Technology and Social Responsbility

Yesterday saw the change in penalty in the UK for driving while on a mobile phone.
This will doubtless cause a surge in the sales of various handsfree kits, bluetooth headsets etc.
Cue collective hand-rubbing of technology providers.

It struck me that there is a far better solution to this. If every mobile manufacturer used the same connector then car manufacturers could start to have built-in hands free without having to worry about what phone their customers might have. Obviously, some high-end cars already have Bluetooth etc, but for the cost of a simple connector and a microphone, every new car could be built with the capability of providing safe, hands-free driving. The world would be a safer place, etc etc.

Of course, if you start down that road, then you might as well start to campaign for speed limiting of cars too. That might stop a good few accidents too, but just like mobile phone connector convergence, won't happen for a long time, if ever.

CSS Tinkering

Inspired by the ongoing CSS travails of ManicMorFF, I decided to try a little CSS tinkering with the blog template tonight. Not everyone's idea of a quiet Froday night in, I grant you, but I find it all strangely relaxing. But only if it works, if it doesn't work I become an incandescent ball of rage and bile.* Obviously, you would have a good argument with regards to the fruitlessness of this tinkering (especially when I have some other things I should be getting on with), but hey, some people have long baths or watch TV, I do this. Thing is, its good just how to learn things for the sake of learning them, you never know when it might come in handy. Although, you're right, I could pick something slightly more likey to come up in the normal course of a life.

So, what do we have for these efforts? Well, we have DropCaps that can be used to start each post and the little pull quote thing you can see above. Quite neat if that's what floats your boat. These things and much more can be found at this excellent CSS techniques list.

Next week, I will have a go at writing Chuckie Egg entirely in client-side Javascript. Well, if I don't, who else will?

Website of the day:
Animals swearing, does it get any better than that? Thanks to WDG for sending it over.

Track of the day:
Can I just say , the so-called Shuffle mode of Windows Media Player is ABSOLUTELY RUBBISH. I now have 9200+ tracks to choose from and it just picked the same song twice within the space of 3 songs. That's pants. Anyway, I did enjoy One More Robot by The Flaming Lips tonight. With a special mention to Topaz by the B'52's, aaah, 1990.


* I'm not really that bad but what is the point of pull quotes if you can't allow tabloid sensationalism to creep in?

Photo Blog #3

Not done a photo blog post for a while. The dark and dreary Scottish winter tends to keep the camera in its bag. Anyway, it emerged into a lovely weekend in the West. There is a large selection of the shots from that weekend on MorgueFile. Here is a smaller taster, all are links for download etc...

The Emperor's New Vocabulary

Many years ago, I attended a conference in Amsterdam. I knew one of the people presenting so, a week or so before I warned him that I didn't want his presentation to feature of the words 'leverage' or 'synergy'. When the day arrived, before he started, he got me to stand up in front of the assembled throng and declared that his presentation wouldn't feature these words as I had banned them. Muted chuckling. Little did I know that EVERY senior manager who stood up thereafter had used these words in their slides and apologised each time.
Thus started my limited and ultimately fruitless campaign for plain English in business. Things have gone from bad to worse and now leveraging synergies seems wonderfully prosaic.
That said, the point of this post is not necessarily about the direct abuse of language, but lets start with that anyway.

GuffSpeak
Clearly, there is much to despise. I rue the day when "we'll take it offline" replaced "I'll talk to you later". Why oh why are people "across" things now? What on earth does "Yes, I'm across that piece". Piece! Where did that come from? "Space" was bad enough. "Yes, I'm working in the internet space." Obfuscation space would be nearer the truth.
There are many more examples and doubtless far greater commentaries on this available elsewhere, so I'm not going to get all listy for the sake of it. We all know what I'm talking about.

Conforming
One of the most horrifying things about this newspeak garbage is that we all get sucked in (yes, even me). I'm find myself saying these things and have internal shrieks of contrition. No one ever says "What the be-jesus does 'take it offline' mean? I'm not online, I'm sitting at a desk, you twonk." No, we go along with it, join in to conform. Why not, its probably not worth the hassle.

NumptySpeak
And finally I'll get to my point. I have a feeling that all this newspeak nonsense is a way that otherwise stupid and content free people can make themselves sound inciteful and intelligent. Somehow avoiding obvious phrases and using these new forms of business mumbo-jumbo gives people a whole different aura. "Listen to me, I talk like a highly paid consultant, I have value, don't I, well, don't I?".

