas, and I keep forgetting things I want to buy, I’ve written up a wishlist. I don’t expect anyone to buy me the expensive stuff, but it will remind me that I actually want those things!
Anyone who has enjoyed early versions of Mario, specifically Mario Brothers I-III and Super Mario World, will love this little collection of Mario theme tunes performed in various ways. From bOING bOING.
A particular story made me very angry on the news today, and particularly what a certain person brought in to be interviewed said. It was about the NHS using data mining to map out areas where, for example, there might be a high instance of diabetes. It is common knowledge that there are 1 million people in the UK who have diabetes but don’t know about it.
That sounds like a great idea on the surface, but it raised several questions in my mind… They use data like what supermarket you shop at, what newspaper you read, etc… Where the hell did they get that from?! Surely the Information Comissioner has something to say about the use of such databases by the NHS? And when did I permit my supermarket to sell this information about me? Never.
What angered me the most however was a person from The Mirror tabloid who was talking about everyone hating cold calls and the NHS shouldn’t do it. Now that’s all fine and dandy, why not. But what got me was her suggestion that we should keep an eye out on our neighbours: where they shop at, if they smoke or not, if they “look” ill, if they eat junk food! Pardon? My neighbours?! I’d get very angry about my neighbour if he knew that much about me.
Call me paranoid or something, but it already worries me enough that my supermarket knows that much about me. What’s starting to worry me is that the supermarkets seem to be readily selling this data onto my government, who can probably use it how they see fit. That’s rather alarming.
In other news, there is finally some evidence that keeping warm helps you prevent getting a cold: some researchers took candidates and dipped some of their feet in cold water, and kept others’ dry. 33% of the ones who put their feet in cold water got a cold, but only 9% of those who kept warm. Why? Apparently it’s because when you’re cold, blood gets redirected from your nose into your cold bits to warm them up. Your nose is your primary defence against the common cold virus. Intriquing! Mothers ‘were right’ about colds (BBC)
If you’re a student of the University of Huddersfield, or considering applying there (or have done so), or used to study there some time ago, you might be interested in a new web site Andy, Dan, and myself (see right) are setting up.
Huddersfield Student Voice aims to fill a gap that the University and Students’ Union have in their sites: a fun and safe online community for students to talk to one another and express their views and opinions about the University, Huddersfield as a whole, or anything else for that matter!
Sony, not content enough alienating customers of its music business by installing rootkits under the excuse of Digital Rights Management, has done it again. This time it’s their games business, though!
A recent patent filed by Sony describes a technology which would tie a video game (or potentially any other digital media) to the first device it was played in, thus making impossible the sale of second hand games which, if you think about it the way they do, equates to lost revenue. I don’t know about you, but we’ve got a lot of second hand games we would have never bought new, ever, so surely it gives them more exposure that way?
Anyway, imagine this scenario: someone steals your brand new PS3 console. Or it breaks. You just got paid so you go out and buy a new PS3 to replace it, but all of a sudden your games refuse to play! How did that happen? Hmm.
I think Sony have lost yet another potential customer. But that probably doesn’t matter, they’ll probably find a way of bringing the law down on people who refuse to buy their stuff.
Update: I’ve just heard of yet another piece of malicious DRM Sony uses on its CDs…
Yes, I’m still alive…just! I seem to have come down with a bad cold / pretty mild flu just yesterday, but that’s no excuse for not having posted anything for 21 days. Mind you, it’s better than some people, who haven’t posted since September 19th!
Not a huge amount has been happening on my side of the story really. I went caving last week, down a hole called Giants Pot (or Cave, who knows) in Derbyshire. It’s one of those caves that you’re recommended not to go down more than once or twice a year due to the high levels of radon… I went down a couple of years ago and followed much the same route: walk about a bit, go down a 5m pitch (we laddered it this time; I hate ladders!), then walk down the Crab’s Walk (it’s so narrow you have to go sideways most of the way), then back up again. Not bad, but very tiring!
In other news, my project is doing better than I could have ever imagined, but there are still some major hurdles to overcome, not least that I still can’t read/write the flash chips (need to build the JTAG adapter), and I’ll have lots of fun shoving a Linux kernel in 2MB of FLASH, not to mention running a whole system in 2MB of RAM! Fun!
I was woken this morning by the sound of our doorbell, at exactly 8:00. It was the new washing machine, or more precisely the washing machine delivery man. The house had a washing machine in it when we arrived, but our landlord wanted £1.50 each per week for the machine. We thought we could do better than that and found a £100 reconditioned Zanussi machine or three, that we went for instead. You do the maths, but we’ll save a pretty penny this way, and we get a better machine to boot!
The first week of Uni went quite well. I’ve got some really interesting modules, like Artificial Intelligence and Artificial Neural Networks, but even the more standard ones like Language Specification & Implementation and Computational Mathematics look good and will definitely get those grey cells going! In addition to this, my current idea for my final year project is looking good: trying to get Linux on an old Sky Digibox (a PACE 2500N). So far everyone I’ve spoken to think it’s a good idea if it’s possible, but that’s the thrill of it all!
Jess is off doing a traffic survey today, getting paid £30 for two hours work! I thought the weather would be miserable and opted out of the exercise even though everyone else in the house has gone, although now it’s turned out fine, if a bit cold. Never mind, gives me plenty of time to tidy this room up a bit!
That reminds me, I need to put a load of washing on…
We’ve now moved in to our new place in Hudderfield, where we’ll be staying until we both finish our stints in University: me finishing up my Computing Science degree here in Hudds, and Jess doing a Masters in Politics at York. The house is really nice, with plenty of spacious rooms—we had to get a 5 bedroom house because there are 5 of us, despite there being two couples, so one room has been converted to a computer room, and the other is being coverted to a lounge / guest room.
The University went through quite a few changes last year, and we’re starting to feel the effects of this now. Our School of Computing and Mathematics has merged with the School of Engineering, to become the School of Computing and, surprise surprise, Engineering. In addition to this, many members of staff have left for a variety of reasons (not one sacked, I think), including the university’s scheduling person: that means we still don’t have any idea what time all our lectures are or anything…and we’re starting on Monday!
I’ve already managed to get into this year’s first caving trip, which is just a freshers’ trip to Longchurn (a nice easy horizontal cave) so should get me back into the swing of things. Lovely! On a sourer note, I need to buy a new battery for my lamp since it leaked last year while we were away…
Anyway, I have to get downstairs to move a few sofas from the garage into our lounge…