Why I wont buy another iPod

I've had a first gen 2gb iPod nano for just over a year now ... yes I was one of those people who was sold the moment they saw one, although to be fair I was looking at buying a new mp3 player anyway so it wasn't a total impulse buy.

Anyway, about 1 year later I think its time to upgrade to a higher capacity device. But will I get a new iPod? The simple answer is a "no". Here is why:

1. iTunes. I'm not talking about the shop (I've always used AllOfMP3!), I am just talking about the software. Its the biggest heap of shit I've ever used. It is slow, bloated, buggy and most of all its crap at its main purpose of loading music onto the iPod! For example imagine you had 100 albums you want to copy to your iPod, but only space for 50; does iTunes copy over the first 50 complete albums? No that would be too sensible - instead it copies over a random selection of tracks from all 100 albums...why?!!?!!
2. It is no longer "cool"...I'd be tempted to say that it was "cool" only for about 6 months before people actually knew what it was, but that is perhaps another story...
3. Despite everyone ranting about how well designed these things are, you cant unplug the data-cable without having to unplug the headphones first because they put the plugs too close together.
4. The data cable shell breaks after a few uses.
   
5. The Hold-Play-To-Turn-Off implementation is irritating; it sometimes takes several attempts to turn the damn thing off.
6. The so-called gapless playback is pretty random. An album will be gapless one day, but not another?
7. The latest firmware has changed how the device works when skipping tracks. Now it seems that to rewind a track I need to press the back key 3 times, even if I am only one or two seconds into the track: once to "wake" the iPod up, second to rewind the track, and third to actually go back. I am convinced that this never used to be the case - now it just feels like its not responding or broken or something when trying to go back a track.
8. Its really fragile and prone to scrapes and dents and all sorts of injuries despite living in a case all the time.

So there we go. Rant over. Basically I have been pretty disappointed with it all, particularly the software. If they were hoping the iPod would drive mac sales then they should have spent a lot more time working on iTunes because at the moment it just leaves a bad taste as it were.

What will I get instead? No idea to be honest - the zune is looking interesting. Maybe I will get one of those if it can update its music wirelessly (i.e. not just sharing tracks with others wirelessly).

World to Matt: "Dont Exercise!"

Maybe the world is trying to tell me something. It seems for the past few weeks everything has been happening to try and stop me from exercising.

For starters, a few weeks ago I had an operation which meant that for a few days I could barely even standup let alone get to the gym. And because I was in so much pain, even just walking around the shops and stuff was a struggle so I just sat around doing nothing except grimacing and calculating when I was ready to take the next round of medication.

So anyway after a couple of weeks I was well enough to start going to the gym again. This went well for about 4 visits spread out over the last week or two. Yesterday I tried to get in and the barrier refused to move to let me in when I swiped my card. Sometimes it does this so I tried again - same thing. Slightly embarrassed I asked the guys on the desk what was going on and it turned out my gym membership had run out the day before. Because I don't know where I am going to end up living or working any time soon I decided to wait before renewing the membership - I dont want to pay £700 for the year then find out I am living and working miles and miles away. Apparently I cant even use the gym on a pro-rata basis either, so no more gym for me for the time being.

So anyway we get to today. Quite a nice day - sun is out but not too much, its warm but not too hot. "I know," I thought to myself "I'll get the old bike out and go for a ride!". So, after pumping up the tyres, I am back on a bike for the first time in years. It was actually kinda fun in a way - nice and calm and relaxing. I did a quick circuit around my local area and was on my way back when - right as I was turning right across a fairly busy road - the chain snapped. It didn't come off, or slip - it fucking snapped. So no more cycling for me either!

Oh and whilst I was writing this blog I just found out I got onto the graduate scheme I applied for at one of the world's best know IT companies so yay!

Matt - Come On Down!

I was idly flipping through channels trying to find a lunch time news bulletin the other day when I stumbled onto ITV, and something I'd not seen in a long, long time - The Price Is Right! It looks like they've finally retired poor Bruce Forsyth - not before time - and got Joe Pasquale in instead. The format is exactly the same as it always was though.

And I loved it.

Now, I dont usually go in for these sort of shows - I guess I like to think of myself as above this sort of thing, preferring to watch documentaries, the news (that was after all what I was trying to find), secretly pretending that I watch Big Brother purely as a science thing and all that sort of stuff. But watching The Price Is Right filled me with joy; when someone won something I was genuinely happy.

Needless to say I was pretty surprised with myself - so much so that I've been thinking about it for a few days now. What was the attraction? What did The Price Is Right have that managed to warm the heart of a die-hard cynic that other shows were lacking?

