I managed to score an Electric Picnic ticket. Three days of bands, camping and craziness starting on the 1st of September. Highlights for me are Massive Attack, Mogwai, Groove Armada, New Order, Bloc Party, Belle & Sebastian, Super Furry Animals, Broken Social Scene, Basement Jaxx, Pet Shop Boys and The Blue Nile.
Should be a blast. Give me a yell if you are heading that way.
It’s easy creating a small fortune. Start with a big fortune and spend most of it…
(Adapted from The Hardest Way To Make An Easy Living by The Streets. That line always make me laugh.)
Redemption Song by Bob Marley is being played in the company canteen. So cool.
* What a classic.
Ed makes a good point on my list of attention sucking silos:
Apple, iTunes and his Nano are all potentially-connected segments of the same silo
Semi-ideally*, Ed is right. Apple is the silo and Apple is all knowing of my Apple.com, Apple Store, iTunes and nano silos.
But who here has worked in a large company with large databases spread across a large range of concepts? Ten to one the arse of Apple doesn’t know what the head of Apple has stored on me. Ten to one there is not a central Apple identity and attention server that aggregates all my Apple activites. I’ll bet my iTunes attention data is separate to my Apple Store attention data. They are probably running different systems in there with no linkage.
I don’t even need to go into Apple HQ to know this. My nano and my iTunes’ silos are already broken. I use last.fm and think it is a wonderful service. Before I got my nano I played 90% of my daily music on my laptop. That 90% was reported through iTunes to last.fm. However I now have a nano and that “what music has Paul played today” link has been broken. When I jack my nano into my laptop every evening iTunes does not suck down the play data and send it onto last.fm**. I actually cannot see what iTunes does with my nano data.
Another example is iTunes and the music I have bought elsewhere. I’ve ripped all my “physical” CDs into iTunes yet when I go to the Apple Music Store and check out the “recommended” lists I will often find recommendations to albums I already own. iTunes and the Apple Music Store are not communicating. They have all this play and asset data on me yet fail to link it all up.
So while they may conceptually be segmented areas of one mega-silo they are effectively separate silos.
* I say semi because ideally my “Apple” silo wouldn’t be one. Currently there is a silo there though and if it has to remain then ideally it should not be segmented.
** Technically there are plug-ins for iTunes that link your iPod to your last.fm account. I have tried at least three and could not get them to work. Considering I am a developer you’d think I could figure it out.
A Tuesday list because I left my iPod at home yesterday.
I have some serious gaps in my music collection but have thankfully plugged it a bit by getting The Greatest Hits by Fatboy Slim. Naturally I have heard of Slim and even enjoyed much of his work but have never owned a Slim album. Scorn hit compilations all you want but they can be very useful in catching up on an artist. This one proves to not only be useful but also damned good. Most of the Slim tracks you know (Rockafeller Skank, Right Here, Right Now, Gangsta Tripping) plus a few I didn’t (Santa Cruz, Slash Dot Dash).
The bonus DVD is also quite nice. It includes an hilarious fan-made video featuring kittens.
So, well recommended if you don’t have Fatboy Slim albums already.
* This song makes me want to kill myself. Horrid.
How crazy-wonderful is this. I’ll be in Wales from the 23rd to the 26th of this month. On the 25th The Eagles are playing in Cardiff and on the 27th Bob Dylan is also in Cardiff.
I’ll definitley make The Eagles concert but will have to invent a teleporter to make Bob Dylan as it is the SOs birthday on the 26th back here in Ireland. It is The Eagles last tour but hopefully Bob will be up for another one.
Still. Two legends of music within two days of each other and not far from here. The Northern Hemisphere has its perks.
* Seriously, Nicole Kidman. It is from the Moulin Rouge soundtrack. Lovely song.
** I am starting to like Snow Patrol more. Still not a band that sticks out though.
Daily bits...