The Blog




He may have been doing finals but still found time to do a May round up mix.
http://whitenoisereview.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/may-roundup-2013.html

I haven't heard all of these, but there's some bangers in there. The blog is highly recommended by the way.
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Already raining then, 
http://www.glastonburyfestivals.co.uk/newssite-snaps-portraits
http://www.glastonburyfestivals.co.uk/data/image/gf033%20-%20JOE%20RUSH%20FROM%20THE%20UNFAIRGROUND.jpg
 News - Site snaps: Portraits »
The Official Glastonbury Festival Website. Jason Bryant photographs some of the staff down on Worthy Farm this week

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Got my tickets for tomorrow night's Akkord - Navigate launch on Houndstooth, Rob Booth's Fabric label. Looking forward to seeing DJRum again as well.

http://www.residentadvisor.net/event.aspx?481944
Akkord, DJRum, Eleven8, Wen. 

Here's Akkord's Boiler Room set
http://basinghouse.co.uk/news/akkord-boiler-room/
 Akkord Boiler Room | Basing House of Shoreditch »
Basing House News. Cityscape Sessions 077: Fairmont · Forget Me Not – The Stronger EP · Akkord Boiler Room · 1st June – Krush with Fairmont & Jim Stanton · 31st May – Hypercolour Pres. Losing Suki – FREE ENTRY · 30th May – Akkord – Navigate EP Launch (Houndstooth) · Pulse Radio interview Casino ...

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Rather better article than usual about batteries and where battery tech is heading. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/05/28/hot_lithium_ion_batts/
It makes a refreshing change from the usual breathless hype of the (mainly) US tech blog coverage to see some real science and facts in there.

The downside is that game changing battery tech is probably going to stay a permanent 30 years out. While there are a few more cycles of incremental change to be had, it won't give us the factor of 10 improvement we need. The available 20-30% improvement is still useful, especially if the costs can come down as well.

This in turn means that we need to focus on reducing energy needs in battery powered devices as much as increasing the storage capacity. That's a good thing in itself.

And for E-bicycles, I want the lifespan and relative safety of LiFePo, with the size, weight and high current capability of RC LiPo (LiCo) at about a 1/3 of the price. m'kay? 
 Hot new battery technologies need a cooling off period • The Register »
Scientists began buzzing about electrochemical energy cells in the 18th century; consumers bought their first low-density Lithium-ion batteries in the late 1980s, and industry became hooked on the things in the 1990s. Ever since, the comedy electronic-device conflagration has been as much a ...

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Look, a post in praise of the iPod Classic is bringing all these other fans out of the woodwork and people who also want an upgrade and a similar device with much bigger storage. Dammit, Apple, where's my 1Tb iPod Classic! It should be here by now.
http://www.engadget.com/2013/05/27/irl-ipod-classic-whosounds-tardis-bluetooth-speaker/

There's a small but real market for a portable device with >250Gb (and preferably 1Tb) of storage and a good audio output stage. If Apple won't build it, then who will? I do understand that the iPod Classic probably doesn't sell very well, have good enough margins and so make Apple enough money to justify the work. But that small demand for an iPod Classic update is still there.

Meanwhile are there any alternatives for those of us with very big music collections and the need and want to take it all on the road? 

And no, Google Music (or similar streaming and locker services) is not a solution. We'll hit the 20k track limit, don't want to pay the bandwidth fees to access it and want access to all that music in places where connectivity is hard.
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Damn pesky kids. We would have got away with it, if they'd seen music -  in terms of a dialectic in which there's a series of advances that entail jettisoning previous styles that have been superceded.

http://retromaniabysimonreynolds.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/who-are-you-2013.html

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Thursday night, 30 May, London
http://www.residentadvisor.net/event.aspx?481944
Also got a ticket for the following night to see Cottam. If I've got the energy.
 Akkord Navigate EP Launch at Basing House »
Thursday, 30 May 2013 - London

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Past club music as opposed to future. But as someone who was too old to be there at the time... It's still refreshing to have some happy drunk reveller put an arm round your neck at 3am in 2013 and say "I hope I'm having as much fun as you are when I'm your age".

And the piano looped over and over.

http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/rave-video-comments-will-restore-your-faith-in-humanity

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It's still refreshing to have some happy drunk reveller put an arm round your neck at 3am in 2013 and say "I hope I'm having as much fun as you are when I'm your age".

Just try and remember that these are the days (right here, right now) that you'll look back on fondly at some time in the future.

And the piano looped over and over.

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Buzz data is going to be moved to Google Drive according to an email doing the rounds. This comment caught my eye though.

"Bradley Horowitz said at the time that the lessons that Google learned from the products short existence would be used in other services like Google+"

So what features that used to be in Buzz do you wish were in Google Plus now?

1) A tab on profiles listing all my comments
2) An RSS/Atom feed of my public posts
3) Vanity Profile URLs for everyone
4) Auto-import of posts from feeds. But to a separate tab on profiles, not to our public streams
5) Easy Location tagging of public posts when using the desktop web interface.

