* Posts by Rob Davis

241 publicly visible posts • joined 13 Aug 2007

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Top prices, old shows - the Beeb's iPlayer goes global

Rob Davis

@Michelle Knight Thu 8 Oct 09 12:18:"syphon off profits from one cheap to produce show to another"

""Obviously, executives would still be able to syphon off profits from one cheap to produce show to another which costs more" so this doesn't actually rule out serendipity."

Would a commercial programme maker want to cross-subsidise? Isn't it reasonable to expect that they would be obliged to return as much of their profits to their investors and shareholders as possible? Cross-subsidy is fine if everyone in the market does it, but not if others aren't doing it and therefore under-cutting those that do with higher returns on same initial investment.

Not against profits in programme making: public and private outfits are a healthy mix.

Cost is not necessarily proportional to quality either. Popular programmes aren't necessarily cheap nor are less popular/niche programmes expensive.

Perhaps the pay-per-view module will rule as you suggest. After all, when consuming other entertainment such as theatre, cinema or concerts, we pay per show, yet their prior promotion on our favourite media platform (newspaper, radio, magazine, internet...) enables the serendipity.

Rob Davis

@Michelle Knight: Where it is going 8/10/09 09:38: Not quite - as the BBC gives serendipity.

On Thursday 8th October 2009 09:38 GMT, In "Where it is going" Michelle Knight wrote:

"This is starting to show where I believe all TV will go ... pay per view. With content being digitally streamed, I believe it won't be long before we're all paying for the television that we specifically watch.

"That will mean the unpopular programs sink to the bottom without trace, while others rise to the top and sing"

Unpopular does not mean bad. Popular does not mean good. Popularity is a matter of collective opinion.

With predictable income from the license fee, the BBC is able to take risks and produce content where other outlets don't see a profit. This means that the BBC can meet its universal obligation that includes representing minority interests and groups. Some initially minority interests which gain wider appeal.

Also consider serendipity (the effect by which one accidentally discovers something fortunate): the license fee enables this to happen by offering things that you don't yet know you will really like. How else can you know what you are interested in - in the first place? Perhaps rhetorical question to you, Michelle: How do things become popular in the first place?

What internet delivered media will give broadcasters is precise audience viewing figures, so no need for BARB for TV or RAJAR for radio.

On Thursday 8th October 2009 09:38 GMT, In "Where it is going" Michelle Knight also wrote:

"why should I spend an extra quarter of an hour watching a show that I could get through in 45 minutes? Over an evening that could be an hour or so I'd gain ... that could be worth paying for."

Yes, and also even when the Sky subscription has been paid there are still adverts in those channels.

Sony HDR-TG7VE

Rob Davis

Why 1080i? 1080p at 24p for archive direct to blu-ray. Micro-SD to ProDuo adapter.

1) Why are we still seeing camcorders with 1080i and not 1080p?

The film industry does not use i - interlaced it uses progressive - p. My impression is that interlaced was developed due to technical limitations in early products. Moreover, if interlaced has any merit at all then why isn't there wide use of a 720i standard for the HD Ready/HD entry level 720lines standard?

2) Have they thought through the whole solution? At some point the consumer will want to move their footage off the memory card onto permanent robust storage. The Blu-ray format is ideal for this and for sharing content with others.

But so many camcorder manufacturers haven't provided a stand alone Blu-ray recorder to make this simple, except for Panasonic. Also, the footage may need processing if the framerate is not 24p for blu-ray. They should be offering 1080p (with 24 frames per second - that's 24 full 1920x1080 frames per second). This would make the footage ready for archiving to Blu-ray without re-encoding/processing.

I suggest a new campaign for a sticker on products to say: "24p: direct to Blu ray ready"

3) Memory cards. I echo other posters here in disliking Sony for their proprietary Memory Stick format when everyone else is using SD/SDHC. The cost of a memory card is justified when it can be used in many devices for different purposes.

One solution might be to try a micro-SD to Memory Stick ProDuo adapter:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/PEAK-1GB-Micro-MLC-Adapter/dp/B000SSMVOW

I have one of these and it works great for a Sony Digital Camera - see my full review at above link by "R.J.Davis". For this camcorder I would suggest using this adapter with a Class C4 8gb microsd that might be able to handle the high transfer rate required by recording Hi-def.

