Posts by Simon Wells

West Virginia seeks Google Glass driving ban

I'm going to make a prediction....

The only people who wear Google Glass all the time will be those twits who also walk around with a bluetooth earpiece attached to their ear lugs. You might wear Glass for a specific task but the idea that you will have it on your head while you sit with your mates in the pub is frankly ridiculous. People spend a long time on their faces, hair and clothes - even those who work in IT - and they are not going to take to something that makes them look like a Star Trek extra. And that's before we even start to talk about the inevitable weight of these things. Did anyone ever try on the Oakley sunglasses with a built in MP3 player? If so, you'll know what I am talking about.

iOS 5 'crashes more apps' than Android

IoS5 crashes more often...

...than any OS I have ever used. And I've still got a Vista laptop.

Tory proposes street-legal Segway legalisation

How...

...are pedestrians, who have been gradually giving over more and more street space to motorised vehicles for more than a century, supposed to cope with a fairly large and heavy object almost certainly driven by an idiot moving at twice their speed along the same pavement?

I realise that I am actually making a huge assumption that anyone who wants to ride/drive/be laughed at in control of a Segway is an idiot. But I think I'm on solid ground. Suspect they are the same demographic as buying the WiiFit.

Freesat launches in UK

I've got a standard Sky satellite dish...

...if I plug in a Freeset HD box, will I get HD?

Guitar maker Gibson thrashes out more robo-axes

Variax

Some thoughts:

1. I've got a Variax. It was £350 and you can use the Workbench software in it to set up any tuning that you like, instantly, and store up to 10 presets. While it's not a 'real' guitar, it works brilliantly in a gigging situation and sounds really great about 85% of the time. Which is better than most modern Gibsons.

2. Who plays in a band that tunes to the guitar? Most bands tune to the keyboard.

3. This Robot thing, if you use it to constantly retune to alt tunings, sounds like an invitation to break strings.

4. Being absolutely in tune is really overrated. Chuck Berry reputedly detunes all his strings. And I play banjo quite a lot. It actually sounds better when it goes a little out of tune.

Russian copyright wars to continue despite AllofMP3 shutdown

Music industry in its death throes

As someone who has consumed a lot of music over the past few decades, it's impossible to feel any sadness at the quandry that major labels now find themselves in. They have consistenly shagged everyone in the supply chain - from artist to retailer to consumer. Their one defence - that they "invest" in new music - is made laughable by their pitiable track record in identifying and nurturing talent that can find a viable audience. The fact is that the music industry of today and tomorrow - thanks to the emergence of low cost, high quality recording and low cost online distribution - bears no resemblance to that of the past. And it's difficult to see that as anything other than a positive thing. It may mean far fewer mega successful artists ending up with mansions on every continent but it should also mean no shareholders raking off the majority of profits and make it easier for more artists to perhaps make a viable living from music.

And, yeah, emusic is great.

University moves to hush Facebook criticism

Well...

...I was taught by James Knowles (if it is the same chap and it seems to be) many, many years ago at a different university. And we ended up making a complaint about him too.

Pentax Optio E30 compact digital camera

Poor review

What kind of three page camera review is it that only mentions picture quality in the penultimate paragraph, seemingly as an afterthought? Next stop, MP3 player reviews with hardly any reference to the sound and phone reviews on which the writer hasn't bothered to make many calls.