I am reminded of some media training I did long time ago. The theory was that, when doing an interview, you think of it as crossing a river and you only ever talk about the 'islands' in the river. So, whatever the question, just go to the nearest island to the question and start talking. I've tried it. It works.
I think these new phrases have become vocabulary islands. Things to say when useful content isn't available but some form of response seems necessary. Rather than uhm-ing and aah-ing, you can fill air time with some meaningless drivel that at least sounds clever. Its a veneer to impress/convince, nothing more.

As as aside, there is also much fun to had with this. Myself and Dame Judy Rubberbun* once went into such a numpty meeting having made up the word 'revantor' (sic) allegedly meaning a member of staff currently earning money/revenue from a customer. We used it. No one blinked. We heard a rumour that others had started to use it too. Fact is, the dumb ones usually think they don't know what it means so say nothing. Try it, make up some words, its a hoot.

There are other non-verbal meeting islands to look out for in numpty meetings too. Watch out for people who take copious notes but say nothing. Note taking makes them feel like that are taking part in the meeting. Also, ticking things of lists as the meeting progresses, that's a great one also.

I'm not saying that everyone who uses these phrases is useless. The main problem is that the long grass of language provides useful camouflage for the numpty and, for that alone, I deplore it. Listen carefully in meetings. You'll hear it. You'll see who they are. You'll despise them. (If you don't already).

That's me been across my piece of my Internet space tonight and I've achieved it within the target timeframe. Shame I wasn't revanating.

* Yes, I know, private jokes aren't clever, but he has no web footprint at all to point at, I know, I ask you...

Unintelligent Design

I'm an atheist. Its not something I generally shout or pontificate about, atheists tend not to, as pointed out by Richard Dawkins in the marvellous The God Delusion.
I'm not here (yet) to go off an any particular anti-religious rant, I just felt the urge to point out something that occured to me recently. Evolution has done some pretty daft things. Which made me think that the whole counter argument of Intelligent Design makes even less sense (if that was possible). You see, some designs are simply 'unintelligent'.
No, before I go any further, I must apologise to all those who have doubtless pointed this out before. But it was on my mind so I going to have my own go at it. What else are blogs for?

Example 1
The thing that triggered this was, strangely, Happy Feet. I saw this shortly after I had revisited the plight of the penguins in the unerringly excellent Planet Earth. Sitting in the cinema, it gives you more than enough time to contemplate quite what a ridiculous ordeal those poor bugger penguins have to go through. -40C, howling snow storms, standing on ice, no food, standing perfectly still for the whole winter, in the dark. No TV. That doesn't strike me as particularly intelligent design. Lets face is, there are LOTS of other places on earth to have a go at that. Nicer places, with fish, sun, maybe some earth. If you were going to go about things 'intellgently' you just wouldn't come up with nonsense like that.

Example 2
"OK guys, here's the deal, we're going to make you one of the sea's biggest and best predators."
"Nice, luvin' it, luvin' it."
"You're really big, large row of teeth, huge brain, biggest on the planet and a really cool sonar thing."
"SCORE, we are rockin'..what are we called?"
"Eh...you're a whale, a Sperm Whale."
"Nice, right, thanks we're off..."
"Eh...hang on...one thing..."
"Yeah, what?"
"Eh...the stuff you eat is REALLY deep in the sea."
"Yeah, whatever, so..."
"And you can only breath air."
"What?"
"You can only breath air."
"You we heard."
"Do we get lights?"

The this doesn't make much sense as a design either. There hardly seems a point to put an air breathing mammal in the sea (any of them). I can't see who you would ever sit down and think, "We'll have lots of big sea guys, but lets make it really hard for them and make them breathe air." Wouldn't happen. I've seen some people do some pretty dumb designs in my time, but nothing as dumb as that.

Example 3
The Magicicada. Wait 17 years, fly about a bit. Die. Genius.

But that is the beauty of evolution. It matters not a jot whether not it is intelligent, it just matters if it works and, crucially, works better than the other creatures trying to survive doing roughly the same thing.

It is the inherent randomness in the genetic variation that can produce animals that are forced to endure quite ridiculous circumstances, not because it makes sense, just because it works, they survive.

This is obviously just a glib argument based on the nuances of the word 'intelligent', but you simply have to rejoice in the wonderful, inherent randomness of it all.