Talking DAB and the future of radio

Rob Davis

@Equitas and @Anonymous Coward Posted Thursday 24th September 2009 17:04 GMT

Equitas Posted Thursday 24th September 2009 14:33 GMT wrote in "Killing off the radio audience?":

"Internet radio isn't all it's cracked up to be, either. Can't get a decent sampling rate on Radio 4 at all -- unusable."

That might be because the BBC choose to use the dated proprietary Real codec at low bitrates. (someone update me if this is no-longer the case) Instead if they used AAC/AAC+ or even eAAC+ then the sound quality would be much higher at that same low bitrate. Some say that such inertia is the BBCs way of encouraging people to choose DAB rather than dedicated internet radio sets or even via internet on the mobile.

Anonymous Coward Posted Thursday 24th September 2009 17:04 GMT wrote in :

"Let's just stop doing radio - better than death by a thousand cuts":

"Someone on here suggested using Internet radio via net connected mobile phone... with even poorer geographic coverage than any broadcast radio! I think not."

But that can change, coverage can be improved. Consider that Vodafone sell (one-off payment for the kit) a Femtocell which connects to a broadband fixed line providing instant call and broadband 3G wireless coverage. (OK, let's put aside the argument about Vodafone asking people to pay to improve coverage for a moment). This does empower people to improve coverage themselves. Can't do that with DAB can you?

Apparently 100million pounds is suggested to be invested into improving DAB coverage. Waste of money! Guess where advertising is growing? (probably) not radio. Guess who the biggest advertising agency is? Google.

Rather than investing such money in DAB - an undemocratic, specialised one-to-many broadcast platform using old technology (MP2, no-error correction for robustness), why not instead use it to help improve high-speed mobile internet access - a general purpose many-to-many communications medium.

Enhancing these high speed broadband internet wireless networks is much more "socially useful" (to borrow a phrase from another news subject) than DAB. And such networks can carry radio broadcasts and provide precise audience figures.

Perhaps rhetorical question: why does the radio industry feel the need for its own platform when internet can carry this competently?

Rob Davis
Flame

Three words: Mobile. Internet. Radio.

The future of digital radio is on mobile 'phones.

Reg you didn't mention this, only mentioned WiFi. Hence the flame icon.

For mobile internet radio:

- Nokia's free internet radio application is great - 10000s of stations from all over the world. So is Vradio's free one:

http://europe.nokia.com/explore-services/music-/internet-and-fm-radio/internet-radio

http://www.vradio.org/

- So much more time and money has been successfully invested in producing robust reception quality on mobiles. Why re-invent the wheel with DAB?

- Modern efficient codecs on mobiles: eAAC+, AAC+, MP3. 48kbps Web Black from Brazil sounds great via my N95 hooked up to my car stereo. Respected MP2 that DAB uses wasn't designed for low bitrates. BBC stations in Real format? Wonder why they don't use those newer codecs...

- Who needs RAJAR for estimating audience figures, when mobile internet radio/internet radio gives PRECISE audience figures?

- Handsets are always improving and do many other things. Why buy a single purpose DAB radio, even if it has got a colour display and touch screen. Anything feature you can dream up on a DAB radio could be done with a mobile phone and mobile internet radio. AGAIN: why re-invent the wheel with DAB?

- Data packages are always improving with allowance to allow longer listening times. Some operators won't fine you if you go over - they will cap and send an advisory note. Billshock(TM) could be proposed as a BBC trademark to incite propaganda against mobile internet radio in favour of DAB...

Against DAB

- Why should where we live determine what stations can we get? We live in an internet age which (geo-locking aside) by default doesn't restrict what information we can get depending on where we live. DAB is outdated in this respect with its use of multiplexes. Why, if you live in certain provinces can you only have middle-of-the-road VH1 playlist style bland-woite [sic] -vayn-man-radio advertising carpets and cars and can't get hip, edgy and cool metropolis-based stations? Why should you be patronised by your locale?

- Also, DAB multiplexes exclude smaller, sometimes more innovative, community stations.

- Mud burble sound - because DAB has no error correction. The standard was finalised in the 1990s. CD has error-correction (reed solomon), standard finalised early 1980s. Go figure.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ7

Rob Davis
FAIL

EU camcorder tariff restricting recording time - idiotic - so circumvent with open source firmware

What a shame the single recording length of the camera is limited by the threat of Eurocrats slapping a camcoder tariff - i.e. increasing the cost.

