A freelance writer’s online musings
Calvin posted this on Aug 13th 2008 under Blog, Computing, Internet, Whimsy
Thanks to Walter at Sxoop for highlighting this priceless flow chart of chit chat with a web designer via Twitter.
Sums it up nicely really. I’m a writer, not a designer, but as soon as anyone finds out I do some website stuff… or I’m in any way involved in internet related work, this is almost invariably the way the conversation pans out!
Does this resonate with anyone else out there?
Calvin posted this on Jul 3rd 2008 under Children, Computing, Education, Evening Echo Column, Internet, Parenting, Technology
Published in the Wow! supplement of The Evening Echo
Technology does a lot of things to make our lives easier. Every day we use our mobile phones, our computers, ATMs, credit card machines, POS systems (or computerised “tills” to you and me) digital television systems that automatically record the programmes we like… without tapes. The list goes on and on and on, and everything is talking to everything else over myriad global communications networks.
(image by Homer Township Public Library)
If you think about it for too long your brain starts to sizzle gently in your cranium… but that’s okay, because you tend not to. Most of us aren’t that interested in how it all works… we’re just happy that it does, because all of this digital wizardry makes our our lives just a little bit easier, allowing us to squeeze more into our busy lives. There are times though, when technology makes life harder, and that can be especially true for parents.
Why? Because technology is everywhere and our children are often better at using it, and embrace it more readily than we do. Mobile phones and the internet are obvious examples… while many parents struggle to understand them, to the children of today they’ve become practically second nature. That’s worrying on lots of levels – but mostly because it means we’re incapable of keeping up with them… let alone keeping track of them.
Calvin posted this on May 29th 2008 under Children, Computing, Evening Echo Column, Internet, Parenting
Published in the Evening Echo, 28/05/08
We have a computer in the corner of the living room. It sits there innocuously, switched off for most of its life. This is the family PC – which really means the kids PC, as both of us grown ups have our own laptops these days. It sees only occasional use – but as the kids get older they’re using it more and more.
Computers are an essential part of children’s lives today. Acquiring mouse and keyboard skills are as crucial to them as learning to wield a pencil, perhaps more so. When I was born computers were about the size of the local library and cost as much as a house. By the time I was 11 they’d made it into the home – but although I was a zealous advocate at the time, the truth is they were pretty useless; the ZX Spectrum, Commadore 64 and BBC Micro with their 64K of RAM and games and programmes saved on audio tape. They were less powerful and of much less utility than the average mobile phone today.
Things have developed so quickly over the last couple of decades that, if you had time to stop and think about it, it would make your head spin. Computers have become so ingrained into our lives that our perception of them is fundamentally shifting: they are no longer “technology”, they’re as much part of the furniture as the living room sofa.
What amazes me is how readily children take to computers. Skills that can take adults years to master are absorbed in a matter of minutes. They find things intuitively – click, double click, windows, files – they just “get it” on a level that adults rarely grasp. We learn this stuff… they just seem to feel it. It’s astonishing to watch.
Calvin posted this on Mar 17th 2008 under Business, Career Moves Column, Computing, Internet, Technology
“Working it” column published in the Career Moves section of The Evening Echo on 17/03/2008
I’ve started using LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com) a sort of grown-up social network for business contacts. It’s kind of like the business world’s equivalent to Facebook and MySpace, but it’s serious stuff – no Vampires, no throwing sheep, no movie quizzes and no posting embarrassing photos of your friends for all the world to see. LinkedIn may be an online social network, but it’s all strictly above board.
The reason I mention it is that, though I’ve had the account for quite a while, I only started to use it last week. I uploaded by e-mail address book into it and hey presto, it found loads of people in my contact list who were also on LinkedIn. Great… I invited the ones I actually knew to connect to my network. Some of them even accepted. Wonderful. I looked at my profile. There was nothing in it.
I needed to dig out what I’d been doing over the years, and when… now, where was I going to find that sort of information? Certainly not in the sieve like contraption that serves as my memory. Oh yes… it would be on my CV: that long neglected document languishing somewhere in the bowels of my hard drive.
Calvin posted this on Mar 12th 2008 under Business, Computing, Digital Marketing, Internet, Technology, mobile
I’ve just posted a piece about “Reality Mining” on my digital marketing blog. From a marketing perspective it opens up all sorts of options. From a consumer and privacy point of view, I don’t know….
I’m not really comfortable with the concept that my phone will be better than my friends and family at diagnosing depression.
How about the fact that using data from your mobile analysts will be able to predict exactly who you’re going to meet, and even on which day of the week you’re going to meet them.
