Tuesday, 6 March 2007
Monday, 5 March 2007
The eight pillars of enjoyment as applied to workflow - Lifehacker
We all experience happiness through various methods, but how about work? What can you do to make that part of your life more pleasurable? Try asking yourself questions based on the eight pillars of enjoyment.
Basically, these are premises based on the optimum productivity workflow: you enjoy the task set before you, you are focused, you have clear goals, etc. The point of this is that we need to try to cut the work that does not result in a good flow (if possible), and jump headlong into the work that does. Yep, it sounds a bit Zen, but if it works, why not? How about you - do you have tried and true methods that make your work more of a joy and less of a drag? Thoughts in the comments
The eight pillars of enjoyment as applied to workflow - Lifehacker
Basically, these are premises based on the optimum productivity workflow: you enjoy the task set before you, you are focused, you have clear goals, etc. The point of this is that we need to try to cut the work that does not result in a good flow (if possible), and jump headlong into the work that does. Yep, it sounds a bit Zen, but if it works, why not? How about you - do you have tried and true methods that make your work more of a joy and less of a drag? Thoughts in the comments
The eight pillars of enjoyment as applied to workflow - Lifehacker
Saturday, 3 March 2007
Why the Treasury loves a gambler | Dt Opinion | Opinion | Telegraph
If you can make one heap of all your winnings, and risk it on one turn of pitch and toss, I admire you inordinately. Despite myself, I love a heroic gambler. (Except the ones who are running my country, or the Department of Culture, Media and Sport.) So I much enjoyed the story of the "Fat Man", the Syrian businessman Fouad al-Zayat, who has lost £23 million on London's ritzier gambling tables.
I loved his grandstanding sound bite ("This is the only sin I have"), though on further reading, I didn't believe it: Mr al-Zayat has other sins. Having lost £2 million to Aspinall's in a single night, he paid by cheque and then rang up his bank afterwards to tell them to cancel it. Aspinall's had to take him to court to get its £2 million (plus costs), in a case that was finally settled last month.
I loved his grandstanding sound bite ("This is the only sin I have"), though on further reading, I didn't believe it: Mr al-Zayat has other sins. Having lost £2 million to Aspinall's in a single night, he paid by cheque and then rang up his bank afterwards to tell them to cancel it. Aspinall's had to take him to court to get its £2 million (plus costs), in a case that was finally settled last month.
Tut-tut. From the little I know about high-stakes gambling (from Victorian novels, mostly), welshing on one's gaming debts is unheroic. Still, you have to admire the weight of numbers.
The only time I ever gambled heroically was in a town called Robinsonville in Tunica County, Mississippi. I went with a Mississippi native, who'd never been to Las-Vegas-on-the-Delta and wanted to go.
The Horseshoe is a neon-lit building the size of Terminal 4 rising up from the vast flatlands; we picked it from a dozen others. We picked a blackjack table (from around 400) and a man said: "Hi, my name's Alvin, I'll be your croupier for this evening." It was 11 o'clock. As soon as we sat down, a woman asked what we wanted to drink. We said Tennessee whiskey sours; she brought them; they were free. As soon as we drank them, she brought more, also free. She kept coming till four in the morning.
Alvin doled out two cards to everyone on the table and we put down $10 each. After a minute, Alvin said: "Bank wins". We did it again. He said: "Bank wins again, ma'am." After 10 minutes, Alvin became gloomier and gloomier. By 4am, our wallets were empty. I asked Alvin, somewhat unsoberly, why he was being so sour-faced when he kept winning and we kept losing. He said: "Because I'm on the minimum wage and tips, ma'am. People tip me when they win. When you lose money, I lose money." We reeled away.
The thing is that Tunica County chose to gamble. Once the poorest county in America, it's now the US's richest per capita. In Mississippi, gambling was legal so long as you did it "on the water" (hence the river boat casinos). Tunica, being well inland, didn't have much to float on, but a couple of entrepreneurs put a small boat-casino on an irrigation channel off the Mississippi.
The locals noticed that "people from Memphis" were driving down in hordes to chuck money at it, so the whole county upped and voted for gambling. The huge Las Vegas casino chains paid the cotton farmers a lot of money for their land but megabucks for drainage ditches on which to "float" the casinos. You'd never know you were "on the water", but your croupier will point out a small well-like arrangement, with black water gleaming at the bottom.
