Posts by Brian 29 publicly visible posts • joined 5 Jul 2007
I always find it amusing how you can read the comments on articles like this and know who the employees are and who the employers are.
Personally, I don't have a Facebook account (or an account on any other social networking site). There are two reasons for this. 1) I prefer talking to people directly, so I converse with my colleagues if I want information/gossip (I'm not even that much of a fan of e-mail). 2) I'm usually too busy living my life to spend time going on a site to talk about what I plan on doing with my life.
But, should the likes of Facebook be banned? Obviously it's a massive drain on productivity, but how often does someone go into work and work solidly through the day non-stop? Everyone needs distraction, and I think Facebook can provide that. Employees could be updating their pages while their brain mulls over a problem in the background. I find taking 10 minutes here and there during the working to day to read various articles helps me solve issues and complete work far more quickly than working non-stop through the day spending half of it spacing out staring at the screen. So maybe it can be a useful tool to relieve stress and boredom in work.
But, if employees are going to be using Facebook on company time, essentially getting paid to do it, shouldn't the comany be allowed to see what is being said on those profiles? Should the execs be given access to their employees profiles so they can monitor what they are saying? They can ensure no bullying of fellow employees takes place or nothing bad is being said in the public domain about the company or its customers.
In companies where it is frowned upon for spending time on Facebook, surely the employees and employers can come to some form of agreement (and saying you can just use it a lunch-time I don't believe is enough) which will allow the employees to continue updating their friends & families with their goings-on and alleviate the concerns of employers about what is being said. As for production, as it has been said, the managers should be able to detect who is not being productive. That is part of their job after all.
So ultimately,no, I don't think it should be banned. But employees should just show some restraint. You certainly shouldn't spend more than, say, one sixth of your day on it (perhaps even less). If employers, ban it, they may as well ban other sites that can take up employee time that is non-work related such as news sites (typing this post has taken 5+ mins away from me actually working, for example). And if news sites are banned, where will the employees get there Paris Hilton gossip for the day?? Such a thing would certainly be a morale destroyer for many of us wage slaves!
£4 a pint aint that bad. Equates to about €5.50, which is only slightly more than your cousins accross the water have been paying for quite some time.
I recently bought a pint of Guinness in Temple Bar (Dublin) for €5.20. GUINNESS!!!! It's literally brewed a 5 minute walk away!
As for the Americans/Canadians; $5 works out to £2.50, so, if the price more than double over here, expect that to be $10 a pint. Although, it should be noted that for Irish drinks in America, the Guinness is brewed in Canada. That's how they claim it's imported because it technically is. They just don't tell ye where from.
And speaking for drink, it's lunch time.
Ok, I don't claim to be any tech boffin, or even a smart man, for that matter. But I don't get the whole iPod being tied to iTunes stuff people complain about. I don't use iTunes with my iPod, so obviously it isn't tied to iTunes. I can still download music and load it on, and I can sync my iPod to a playlist using winamp if I feel so inclined. In fact, I installed iTunes first, then Winamp, found Winamp easier to use, and so never went back to iTunes.
Now, maybe people are complaining from a point of view that if you want to update the iPod software you need iTunes (maybe that's what I'm missing), but then, how is that any different that having to use Windows Update to update Windows?
Anyone remember that terrible show with Cilla Black where she sung that stupid song at the end? I can't remember what the theme was about, all I remember was that it made me feel very sick watching it. But then the question is, why did I watch it? I can't be expected to answer such questions!!! I was only about 10 at the time!!!!....... I think.....
Anyway, what does this have to do with the Anitgua Vs. US? Nothing!! I was just writing the header for my comment when the image of Cilla in a black sparkly cocktail dress popped into my head and made me gag a little.
As for my comment, I'm actually surprised and the level of surprise at the US's reaction. This was an obvious path the US was going to take with this issue. If I thought about it ahead, I would have set up a gambling company in Antigua to take bets on it. Judging by the surprise here, I would have made a fortune!!!
While the WTO is supposed to deal with the rules for trade on an international level, as with most things to the US, this translates to "rules of trade beneficial to the US". We must look to our own leaders to ensure the US government realises that this is not the case. While the EU is putting pressure on them, I must wonder exactly how much follow through they'll actually have on the matter.
There's no point in blaming Bush. He's everyones scape goat these days. I'm sure he's only vaguely aware of the situation, if at all. If the US prevail in the case, questions must be asked by our leaders. If/when the lose, and if they chose to ignore the ruling and get away with it, we cannot 100% blame America. After all, it's not exactly the safe haven for the morally superior human. We must also blame the other signatories to the WTO. It is up to us to ask our leaders why they failed to enforce the rules on the US, not just for us ask the US why they didn't follow them.