But you also have to give all your sympathies to the myriad of creatures whose 'designs' were even worse and meant they didn't survive. What on earth could have been going on with them?

The Unexpected Attractiveness of Random Broadcast Media

Driving home tonight listening to XFM we were pleased to hear the sudden appearance of This Charming Man by The Smiths. Clearly, a classic, but not often heard on the radio. Silence fell in the car, all talking stopped and, after a brief moment of listening, we sang along for all we were worth. ( until Heather Suttie talked over the end and then cut off the last bit, sheesh. )
The thing is, I could listen that song any time I wanted, I have the MP3 on my phone. But for some reason, because it appeared randomly on the radio, it was all the more welcome.
I've noticed this often over the years when a radio station manages to play something half decent for a change.
The same applies to TV. I will often be delighted to see a film* appear in the regular schedules and make sure to watch it, even though:

• I will have seen it umpteen times before
• I own it on DVD

This often still applies when I have to sit through all the adverts, I don't just put the DVD on and watch it at the same time, I watch the broadcast version.

Maybe its just me. Am I odd? Let the nation decide...

* usually Apollo 13

Miniature Music

It wasn't one of the most exciting things I have ever done, but I have just about finished ripping all my CDs onto hard drive. Something close to 40GB of the stuff. It took a long time but it has been worth it for a whole number of reasons.

Firstly, and unexpectedly, it has allowed me to rediscover hitherto undiscovered gems hidden in the collection. Sticking the whole lot on shuffle is even more fun that it ever was.

Secondly, I have freed up a LOT of space in the living room. Two cupboards are going and will be replaced by a small, metal box the size of a small, metal box. And the attic will have gained a few large boxes of CDs. Next, I need to get one of these and I'll be flying (until such time it'll be me and Sennheisers at the laptop).

It does make you think though. If you can reduce that much furniture to a small box. You can surely reduce an entire record shop to a kiosk or whole in the wall. No doubt someone, somewhere is already thinking about this. You can get an album at 192kbps easily into 128MB and a 128MB USB pen drive costs about hee-haw these days. So, why not pitch up at a machine, stick in your pen drive, stick in your debit card and walk off with any album you want? Its not as if this is some space age fantasy from the Jetsons, its all very possible now. Which makes you think there must be a strong commercial imperative not to do it. Obviously, you could argue that this is just a slightly less elegant solution to what can be acheived by downloading and that is, in many ways, true. And companies clearly want the cross-sell/window shopping aspect of retail space. But why not the best of both and have a 'download kiosk' in the shop itself?

Obviously, you can't ignore the tactile pleasure of buying a thing. Not that CD's have ever got anywhere near buying vinyl.

This also leads on to another digital media concern. I have 40GB of music on my hard-drive. If my hard-drive went phut, I would be annoyed but I could retrieve it all again from the attic (or my backup). But what if I have 40GB of downloads that all go south and I haven't backed up? I may have missed something but this is something that I don't think the ever-increasing downloads industry has addressed. Perhaps one way round this (other than telling people to back-up more) would be to have a download service that remembers what you have bought so that you have the right to download it again for nothing. Does that exist? If it doesn't it should. Obviously, it wildly open to abuse so that's probably why it doesn't exist.

One day I'll start one of these posts with a little more of a coherent point. Maybe not.

Turner Prize Nomination

Many silly, pointless things get nominated for the Turner Prize.
I think art should be a thing of beauty, something that affects you emotionally, fills you with awe and wonder.

Therefore, I'd like to nominate Denis Bergkamp's goal against Argentina in the 1998 World Cup. Maybe I'd need to get it played on a loop on a large screen in an empty room, but here it is in dodgy video (doesn't do it justice) on YouTube. This is art, this is beauty. Amazing.



Now don't you try and tell me anything Tracy Emin has EVER done is even vaguely that good.

Ants Are Not Pants - Success in a Process Free World

Have you ever sat and watched ants at work? Its fascinating. Drop a small pile of sugar. Word soon gets round. Then they all appear, forming nice ordered lines, one in , one out, until all the sugar is gone. But that's an easy task.
They can build enormous colonies, complex air-conditioned structures. They feed massive nurseries, fill larders, defend themselves against constant onslaught from things with long tongues. Hugely successful, collaborative, co-operative environments made up of thousands of individuals with a clear and common purpose.
What is more remarkable is that all this is achieved with none of the things that we would need to get even close to achieving something as varied or complex.
They have no language to speak of, a little dance, the odd chemical trail but nothing too funky. All this processed with brain the size of this full-stop .