What became Las-Vegas-on-the-Delta was not a decision thrust on Tunica County by the federal government. They didn't get gambling because President Reagan thought a supercasino was a good idea, but because some locals thought was a good idea.
In Blackpool, some locals thought it was a good idea as well. In the very early 1990s the billionaire Trevor Hemmings, who owns Leisure Parcs, floated the idea of Blackpool becoming a casino resort. He thought it would regenerate the place (and something had to). All sorts of people got behind him and the Blackpool bidders lobbied Parliament for a "resort casino". They provided MPs with much documentation about regeneration.
Meanwhile, Mr Hemmings spent £74 million on a big chunk of the Golden Mile, where he thought a resort casino would sit nicely.
What happened next is so depressing it hardly bears recalling. The Government, in the person of Tessa Jowell, seized on the Blackpool bid and ran off to Tony with it. She was just loving the whole idea of "regeneration", frankly. Regenerating depressed parts of Britain was a fabulous idea. Doing it at no cost to the Chancellor's purse was too fantastic for words. In minutes, there was a government plan for "resort casinos". Why stop at one?
Blackpool should have noticed that the Government's documentation immediately dropped "resort" from its documents and changed it to "regional" casinos. Perhaps they did notice. "Regional", like "regeneration", is one of New Labour's keywords.
Once "Blackjack-Lil" Jowell had highjacked the Blackpool bid and turned it into the baffling and bothersome Gambling Bill 2005, there was no stopping the lunacy that followed: the cowboy boots, the croupier poses, the ranch, the Dome, the snapping in Parliament about "not bringing Las Vegas style tricks of the trade into Britain". (Some hope. Those guys know what they're doing, even if she doesn't.)
I don't care what Fat Men do with their squillions at Aspinall's: good luck to them. I don't believe that a supercasino will "regenerate" an already regenerated Manchester, or pay for the Olympics, or provide jobs for thousands in depressed parts of Britain. (British casinos don't allow tipping.)
What I hate is when every aspect of British life becomes an arm of government and a Treasury resource, to be fleeced at will (the Chancellor is looking forward to the many £££s he will make from online gambling). Jowell famously said her Bill was "100 per cent regulation and 99 per cent protection". Makes the flesh creep, that sort of remark.
Why the Treasury loves a gambler Dt Opinion Opinion Telegraph
The only time I ever gambled heroically was in a town called Robinsonville in Tunica County, Mississippi. I went with a Mississippi native, who'd never been to Las-Vegas-on-the-Delta and wanted to go.
The Horseshoe is a neon-lit building the size of Terminal 4 rising up from the vast flatlands; we picked it from a dozen others. We picked a blackjack table (from around 400) and a man said: "Hi, my name's Alvin, I'll be your croupier for this evening." It was 11 o'clock. As soon as we sat down, a woman asked what we wanted to drink. We said Tennessee whiskey sours; she brought them; they were free. As soon as we drank them, she brought more, also free. She kept coming till four in the morning.
Alvin doled out two cards to everyone on the table and we put down $10 each. After a minute, Alvin said: "Bank wins". We did it again. He said: "Bank wins again, ma'am." After 10 minutes, Alvin became gloomier and gloomier. By 4am, our wallets were empty. I asked Alvin, somewhat unsoberly, why he was being so sour-faced when he kept winning and we kept losing. He said: "Because I'm on the minimum wage and tips, ma'am. People tip me when they win. When you lose money, I lose money." We reeled away.
The thing is that Tunica County chose to gamble. Once the poorest county in America, it's now the US's richest per capita. In Mississippi, gambling was legal so long as you did it "on the water" (hence the river boat casinos). Tunica, being well inland, didn't have much to float on, but a couple of entrepreneurs put a small boat-casino on an irrigation channel off the Mississippi.
The locals noticed that "people from Memphis" were driving down in hordes to chuck money at it, so the whole county upped and voted for gambling. The huge Las Vegas casino chains paid the cotton farmers a lot of money for their land but megabucks for drainage ditches on which to "float" the casinos. You'd never know you were "on the water", but your croupier will point out a small well-like arrangement, with black water gleaming at the bottom.
