Things I should speak about but there’s too much happening in the world:

• The tories are holding a ‘gay summit‘ which is a shock to those of us that remember Margaret Thatcher’s rants. I am certain that, at one point, it was the Conservatives who wanted to round us all up shoot us.
• Andy points to a site for hot Brazillian men – which amuses for some reason that I can not explain.
• And over at Man of the Moment, I am receiving a lot of comment spam on Andrew Kinlochan which means I need to find the time to upgrade this instance of Moveable Type to implement some of the spam blocking features. In researching them, I notice there’s a whole raft of new functionality in the next release. I am, sadly, excited by this news.
• Six Apart, the guys behind Movable Type, have grown phenomenally this year. Mena’s written something about it which goes to show how difficult it can be communicating when you’re a small company.
• Lance Arthur has written 13 Reasons Why You Could Be My Boyfriend and, as always, it’s a very well written piece. But one of the items really struck a chord with me for some reason: ‘6: You Have Passion‘. It got me asking myself, ‘what subject am I passionate about?’ and, right now, I am not so sure (although I can go on about my new found love of the gym and roller casters if I am pushed). I don’t think that’s healthy.
• Dan Savage got legally married – but to a woman: ‘We emphasized to the clerk and her manager that Amy and I don’t live together, we don’t love each other, we don’t plan to have kids together, and we’re going to go on living and sleeping with our same-sex partners after we get married. So could we still get a marriage license?’ How fantastic.
• And I learned a new acronym today: SPIM (spam over instant messaging). You heard it here first (maybe).

What a great day.

On this day…

2004: Straight Men Are Shopping Kings?

Oh dear, technology is really getting the better of me. Reading my selection at Bloglines, Matt at Hit or Miss pointed me to his TV recommendations page. One of his recommendations is Hedwig and the Angry Inch – which I have been meaning to view for a long while. So, a quick search at MyDigiGuide and I see it’s on Sky Movies 1 this Thursday. Now, when Sky+ implements some kind of web-interface I will be away.

On this day…

Did I miss much while I was away? I know I missed Tom winning a Bloggie or two – congratulations to him. plasticbag is always interesting reading but ‘Why do bloggers kill kittens?‘ must be one of my favourite posts of recent times. His idea of ‘a representation of a person online’ is a good idea about what a site is – including mine – but I have to say that I just plain enjoy his writing – regardless of if I agree with it or not.

On this day…

2004: Here We Go Again
2004: Riding The Top Coasters In The World
2003: Geneva, 12 August 1949

The BBC is reporting on an interesting piece of research about the way people are using personal music players to claim back something personal from a world where we are surrounded by advertising messages:

Through interviews with Walkman owners and now iPod buyers, he found that listening to music acts as a shield, aura or cocoon … Using headphones helps to keep the world at bay and reclaim some space. [Source]

Yesterday I listened to my own choice of music in the gym rather than watching one of the televisions hanging from the ceilings. It was a very different experience and – to be honest – I almost caught myself singing along. I had purposely chosen a lot of upbeat pop/dance to keep me going and it worked. While my usual fare of Sky News and Chart Show TV are interesting, this time I knew my whole musical selection would be good and I would find the whole hour interesting and commercial free.

But what about the aspect of the walkman or iPod as a space definer? I think this is probably very obvious. I often ride the London Underground listening to music to cut me off from the rest of the people there. In a morning, it really does give you a sense of your own space when you are sardine-squashed into a carriage. In an evening it keeps you occupied – less likely to be engaged in a conversation with somebody who you might find threatening.

A few weeks ago, cityofsound pointed me to Traffic Island Disks – an interesting radio programme looking at the music people are listening to as they wander around an area of London. It really is very interesting listening to how people define their own spaces through the music they are listening to (it’s also a pretty good idea for a radio show).

On this day…

2007: I’m Silent. You Are Not.
2004: Similarities At BBC Radio
2003: Freddie, Will and George
2003: And The Years Pass

Do you know how hard it is to find the link to the Real Player for Palm devices? It’s not very well-signposted. Perhaps, if I post a link here, search engines will improve its ranking! If you’re looking for the Real Player for Palm connected devices (Treo 600, Tungsten C, Tungsten T3, Tungsten T2, Tungsten T, Tungsten E or Zire 71) then you should visit the Real Networks page devoted to it!

Additional note: the user instructions for the Real Player for the Palm are also available.

On this day…

2005: Erasure: The Nightbird Tour
2005: They Have The Cool Jobs
2004: Formula 1 2004 Race Calendar For Outlook Import
2003: They’re All Abroad
2003: Thoughts on Blogspace

this is the phixx car sticker – honestly

So, the official Phixx web site alerted me to two interesting facts this week. Firstly, Andrew is giving away his car. Honestly. In one of the most bizarre (and possibly desperate) publicity stunts for a single, Phixx are giving away Andrew’s car. How do you win? I’ve no idea because they won’t tell you until the single is out. And then, today, I received an email with the subject ‘Phixx Window Sticker’. The clever marketing bods have ‘put an A4 poster together for you to download and place in the back window of your car’. I thought that it might be a nice idea to go and look at it – except anybody could have knocked this up. What a disappointment. That’s the picture. The pdf doesn’t render properly on my machine (but the World version does). All in all that’s brightened my afternoon. So, despite the simplicity, I may now be forced to buy the single – Love Revolution is out on Monday. You may have seen the car stickers!

On this day…

2005: Closer
2004: Graffiti Shop
2004: You Can’t Hear Yourself On The Tube
2003: Commercial Free
2003: A Quieter Life

If you have an interest in UK politics then this could be right up your street or, at least, somebody’s street. The design is a little crude but downingstreetsays.org has just joined my list a Bloglines. Somebody’s got to keep an eye on what Tony’s saying!

I was mighty impressed that the report highlighting downingstreetsays.org at BBC News didn’t feel the need to explain weblogs to anybody. Hoorah. Happy Tuesday!

On this day…

2005: Buttons In The Honesty Box

Just a little bit of fun for today:

Pholph’s Scrabble Generator My Scrabble© Score is: 11. What is your score? Get it here.

What’s yours?

On this day…

2004: January Interest
2003: Shuttle Lost

At the start of December I wrote again about spam in my mailbox and suggested that my ISP, Demon, should do something to allow server-side filtering of mail messages. Hoorah, my January post brought good news and spam filtering is to be introduced. Maybe some of those email addresses will become useful again!

On this day…

2004: Forgotten Credits
2004: Supporting Greg
2004: Where In The World
2004: Desert Drag
2003: January Snow? A Surprise to Transport Chiefs