I can't find enough derogatory words to blast them with, but here's a few: idiotic, stupid, futile, dinosaurs, fools...

Won't they realise that there is an inevitable convergence between digital stills cameras and camcorders into the same product? They both use lenses and CCDs. If you can get great stills why not great video with the same lenses. Cuts costs, simplified market, better more flexible lenses.

All I can suggest is that Panasonic go down the route of Canon (with CHDK, the Canon Hacker's Development Kit) - and partially open source the firmware to allow user customisation

Surely this would provide a loophole to circumvent the EU, if the mod was user originated?

Windows XP customers positive but split on Windows 7

Rob Davis
Jobs Halo

One variant of Windows 7, please.

It would be more appealing to me go from XP to Windows 7 if there was only one variant. Not Home, Professional, Ultimate...

This is so unnecessary and confusing to the consumer and increases costs of inventory management at Microsoft.

Having said that I am positive about Windows 7 - I think they got it right this time: faster boot time, improved GUI...

Remember Windows ME? That wasn't well received - and I compare that episode with Vista. So I think Microsoft can bounce back like they did before.

Linux is similar with all its variants, Debian, Ubuntu etc. confusing for the consumer.

Where MacOS X has won is because there are no variants. Keeps it simple.

iTunes swallowed a quarter of US music sales

Rob Davis
WTF?

Re: The record companies are miming

Have I missed a joke or something...

Anonymous Coward Posted Tuesday 18th August 2009 17:22 GMT wrote:

"I was at a music event the other day, there was a DJ, he had the full setup. 2 turntables, big mixer, 2 headphones, he played a 2 hour set, smoothly mixing records on his turntables, queuing up the next record and playing with the sliders."

"He did everything, except for one small thing............ he never changed a record, not once, he just pretended to que the same 2 records over and over again."

Those records were probably timecode vinyls - they are recordings of signals, that when played into a the computer with appropriate software (see below), the position and speed of the track can be calculated to play a audio file on the computer accordingly, thus emulating vinyl.

Using this software and hardware

http://www.native-instruments.com/#/en/products/dj/traktor-pro

or

http://www.scratchlive.net/

"The Apple Laptop on the corner of his turntable was really playing the music, he was just miming being a DJ."

Yup it probably was, but he still had the skill controlling the vinyl.

You'll find this at most music events, bars, clubs.

Am I telling you something you already know? I guess I might have missed something...

As far as iTunes taking more market share - that's progress. Sure saves carrying Vinyl around everywhere. I'm not a fan of iTunes though I have bought tunes from them, DRM and non-DRM. Also from amazon. Guess what? So convenient!

Music has been around long before record companies have. But record companies still have their role: how to position artists, when/where/how to release artists material, choosing the right time. Sure there might be some bad ones, but it is a populist view to slag them off, but all that aggregate knowledge over years of managing several artists has to be useful. Great works by an artist does not automatically sell itself. Sure they want their money, but this is business.

The industry continues to evolve. Selling music is not the only way for artists to make money: merchandise, festivals, concerts, sponsorship, use in adverts, film, television, computer games.

Is Google spending $106.5m to open source a codec?

Rob Davis
Pint

@CODECs shouldn't be patentable

Patenting open source and/or ISO standard code is not necessary a problem as it is up to the patent holders to choose whether they charge, not an obligation. Patents don't automatically protect themselves. They have to be enforced, by choice or necessity.

Commercial companies have managed to sell products containing open source code for a while now: MacOS is based on open source Unix BSD-based Darwin plus their own proprietary user interface, etc., countless TV set-top-boxes, network storage drives - and - now mobile phones, e.g., Android are based on open source Linux, mixed with proprietary components. So it can work.

One wonders why, if the BBC had developed an open source codec back in 2003, that they hadn't developed this to production quality for the iPlayer, avoiding the row over supporting Windows first with a proprietary codec, and at the same time relinquishing their dependence of Real Video.

Perhaps Digital Rights Management absent from the BBC's dirac codec deterred them from adopting it for the iPlayer. Though with the benefit of hindsight, DRM seems to be going out fashion rapidly with iTunes being increasingly free of it for example. Time to revisit the dirac codec, BBC?