Chuck on Chuck eh? I don't think that would be so much of a paradox as it would be one of those Zen Kone things
"If Chuck dies and there is no one there to see it, does it really happen?"
or
"What happens if an unstoppable Chuck meets and imovable Chuck?"
I can already feel enlightenment pour into my soul.
<long winded rant>
I am in a similar position and agree with this. I have a Sony Ericsson v630.... or something like that. Model number aint on the cover and I aint taken the batter out for the purposes of this post.
The phone has all the usual things most modern phones have; camera, memory card (I got a 4GB one a few weeks back), makes calls, text messages, emails, surf the net, bluetooth, MP3's, some weird video format, etc. The phone is locked to Vodafone, but that's my provider so what do I care?
My point is, either using the phone cable to directly connect the phone to my PC via USB (when I do this, my phone is picked up as an external USB hard drive), or over bluetooth, I can dump MP3's onto my memory card. I can plug in my earphones and listen to the MP3's if I so wish, just like a real MP3 player!!! But, I can also selected any of my MP3's as a ringtone. I don't need to modify it, or pay anything to do it. I just rip the song off a CD, copy it to my fone, and select it as my ring tone.
Now, I haven't seen an iPhone yet, but have read a bit about it. And if the iPhone could just play MP3's, this issue obviosuly wouldn't be..... well, and issue. For those Apple defenders, the iPhone was designed by APPLE, not the RIAA. It was programmed by APPLE, not the RIAA. APPLE wrote the iPhone software in such a way that prevented you from using an MP3 as a ringtone. There is no two ways about that. MAYBE the RIAA are pressuring Apple now to charge twice for a ringtone, but it was Apple that gave them that opportunity by restricting the iPhone and not allowing it to use existing MP3's (bought or ripped from CD) as a ringtone. The charges may be the result of the RIAA, but the restrictions are Apples doing.
Now, I aint an Apple blaster or "fanboy". I have an Apple notebook, a PC with XP on it, and two *nix machine. I have an 80 GB iPod, because my 4GB on my fone just isn't enough space and I think it's a pretty good device. It suits my needs. Apple software in general is very good, and is very hard to fault a lot of the time. But this restriction on the use of MP3's on the iPhone...... there's clearly money making reasons behind that, because if the RIAA forced them to do it that way, then they would have forced Sony Ericsson, Nokia, and any other phone manufacturers that make phones with MP3 players built in!
</long winded rant>
"68 miles in 2 hours = high speed?
Okay, what I am missing here?"
You're missing that the world doesn't end at the English coast!!!
London to the Chunnel is about 68 miles, but as the crow flies, it's over 200 miles to Paris (Paris to London was the 2 hour run!), never mind the distance if you follow the rail line route..... so yeah, 2 hours is fairly high speed.
Definitely Germany and the UK. Uncertain if they'll base their decision on population size, pliability of network providers, or a populations phone usage per head.
They'll probably look at the iPod sales as a template for success though.
P.S. Does everyone know it's System Administrator Appreciation Day? What have you bought your admin person today? Plus, why is it they're the only nerds to get an appreciation day?
Why is it that the CEO of a company believes it's okay to shamlessly plug his pathetic search engine on the comments section of an article, when it be used to provide personal comments of individuals views. While I know views of the public are generally not unbiased, they don't tend to intentionally advertise a direct competitor(s) of the companies targeted by the article.
This is not an advertising forum and people like Mr. Bean (I know, it's Beens, but the reference was satisfying!) should have their accounts suspended in my view. That posting was not a personal view of an individual that does not have an alterior motive behind it. It was an advertisement.
While I admit it is great Ixquick is protecting peoples privacy, I think it's despicable what their CEO has done here (though I highly doubt he even typed the posting himself). If you want advertising:
A) Pay for it like most organisations
B) Develop a GOOD search engine that will get you noticed (Like Google and the others did)
C) Do something that irritates the general public to draw attention to your company (Like Google and the others did), and then try to correct it (Like Google and the others did).
Remeber, no publicity is bad publicity. But your actions here are disgusting at best, and while I despise the data retention activities of the other search engines, I for one will never be using yours.
If ye want a real spoiler, how's this;
Clearly since they didn't kill off Harry, this "last book in series" is a clever marketing ploy. I foresee there shall be another, where Harry and his crazy friends get together to bring back Ron from the dead. The opening chapter could read something like:
The chick who's name I can't spell: "Harry, we did it, Rons alive again!"
Harry: "Good to have you back Ron! How are you feeling?"
Zombie Ron: "Brrrrrraaaaaaiiiiiinnnnnnnsssss....."
Everybody: "Oh Ron, ur such a gas ti...... oh wait!!!! AAARRRGGGGHHHH"
Now that's good reading!!!!!
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