Is everything alright North West Tonight?

What happened to the studio? The lights, the blue/green screen, the snazzy backdrops and multiple camera angles?
Have I missed something here? Is it the start of a new, no frills BBC?

The presenter of North West Tonight sat in front of a white wall with a projector screen showing faded images over his shoulder. A member of the production team cast their shadow over to the side of the make-shift set.

So what was wrong with the news room?

Maybe it will be revealed in tomorrows news.

One Hundred and Sixty Gigabytes

Let me say it again, (as I can't quite believe it myself yet!), 160gb!


Well I've seen the new iPod line up over on www.apple.com and to be honest, I'm as excited about iPod Touch as I am about my Nokia without its sim card. What does catch my eye however, is the iPod 'Classic'.


I was looking at mp3 players a few weeks ago and Apple stood out from the crowd with its ground breaking 80gb player, there was little competition. I was amazed at how many expensive devices
are still limited to less than 10gb.


But now the 80gb is the base model in the 'Classic' range! 160gb is the top spec. My Windows 3.1 computer used to have a 500mb hard drive! I can't even remember how much space was on our old Amstrad, but I'm pretty sure it was measured in kb.


So do we really need all this space?


Yes!


Each week I find myself downloading more podcasts and vodcasts, usually I'm listening to speech in excess of half an hour, some of which is put together using bad encoders leading to even more exaggerated file sizes. All of this means that I am rapidly approaching the 10gb limit of many mp3 players, and likely to exceed at least 50gb by this time next year.


And yes, I do listen to the files more than once!


The iPod's search feature allows users to search for files on the topics they are interested in hearing about, and as I build up my podcast collection, it becomes increasingly encyclopaedic and therefore relevant in more and more places - it makes sense to make it mobile.


All of this leaves me wondering though, why am I still seeing PDA's with a mere 64meg memory? I know the issues of cost and battery, but I'd be happy with a device that's an extra 5mm thick, and even a 10gb PDA would allow me to store large PDF library's and of course multimedia files.


Come on people, sub 10gb devices are older than Granny Smith! Learn from Apple!

Train Gain

I'm writing this entry while sitting on the 1030 Merseyrail service from Ormskirk to Liverpool. It's now 10.45 and we're just leaving Maghull.

I travel on public transport regularly, and it amazes me how little it takes to make a journey more enjoyable. A smile from the conductor, friendly small talk with other passengers, an interesting view from the windows. But so often, nobody smiles or talks, the passengers are all too preoccupied with avoiding eye contact with each other, scared that they might offend or invade somebodys privacy. Everyone seems to be trapped in a Bubble of personal thought between the ear buds of their iPod, only accessible via SMS.

How much more interesting would it be if we all talked to each other? How much could we learn?

So as we pull into Walton station, I ponder these thoughts, while my fellow commuters think of how things used to be in times past, and look in disgust at that antisocial lad whose been typing on his smartphone since Maghull!

I guess it's all about perspective!

Frosty

Welcome to Frosty's Weblog

This is my first weblog entry! I hope that in the future I'll post some interesting and inspiring articles on many subjects!
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Frosty