Hats off the Google for its latest philanthropy into the open source movement, along with Google Summer of Code and the like. Meanwhile, the other companies go down the old route of technology lock-in, where compatibility is the enemy of competition.

Google jettisons radio broadcasting biz

Rob Davis

Google's radio broadcasting business demise due to its core business - online advertising

Why is radio advertising in decline? Because the money is going to online advertising instead - of which Google is the leader.

So their core business likely reduced the market for their radio venture.

Southampton Uni getting Nehalem supercomputer

Rob Davis
Welcome

Community Computing?

Perhaps they could set up some kind of social enterprise to rent out some spare computing time for the local population, as part of a local Digital Britain initiative.

E.g.

- for local film makers and animators to do rendering and effects quicker than their desktop

- real-time analysis of local data mining to produce some useful mashup applications - any ideas?

- local chess and other game competitions versus the computer

The university and its students could always do more to work with the local community for mutual benefit.

Who knows how this could enhance the local digital media/technology economy?

Apple-apeing Microsoft spins out retail store prototype

Rob Davis
Go

""Get away from you parasite metro-sexual freaks! You! Yes you!"

"Get away from you parasite metro-sexual freaks! You! Yes you!"

How I laughed like a drain when I read this. Thankyou! You cheered me up no end.

Sony preps hi-res Atom N netbook

Rob Davis
Thumb Down

Re: Nexos Enigma - NO 13" MacBookPro with 1440x900

check the apple store

Apple MacBook Pro 15in June 2009 release

Rob Davis
Stop

RE: Can we get our money back?

I'd keep it: if your machine has an ExpressCard interface you won't get this in the newer hardware except for the 17"

Apple punts batterylicious MacBook Pros

Rob Davis
Thumb Down

NO EXPRESSCARD/34 SLOT on 13/15inch models! High speed eSATA for HD video edit not possible

Not having ExpressCard/34 on the 13 and 15 inch models will exclude them from full true 1920x1080P high definition video editing using high-speed 10000+rpm external eSATA hard drive stotage and arrays via a eSATA connector ExpressCard/34 card. Or anything else that would benefit from such high speed storage.

This would have been possible using ProRes422 codec in final cut pro.

I would like to benefit from their smallish size on the move and plug them into a large full HD external monitor for full HD video editing at home.

Only the overgrown 17" supports ExpressCard/34.

Why? How silly of Apple to do this. One can pay for PC laptops of similar price and get this feature.

VERY BAD INDEED.

Maybe the Firewire 800 will work but it is no match for the theoretical maximum of 1.5Gb/s or 3.0Gb/s on eSATA. The ExpressCard interface is 1Gb/s+ so Firewire800 is not exploiting this fully.

In anycase the expansion potention for 13/15 models is limited with ExpressCard absent.

Apple White MacBook Early 2009

Rob Davis
Thumb Down

No ExpressCard expansion, no Firewire 800

These are absent from netbooks on the grounds of cost. But left out in a 700pound-plus regular size laptop such as this?

They are a glaring - and limiting - omission. Particularly for high bus speed audio and video hardware applications and add-ons available for ExpressCard.

Windows 7 'upgrade' doesn't mark XP spot

Rob Davis
Stop

One version "flavour" of Windows 7 please

Did they not learn their lesson of too many confusing variations of Vista?

Why not just one Windows 7 for everyone.

How idiotic.

Pentax K-m entry-level digital SLR

Rob Davis
Thumb Up

@Movie Mode - Alistair

"Seriously, who in their right minds would want movie mode on a DSLR?"

Because the flexiblity of a DSLR gives you the choice of lens to use for your movie - and a very wide choice at that. All kinds of filmic effects are therefore possible. Why be restricted to what you get with a camcorder - though camcorders are good at what they do. It's a bit like the converse of why would anyone want a stills mode on a camcorder. Basically one has the convenience of a 2 on 1 function device with less to carry around. The convergence is inevitable - both systems use CCDs, memory cards, lenses.

Really can't believe the short-sighted, limited and unimaginative comments of readers I've been seen on here and other internet sites and forums.

Why port your Firefox add-on to Internet Explorer?

Rob Davis

@Dr. Mouse

I'm not interested in calling myself a programmer, rather someone who makes things that work.

And I've worked with all of these extensively: ARM Assembler, C, C++ and Java.