Yikes!
Calvin posted this on Dec 4th 2007 under Business, Computing, Reviews, Technology, Time management
At the IT@Cork Technology in Business conference last week, a fantastic day was rounded off perfectly when my name was drawn at the end-of-conference drinks reception and I walked away the proud new owner of a HP iPAQ Voice Messenger Smartphone.
The HP iPAQ 514 voice messenger — so much more than just a phone
First impressions are great — it crams a fully functional Windows Mobile 6.0 pocket PC into a package that’s no bigger than your average mobile phone, and with WiFi and Bluetooth onboard, VoIP capability, and support for push e-mail, POP3 and IMAP it’s got everything you need stay productive on the road.
I’ll post a more detailed review when I’ve had chance to play with it — but up to now I’m delighted with it. I was thinking of upgrading my clunky old Nokia anyway — and this, as they say, will do nicely.
Calvin posted this on Dec 3rd 2007 under Business, Career Moves Column, Computing, Technology, Writing
"Working it" column published in the Career Moves section of The Evening Echo on 03/12/2007
You have to feel a bit sorry for the word “Innovate”. I mean, there it was, quietly minding it’s own business, sitting between innocuous and innuendo in the dictionary, when suddenly it was plucked from obscurity and elevated to a position of overnight celebrity.
Now it finds itself rolling glibly from the lips of silver-tongued politicians, plastered across the pages of the world’s media and evangelised by important individuals like guru’s and the people in think-tanks. Innovation is the Jade Goody of the lexicon – only with more substance. Not long ago you hardly ever heard anything about it, now all of a sudden you can’t escape it.
Calvin posted this on Nov 21st 2007 under Computing, Reviews, Technology
Apple’s new iPod Touch is a phenomenal piece of design. Sleek, sexy and so cool it hurts, this is perhaps the most desirable tech gadget on the market in Ireland this Christmas (with the possible exception of its feature rich sibling, the much-hyped iPhone), and by and large it delivers in spades.
The iPod Touch — has a digital media player revolution begun?
That said, I have several issues with the iPod — not least of which is the fact that you’re tied in to proprietary media formats, and are forced to download Apple’s proprietary software before you can even use the device. Despite a few shortcomings, however, the Touch is a remarkably accomplished piece of kit.
The worst thing about the one I’m reviewing is the fact that I have to give it back to Apple when I’m done!
Product Reviewed: Apple iPod Touch 16GB
Also Available: Apple iPod Touch 8GB
| Feature | Rating |
| Music | 8/10 |
| Video | 8/10 |
| Navigation/Controls | 10/10 |
| Features | 7/10 |
| Software (PC) | 5/10 (not bundled) |
| Ease of use | 10/10 |
| Overall | 8/10 — Highly Recommended |
Calvin posted this on Oct 9th 2007 under Business, Computing, Internet
I’ve just got off the phone with our local fixed wireless broadband provider Rapid Broadband. They’ve been given permission, apparently to relay a signal from a premises up the road — which means, all being well, that I could have a 1Mbit/second broadband connection up and running in the next two to three weeks.
Finally I can get out of the dialup doldrums and see what all this Web 2.0 fuss is all about. It also means I’ll be able to work effectively both up in the home-office and down in the house… and that my wife won’t have to steal my computer to write lengthy e-mails to her friends.
So, fingers, and everything else, crossed….
Calvin posted this on Oct 1st 2007 under Business, Career Moves Column, Computing, Internet, Technology
Published in the Career Moves section of the Evening Echo on 01/10/2007
In our parents day, encountering SPAM at work meant that you had some dodgy looking pink luncheon meat on your sandwiches. While the SPAM of the day may well have been unpalatable, at least it served a purpose. Today’s endless barrage of electronic spam, by contrast, is of no discernible benefit to the person receiving it whatsoever.
In short it is unwanted, unwelcome, unhelpful, and it’s costing Irish businesses a not-so-small fortune.
What has all this got to do with recruitment, careers and so forth, I hear you ask? Plenty. It affects your efficiency at work, and it costs the company you work for money. How much spam arrived in your company e-mail account inbox this morning? If none did, rest assured you’re in the minority, and guaranteed that you’re not receiving it because your company has invested time, energy and expense to filter it out behind the scenes.
What about the CV you so diligently crafted and sent out to all those recruitment agencies? Did it actually arrive or is it sitting in an overzealous spam filter, unopened and unread?
As more of our communication at home and at work takes place through electronic media, spam is becoming more and more of a problem – and impacting more of us than ever before.