I think its to do with the whole ethos of the show - the pretty crappy prizes (by today's standards) like some hair straighteners or an iron, the tongue in cheek yet almost ego-free presentation (kudos to Pasquale incidentally - he did a great job), and the rowdy shouting from the audience. Unlike other game shows like Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, The Weakest Link, The X-Factor etc etc, there was no greed - the contestants looked like they were just there for some fun and maybe leaving with a couple of hundred quid and a Barbecue or something if they were lucky on the games that required no real skill at all. There was something very endearing about it all. I'm actually looking for when its next on so I can make a point about watching it. I wish more of the trash we get on TV was like it - I dont want to see people desperately hoping to get rich and/or famous out of some show. Bring back all the other classics too - The Crystal Maze and You Bet, please come back!

Only in London...?

I really love London. In the past I could take it or leave it, but as I've got older and got out there a bit on my own its really grown on me. There is the lively hustle and bustle of it, the fact you can do anything you want whenever you want, and the great transport - but most of all its the lunatics that really set it apart in my opinion.

The other day I was minding my own business waiting for a tube at Finsbury Park to arrive; I sat down on a bench next to what appeared to be a perfectly normal person - until they started mumbling that is. "Oh yeah....Oh - yeah... oooo" as they were caressing what appeared to be a guitar bag. I turned away for a moment, but turned back when he started playing his guitar to see the guy now stooped over, leaning right over his instrument (oo-er!). It wasn't actually too bad - fairly run of the mill Spanish sounding music. A few people further down the platform ignored the music, probably thinking - like I was - that it was a busker. But then the music started getting more and more unhinged - syncopated and faster. And it got faster, and faster. I'm no musician but it must have been about 300bpm and it was insane. Imagine a typical generic Spanish sounding folk tune played about two or three times faster than it should be. Someone who looked like a London Underground employee - complete with radio - walked past once, and then walked back again a few moments later (clearly a stealthy "check out the nutcase" manoeuvre), but the guy carried on playing like some sort of possessed crack addict. Then without any warning or appreciable end of the song, he stopped and put the guitar away, the train arrived and he got on as if nothing had happened. It was actually kinda electrifying to hear the music played so damn fast; I felt like clapping or something but for some reason I didn't - kinda felt like I should have.

Then the next day I was again minding my own business waiting for a train to arrive when I heard someone shouting at the top of their voice "Homophobia! Homophobia!" from some way off. I'm not sure if they were angry about the amount of homophobia they felt was present in society, or if maybe they were some how trying to promote it by shouting it loudly on public transport.

Who knows.

What I do know is its stuff like this that makes London such an interesting, fun and entertaining place to be!

"Business" vs "Business Casual"

You know I was just thinking actually - what is really the difference between "Business" and "Business Casual" anyway?

As far as I can tell, "Business Casual" is just a suit, proper shoes and a shirt but no tie. "Business" is just the same thing but with a tie?

Is it really worth the effort?!

The graduate job hunt continues...

This week looks like its going to be a hectic week for job hunting.

Tomorrow I've got a "chat" at a graduate recruitment .com who rather cheekily describe themselves as based in Soho, but I'd call it "round the back of Tottenham Court Road" myself. But anyway - from what I can tell they are a pretty small outfit, but I reckon it could be a great fun place to work. I'd be working on their main website, and a few of their smaller ones, doing ASP.NET so it sounds like it would be ace.

Last week I had a "Talent Acquisition" guy from a large international search .com phone me up about an application I'd sent in weeks ago - to cut a long story short I thought they'd just binned my CV, but it turns out they weren't going to have the job, then they were, then they weren't, and now they are again. It sounds really cool - working in a central web development team basically doing all of the HTML, CSS, Javascript, PHP etc for all the portals on this .com (trust me there are a LOT!) as required. My application is with the technical guys who are giving it the once over, and hopefully they are going to setup a technical interview for me later on. Sounds great and looks like a great place to work, but I'm kinda concerned about the fact the job has been kinda uncertain...would I get the job then get made redundant in 6 months?!

Anyway, on Wednesday I am going to a first round interview of a HUGE IT company near Waterloo. Full suit and tie job this one so shitting it a bit already, but I guess I've been through enough of these things now to just sit back and relax and take it all on the chin. Unlike the two mentioned above its not a web development role - its a full on graduate IT consultancy role so I wont really be in my comfort zone, especially as I get the feeling this company is strictly a Java institution...should be interesting! From the looks of it this day is just an initial day to further cut down the number of candidates before what I assume will be a second round for the "real" interview.

Busy busy busy!

So here we go again...

Ok so another blog. The last time I tried blogging I eventually realised that what I really wanted was a place where I could provide tutorials and information about technical bits and bobs. Eventually the blog failed and I took the whole thing down...but even now I still get 404s for blog entries so I guess someone found some of the stuff interesting or useful.

So anyway - fast forward by about a year or so, and with a refreshingly anonymous Blogger blog and a proper site setup with a decent CMS for the technical writing, I'm ready to give it another go.

First impressions of this blogger account are good, so we'll see how it goes!