I'm sure there's more.
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There's an email from Google doing the rounds about the final act for Buzz. Our old posts are going to be archibved to our Google Drive, apparently.
http://thenextweb.com/google/2013/05/25/more-than-a-year-after-its-shutdown-google-to-move-all-buzz-posts-to-its-drive-service-on-july-17/

It's prompted me to go back and re-read my burblings from 2 years ago!
https://profiles.google.com/106416716945076707395/buzz

"Bradley Horowitz said at the time that the lessons that Google learned from the products short existence would be used in other services like Google+"

I wonder what those lessons were. Because there's still some function that used to be in Buzz but is not in G plus, that I miss.
 More than a year after its shutdown, Google to move all Buzz posts to its Drive service on July 17 »
Google is taking the "last step" in its shutdown of its Google Buzz product. Starting July 17, the company announced in an email that all posts will be saved to Google Drive.

Back ...

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Good interview with the Ginger Twat, or Tony Carter as he's better known. Familiar to anyone who watches motorcycle racing on Eurosport.
http://www.paddockchatter.com/2013/05/tony-carter-exclusive-2-stroke-passion.html
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How should YouTube - Google Music - G All Access integration work? Given that YouTube is now one of the foremost ways of consuming music and especially very new, preview and obscure musics.

This question was prompted by Last.FM integrating videos from Muzu into their system. 
http://thenextweb.com/insider/2013/05/21/last-fm-joins-forces-with-muzu-tv-to-bring-90000-music-videos-to-its-internet-radio-service/
 Last.fm joins forces with MUZU.TV to bring 90,000+ music videos to its Internet radio service »
Last.fm has teamed up with MUZU.TV today to bring over 90,000 music videos to the Web version of its Pandora-style Internet radio service.

The partnership will add relevant videos ...

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It's a Bloody Mary, Jim, but not as we know it.
http://boingboing.net/2013/05/23/extreme-bloody-mary-wisconsin.html
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Just seen in a comment: 

Fossil fuels are made from once living things and burning them releases their joy back into the world

Think about it. All that carbon locked up in fossil fuels is unavailable to photosynthesis and hence life's food chain. We're setting it free to be turned back into life. What's a few millennia and extinctions between friends?

Which raises the question. If the industrial and anthropogenic total use of fossil fuels and other resources wipes us out, how many millions of years would it take to lay down another fossil fuel supply and for another intelligent animal to appear to make use of it?
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This promises to be a good comments thread.
http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2013/05/the-language-of-alienation.html

can you come up with some examples of sentences that would be incomprehensible (without explanation) to a denizen of 2003 that don't revolve around ephemeral tech or pop culture churn? And can you provide and deconstruct some sentences from 2023 that, if we had sufficient foresight, we ought to be able to understand and interpolate a context for?

My fav so far. "Skype trojan forces Bitcoin mining, security firm warns"
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-22064534
 The language of alienation - Charlie's Diary »
Some examples, culled from reddit, to get you started: hang2er: "I can't get a 4G signal here, I'll skype you on my droid as soon as I hit a hotspot, I need a coffee anyway." Retinence: "The headline, 'Galaxy Nexus: Android Ice Cream Sandwich guinea pig.'" (But tech is easy ...) ...

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Chaipuccino is not a thing, no matter what Starbucks may say. If you run a cafe and you have Chai tea bags as well as the usual English Breakfast, then congratulations. But putting hot frothed milk in a fancy tea pot, adding a chai tea bag and serving it with a fancy cup is just plain wrong. Please just treat it like Workman's Tea. A mug, tea bag, boiling water and a splash of milk once its brewed a bit is fine.

And Starbucks, no thanks for the Chai Tea Latte. Maybe some people like it, but I reckon that's just wrong as well.
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Something to get lost in. http://electronicexplorations.org/?show=zhou Fairly short and quirky mix of tunes "that I would want to listen to". Recommended.
 Zhou »
"I chose to focus on the less dance floor orientated sounds for this mix and instead tried to compile a selection of tunes that I would want to listen to. It is a mix highlighting some of the music currently coming out of Bristol that I find most exciting as well as tracks that have informed the music we make ...

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Shock horror. Festivals are expensive and only middle aged, middle class people can afford it.
http://www.factmag.com/2013/05/16/study-60-of-young-people-priced-out-of-festivals-average-festival-costs-420

Which explains how white, middle aged and middle class, Glastonbury can appear to be. (sez, the balding old git).
 Study: 60% of young people priced out of festivals; average festival costs £420 »
FACT is the UK's best online music magazine and home to the weekly FACT mix series.

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Realists have no idea how they ended up living on this once hospitable planet with all these fools
 Chinese Demand, Peak Oil And Realism - Decline of the Empire »
This is the third and final day of my spring fundraiser. If you value this website, consider making a donation via the Donate (Paypal) button on this page, or by sending a check or money order to the PO Box I gave you in Tueday's post. Thanks — Dave [Tony Judt's book Ill Fares the Land] has a touch of prophecy in the authentic sense of that term. Prophecy is not about foretelling the future; it is about warning those in the present that unless th...

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