Matt Jones

Archive for September, 2004

Tom Waits on Letterman

Quicktime Movies, hosted at looptvandfilm.com:

Update [24/10/04]: If the above links aren’t working, tomwaitsfan.com is also hosting the clips:

HAL: Home Automated Living

HAL: Home Automated Living
Open the curtains, HALI’m afraid I cannot allow that to happen

HAL 9000 For Sale

HAL 9000 For Sale

The Universe Within

The Universe Within
via v-2

The Real Purpose of the Google Toolbar

The speculation that Google is going to introduce a Mozilla-based browser to rival IE is interesting considering they’ve seemingly ignored Mozilla users with their IE-only Google Toolbar. The Toolbar, being IE’s only redeeming feature, seems responsible for many wouldbe upgraders sticking with an otherwise buggy, spyware prone piece of software.

Mozilla is a platform designed so that third party developers can create extensions for it. Google could have created a Toolbar for it easily and kept Mozilla/Google fans happy and the fact that they haven’t done this has puzzled me for a long time. Now I realise that Mozilla support for the Toolbar wasn’t really a priority for Google; there’s something far more important they’re working towards.

With the release of a Google browser looking likely, maybe the Toolbar has been part of a long-term strategy to aid web users’ transition to the Google Browser. Imagine what effect a simple ‘Upgrade my browser’ button would have if it were to be prominently positioned on every IE window.

Like a Trojan Horse, the Google Toolbar has found its way into the core of IE. Maybe soon it will deliver its fatal blow.

Space Probes feel Cosmic Tug of Bizarre Forces

Space Probes feel Cosmic Tug of Bizarre Forces
It’s an alien deep-space tractor beam of course!

Skull and Bones

(Realaudio Stream) Skull and Bones
Radio 4 Programme about the secret society to which Bush & Kerry belong

First direct image of a planet orbiting another star

First direct image of a planet orbiting another star

Xlab on the iTunes Affiliate Scheme

Xlab on the iTunes Affiliate Scheme

Engineer Builds Robot that Walks on Water

Engineer Builds Robot that Walks on Water
The Second Coming?

Beeb article on Wikipedia

Beeb article on Wikipedia

The SHGb02+14a Debacle

SHGb02+14a is the unexplained signal from space detected by the Seti@Home project. It was New Scientist that had the story, quoting Dan Werthimer – chief scientist for the project – as saying ‘It’s the most interesting signal from SETI@home. We’re not jumping up and down, but we are continuing to observe it’. The article suggested general excitement with a hint of skepticism among the scientists involved.

It’s strange then that David Whitehouse, in a report for BBC Online quoted Werthimer as saying ‘It’s all hype and noise. We have nothing that is unusual. It’s all out of proportion’. There’s also this piece on the Planetary Society site which suggests that New Scientist is to blame for exaggerating the issue. Remind me to never visit the New Scientist site for accurate and balanced reports on science and technology.

The range of facial expressions needed to become a successfu

The range of facial expressions needed to become a successful Table Tennis player
via Kottke

Original J reg Proton in Samurai Silver, with Spoiler

Original J reg Proton in Samurai Silver, with Spoiler

iTunes Affiliate Programme

iTunes Affiliate Programme
This is going to be popular with webloggers. Should work nicely with tools like Kung-Tunes or Recent Tunes

Pictures from The Surface of Whitley Bay

Or wherever my travels take me.

I bought a digital camera a few weeks ago; the first time I’ve bought one that doesn’t sacrifice image quality for sheer novelty factor. It’s a refurbished Digital IXUS II from the Canon Outlet Store on eBay (highly recommended if you’re after a bargain digital compact).

So with a new means of taking pictures and a returned interest in photography (after having studied the subject for three years!), I’ve resurrected frownland.com to be a photo log (heavily inspired by Heather Champ and hchamp.com)

I decided to use Folderblog to power it, for the ease with which it can be set up and the fact that it doesn’t use MySQL which my web server seems to struggle with just slightly. I had to hack it a bit to provide user friendly URLs and I’m still working on getting the template right. Also, I may add an RSS/Atom feed if I get round to it.