"Darren sets out on his quest for CMM Level 5"


What's worse, they have no written processes, no Mission Statement, no quality manuals, documentation, reviewers, signatories, counter-signatories and, unbelievably, no single form has ever been found filled in anywhere near any insect colony in the animal world.
How can this be possible? A complex task achieved with no brain, a minimum of communication and no processes at all? Surely there has to be a mistake. After all, are we all not told that even the simplest task needs process/control/methodology?

Put simply, you don't need a process if you know what you are doing.

Processes exist for two main reasons:

1. Most people are at best average and don't know what they are doing.
2. A large subset of jobs only exist because of the existence of processes.
   

The real working world, the structure that we exist and operate in is, in fact, a myth created by the mediocre. A grind set at the IQ of lowest common dumbinator, at the pace of the rate determining step. And the framework that keeps all this operating is a set of pointless, sub-optimal processes. They don't make things better, they just make sure it doesn't get any worse.

Imagine your organisation with everyone who exists to process and everyone who doesn't know what they are doing removed. Its lean, mean and focused. Not to mention efficient, successful, driven, high-morale. Need I go on? Its not like you are believing me are you?
But think of it. Everyone is good. Everyone knows what they are doing to contribute to the common goal. Everything just works. Remember, ants aren't pants, so why are we?

"What you are describing will lead to anarchy!" I hear you say.
"Not necessarily" I retort, tongue not entirely in cheek.
"OK, maybe only in very small companies then" you weakly concede.
"Yes, I say, absolutely, but what if you broke down the work of large organisations into small company-like structures, 'talent cells' I'm going to call them, then you could extend the model infinitely." I say, extending an already ridiculous notion into the way beyond.
"You're either a genius or an idiot, I've not decided yet, but I think you might be an idiot" you say, before walking off with your clipboard.

Clearly, you can't write nothing down, you can't stop all communication. I'm only using the extreme view to make a more considered point. In fact, this is all an elaborate, exaggerated prelude to one simple message. If you are only going to have one process, or one process you are going to get right. Make it recruitment.

If you assume that everyone you recruit fits the 'Ant' model then you can design a leaner, more efficient structure. All you have to do is to make sure that you get the right people and it will work. Don't recruit on the basis of getting people who will cope with a little guidance, control, process, review, audit, reins, safety helmet. Recruit people who will push the envelope beyond what you currently do now. Look at your structure now and spot where there is waste and inefficiency.

Lets go back to the ants. Are we to assume that ALL the ants, every single one in the myriad horde, gets it right? I doubt it. There must be some ants that don't quite get it on occasion. I bet the workers, soldiers whoever spot this and rip them a new one.

I could go on. No really, I could. But a blog isn't a place to publish the entire treatise, if you want to hear me go on at longer length about process-light environments then drop me a line.

I will conclude this meanderings with one sad truth. This model could never work. Why? Because there aren't enough ants to go round.

Website of the Day:
This one is for Stuart, because he was asking. It also helps cultivate my 'crashingly dull' theme, eh MorFF?

Track of the Day:
From the opening chord of their debut album, Suede always sounded a bit special. So, tonight Matthew, I've going for 'So Young', which I was when it came out.

All Around The World

Signed up for Google Analytics recently, you get quite a lot of cool stuff for free. And, for the record, I don't subscribe to the "Google are the next Microsoft, taking over the world, yada, yada" thing. The do some very useful stuff.
Anyway, in Analytics you get a really sweet GeoMap that gives you an idea where your traffic comes from. This the map from this site on 3rd February 2007.


Click to enlarge

I was quite startled by the coverage of the globe (but come on Africa, put some effort in!). Its a little spooky to see how many people from how many places drop by for a nanosecond before they find something more interesting.
( Obviously, I have to give a big 'shout out' to what appears to be an emerging fan club in Mexico, Ola! )

Its worth nothing that most of these hits are photography related and many come from the Flash Relief site. Since I've been listed on there, hits have jumped quite a bit. As yet, I've not managed to attract many people on the basis of what I ramble about!

As an aside, something in my GMail inbox has been driving some very odd ad links this week including a link to Sunshine Colonics. This is a generally unremarkable site, but I have to take my hat off to whoever named the company, if they meant it like I hope they did, it genius
.