Hauppauge myTV Pocket Freeview PMP

Rob Davis
Thumb Down

Record onto SD would be useful

What a tease: a Freeview receiver with an SD card. The tease being the missing link between the two - being able to *record* TV programmes onto SD card so that the device becomes one of the first, if not the first, solid state Personal Video Recorder. And portable too.

Sandisk have the VMate SD/SDHC recorder but it is not portable and is only for analogue video.

Apple MacBook

Rob Davis

17" update?

Apple: where's the update for the 17" MacBookPro?

'World's largest TV' sports super HD resolution

Rob Davis
Go

For infinite definition and 3 dimensional entertainment...

...go and see a show at a theatre.

Roberts Stream 202 DAB/FM/net radio

Rob Davis
Stop

Buy this instead: Revo Pico Wifi

http://www.revo.co.uk/digital-radio/revo-pico-wifi.php

- same price

- mains or battery powered

- splash proof: ok for bathroom, garden etc.

Doesn't do DAB or FM, only internet radio, but theres much more choice and you can get most if not all of the DAB and FM stations online anyway.

Hackintosh maker bites back at Apple

Rob Davis
Go

How you use Mac OS X is up to you (in the EU)

If you buy Mac OS X, then how you use it is up to you.

Sure it's illegal to copy it but you can run it on any hardware you choose. The hardware conditions of the Apple EULA is not enforceable in the EU, apparently - as this commentator suggests:

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/04/14/openmac_advertised_for_39999.html#comment-1048710

Quoted here for convenience

"Oh dear no, not this again!

1) The reason Apple cannot stop anyone installing a retail copy of OSX on anything they want is the same reason Microsoft cannot stop anyone running a retail copy of Office on anything they want. It is also the reason Black and Decker cannot stop you using DIY drills in the way of trade, and the reason why Vauxhall cannot stop you installing after market parts in your old Cavalier, and the reason why Faber and Faber cannot stop you reading the Collected Poems of TS Eliot in the bathroom by making it a condition of sale that you agree not to.

It is because post-sales restrictions on use are not enforceable in the EU. Not by EULA, not by signed document at time of sale, not if you have to dance it to a jig and sing your agreement in Mandarin before leaving the store. You cannot relinquish your statutory rights as a condition of buying a product, and one of them is freedom from post sales restrictions on use. Read those guarantee forms vendors invite you to send in sometime. See that part about your statutory rights not being affected? Think that's there out of the goodness of their hearts? Its not, its there because its the law.

2) And no, you did not just license it, you bought a copy. As when you bought your copy of the Collected Poems. Or you bought that copy of the Rasumovsky Quartet. Or you bought that drill. Calling something a license not a sale does not make it so. If it walks and quacks like a sale, that is what it will be held to be.

3) And come out of your dream world about "OSX is written for the hardware, and consequently it is far more reliable. OSX is basically a hand tailored suit made in Hong Kong whilst windows is a mix clothes from Marks , Oxfam and things left on a bus. Nothing quite fits...."

OSX relates to its perfectly standard though mostly mid range hardware in exactly the same way any other OS does. It uses drivers. You may not be familiar with these things, they are bits of software written mostly by vendors which permit an OS to address the hardware in question. Driver quality is important. But there is no material difference in how any modern OS relates to hardware and drivers. Thinking that OSX has somehow a more intimate relationship to an nVidia graphics card than Windows or Linux is idiotic. And by the way - its not that the OS was written for the peripheral hardware. Its that the drivers were written for the OS.

Or maybe you are thinking of the processors? Cannot be. Surely you do not think that OSX was written for the Core 2 in some different way than Windows or Linux was?

Please wake up there!

In conclusion. The Apple hardware is no better than anyone elses. It is however a more expensive solution to most computing problems, a more unbalanced set of components, and often is crammed into monstrous industrially designed cases. Perforated aluminum must be one of the worse materials ever for floor standing cases. Well, concrete might be a bit worse. The overheating problems with the laptops are legendary. You will mostly find low end or even obsolete graphics cards coupled with the most expensive processors around, mediocre memory, and too little of it, and very middle range disk drives. Power supplies are at best adequate. You'll find, as with the Mini, hardware features, like the ability to carry it around in your coatpocket, that hardly anyone needs, but which cripple performance though they improve appearance in some circles. It is no more and no less a hodgepodge than any other middle range Intel based machines, just rather more expensive, and less well balanced. Maybe its more of a hodgepodge in fact.

Prediction: this will never come to court. Just as MS will never sue someone for running retail copies of Office under Wine, even though the EULA says it has to be run only on Windows. Why? Because they know they would lose. As would Apple. Now whether this particular company can be bullied out of what it is trying? We'll see. Maybe. This stable door was opened in law however when the first retail copy of OSX was put on sale. Too late to close it now."

Sun's JavaFX debuts with familiar cast

Rob Davis
Coat

Eclipse is faster than Netbeans (help me out guys)

I've been developing Java software in Eclipse for a while now. I considered Netbeans this week because there is a GUI application I need to make and I saw that Netbeans has some nifty looking tools to make this easy.

But I found Netbeans to be much slower than Eclipse. So I've abandoned it for now.

My machine is faster enough Pentium D 2.8GHz.

Any thoughts?

Next Debian's 'Lenny' frozen

Rob Davis
Thumb Up

Love Debian - excellent tips at howtoforge.com

and other sites.

In the day job it my work teams intranet and outside of work in my role as IT Manager for a small radio station, it will be running one of our broadcast output loggers.

Easy to install, as easy as Ubuntu.

Also, I like it that there is only one flavour of Debian. With Ubuntu you can have server or desktop - even more decisions after settling on a distro.

Vendor touts PC's Mac OS X compatibility

Rob Davis
Gates Horns

That's why they bought PA Semi

"I am sure Jobs and Co will question the logic of moving to x86..."

Perhaps that's one reason why they bought P.A. Semi -

"designs PWRficient family of 64-bit multicore processors based on POWER design" (from their website), apart from using this company's relatively power efficient technology in their future iPods and iPhones.

Apple are a hardware and software vendor - for them to control most or all of that can make good business sense. Perhaps the x86 line of Apple desktops and notebooks has a limited lifespan, longer term they may switch to P.A. Semi designs. They've successfully switched CPU architectures before - 68000 to PowerPC to Intel x86. So they have that experience to help them should they switch to PA Semi.

Plus they still support PowerPC based MacOX - perhaps they will continue this given that PA Semi designs are POWER based, so that they will be well prepared to switch back.

The legal route of stopping clones may not hold - given that, for example, the EULA license Of MacOS X cannot dictate how an end user uses it. Sure the user can't make illegal copies, but the user cannot be told by Apple what hardware they should run it on - according to this comment:

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/04/14/openmac_advertised_for_39999.html#comment-1048710

How to be an instant Web me-2.0 developer

Rob Davis

JQuery for AJAX?

This should have been included in the AJAX table.

HD TV in the UK

Rob Davis
Paris Hilton

1080p or 720p ?

"HD TV in the UK"

"Time to buy a 1080p telly at last?"

Or maybe just a 720p HD ready TV rather than a full true 1080p HD TV.

I think no-one offers full 1080p HD TV in the UK yet it's all just 720p TV.

Is this still true? The over simplified brochureware on BBC, Freesat websites makes no reference to this crucial detail.

Paris because of the bimbo marketing effort for Freesat, with no effort paid to giving precise details in a form the public demand.

Dissolving the plastic bag problem

Rob Davis
Thumb Up

Open Source Biology and DNA Computing

It's a shame that intellectual property law and patents stifle progress in phages.

Is there a way that development in this field can be Open Source, so there could be an Apache, Linux or GNU of the biological science world?

After all, phages and other viruses are DNA computers.

3 told to cut rates

Rob Davis
Go

VOIP or WiMax to end this oligopoly and its dictatorial pricing schemes?

If/when these really take off perhaps we won't be constrained by the few mobile operators forcing these pricing plans on us.

And perhaps people could start their own operator companies using asterisk.org technology?

BBC's Today Programme shutters message board

Rob Davis
Go

theregister.co.uk comments system to provide expertise to BBC?

Perhaps they should draw on the expertise of theregister.co.uk and its comment system. The comments on articles here are never problematic. But then perhaps this is a niche site that attracts more congenial readers.

Otherwise, consider the mollom.com service.

Royal Navy warships could run on sunflower oil - if fresh

Rob Davis
Alert

www.powerofcommunity.org

www.powerofcommunity.org -peak oil and cuba

Also consider bioterrorism - bacterial weapons used to rot the bio fuel reserves

Bournemouth floats UK's first 100Mbps sewer broadband network

Rob Davis
Joke

Internet from the sewers - wasn't it filthy enough already?

So we have sewers to take away our filthy stuff but now the internet comes from there to bring it all back up.

Blu-ray 0, SDHC card 1, THX Chief Scientist predicts

Rob Davis
Thumb Up

Ideal for increasing no. of dwellers in uncluttered tiny flats constantly on the move

I couldn't care less about packaging and artwork because as the cliche goes: life is about collecting experiences - not things. To quote the late Michael Hutchence in an early 80s INXS song: "everything is nothing when you're dead"

I don't want to *collect* things that I might only watch once. I've never seen the point of cluttering my place by building up a movie collection. It's too much visual noise to look at in my home. I must admit I'm not a huge movie fan. But I'd pay a similar amount to just watch it at the cinema.

I want to be nimble, to move around, chase the work and the fun. So I don't want baggage to concern with. It also means travelling on trains so the SDHC solution is ideal for watching on a mobile meanwhile. That way lost minutes traveling are made useful again.

I think Blu-ray still has appeal though - for long term data storage and backup with the convenience of exceeding the DVD 4.7/8Gb limit. Precious data on a SDHC card is unnervingly ephemeral and transient.

What I want to know is when are Digital TV/DTT/DVB-T/Freeview set-top box makers going to bring out a Freeview PVR video recorder that uses removable SDHC cards instead of a hard disc? (sure there SanDisk's Vmate but this is analogue video input not digital TV reception)

That way you can watch programmes recorded on your mobile during your commute. There is a market window opportunity for this right now - while its early days for iPlayer/Kangeroo on mobile due to data rates, cost and widespread handset capability. See my thread on this here: http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=649714

DAB: A very British failure

Rob Davis

Internet radio on mobile is best for choice, sound quality, better value and smaller stations

By coincidence I wrote an article a few days before this on our local community radio station site that I run.

In summary radio on internet enabled mobiles is the future, with a widening choice of very capable mobiles together with falling mobile data costs, the all-in-one value of a mobile, improving user interfaces (touchscreen), portability receivable anywhere there is a 3G signal, not just tied to a local region.

http://skyline.fm/content/digital-radio-and-mobile-internet-why-dab-may-not-be-answer

Microsoft! bids! $44.6bn! for! Yahoo!

Rob Davis
Thumb Down

Bad news for yahoo-owned flickr.com and del.icio.us?

Yahoo own Flickr - one of the best photo sharing websites used by pro photographers and the rest of us. Acclaimed for its no-fuss minimalist ease of use of its many features. Yahoo also own del.icio.us is a versatile website bookmarking/favouriting tool, again winning on ease of use and simplicity.

I would hope that these invaluable tools are not affected by an acquisition. Microsoft may try to promote uptake of its own proprietary technologies by introducing them into these tools. And that would restrict how they can be used. Compatibility is the enemy of competition and using proprietary technology as a safeguard to profits is an outdated idea. Google have had phenomenal success without needing this approach.

Nokia wins hearts, minds with breakthrough mobile

Rob Davis

Nokia 5500 Sport is a great alternative still in production I believe

I would recommend the Nokia 5500 / Nokia 5500 Sport (same phone but with different accessories).

This phone is robust, compact, has a good standby time but yet sports Symbian Series 60 edition 3, has micro SD card support up to 2Gb, a basic camera and a built in torch.

Colour screen. Multi-format music player, extendable for more exotic or rarer formats using coreplayer.com

With sports applications to motivate.

A great reliable practical robust reasonably compact phone.

IBM hopes open office is Symphony to your key-tapping fingers

Rob Davis

Lotus Jokes

Lotus Notes was described diplomatically by an IT Support worker at my previous workplace as "not having many fans."

It is a truly awful program: look-and-feel inconsistent with other applications, awkward user interface - for example its non-proportionate scroll-bars, pointless adjustable dividers and difficult to use on at other site locations because of the many incomprehensible set-up questions.

Samsung iPhone rival to hit UK in November

Rob Davis

Why is something always missing? (WiFi)

I would expect a Mark II of this 'phone to include WiFi, based on one of the newer programmable radio chipsets that would support Bluetooth and wireless USB with on-the-go.

Boots, House of Fraser not renewing IT director posts

Rob Davis

You would say that...

...as an IT magazine you want to big up your industry.

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