What became Las-Vegas-on-the-Delta was not a decision thrust on Tunica County by the federal government. They didn't get gambling because President Reagan thought a supercasino was a good idea, but because some locals thought was a good idea.
In Blackpool, some locals thought it was a good idea as well. In the very early 1990s the billionaire Trevor Hemmings, who owns Leisure Parcs, floated the idea of Blackpool becoming a casino resort. He thought it would regenerate the place (and something had to). All sorts of people got behind him and the Blackpool bidders lobbied Parliament for a "resort casino". They provided MPs with much documentation about regeneration.
Meanwhile, Mr Hemmings spent £74 million on a big chunk of the Golden Mile, where he thought a resort casino would sit nicely.
What happened next is so depressing it hardly bears recalling. The Government, in the person of Tessa Jowell, seized on the Blackpool bid and ran off to Tony with it. She was just loving the whole idea of "regeneration", frankly. Regenerating depressed parts of Britain was a fabulous idea. Doing it at no cost to the Chancellor's purse was too fantastic for words. In minutes, there was a government plan for "resort casinos". Why stop at one?
Blackpool should have noticed that the Government's documentation immediately dropped "resort" from its documents and changed it to "regional" casinos. Perhaps they did notice. "Regional", like "regeneration", is one of New Labour's keywords.
Once "Blackjack-Lil" Jowell had highjacked the Blackpool bid and turned it into the baffling and bothersome Gambling Bill 2005, there was no stopping the lunacy that followed: the cowboy boots, the croupier poses, the ranch, the Dome, the snapping in Parliament about "not bringing Las Vegas style tricks of the trade into Britain". (Some hope. Those guys know what they're doing, even if she doesn't.)
I don't care what Fat Men do with their squillions at Aspinall's: good luck to them. I don't believe that a supercasino will "regenerate" an already regenerated Manchester, or pay for the Olympics, or provide jobs for thousands in depressed parts of Britain. (British casinos don't allow tipping.)
What I hate is when every aspect of British life becomes an arm of government and a Treasury resource, to be fleeced at will (the Chancellor is looking forward to the many £££s he will make from online gambling). Jowell famously said her Bill was "100 per cent regulation and 99 per cent protection". Makes the flesh creep, that sort of remark.
Why the Treasury loves a gambler Dt Opinion Opinion Telegraph
Friday, 2 March 2007
Achievement - Forbes.com
We all have our own measure of success. For a high-powered Wall Street trader, a $10 million payday might not be enough--although most of us would be satisfied with a fraction of that. Mozart composed more than 600 works, while novelist Harper Lee wrote just one great book.
Great people judge themselves failures, and those who accomplish nothing swell with pride. What, then, is the measure of a life well led? Our special report on achievement offers context but no simple answers. Why do some succeed while others don't? Are we all failures? Perhaps ultimately the greatest achievement is simply a sense of dissatisfaction that makes us strive to do great things.
Read on ...
Achievement - Forbes.com
Great people judge themselves failures, and those who accomplish nothing swell with pride. What, then, is the measure of a life well led? Our special report on achievement offers context but no simple answers. Why do some succeed while others don't? Are we all failures? Perhaps ultimately the greatest achievement is simply a sense of dissatisfaction that makes us strive to do great things.
Read on ...
Achievement - Forbes.com
T r A C e Y t H o R n | o U T o f T h E W o O d S
Remember Everything But The Girl? Well, they're still much-missed for their unique fusion of electro-pop-dance-soul-mixes, etc, but the rather lovely Tracey Thorn is back with a new album. Ben Watt, her long-standing partner in music as well as life, has continued to create (Lazy Dog, etc) ever since the demise of their EBTG persona, but it's great to hear Tracey's beautiful voice once again. Enjoy ...
T r A C e Y t H o R n o U T o f T h E W o O d S
T r A C e Y t H o R n o U T o f T h E W o O d S
BBC Signs Content Deal With YouTube - WSJ.com
Interesting development ... YouTube may at last start to have some quality content - I mean, there's only so many times you can watch a cat falling over, or a teeenager running into a fence. If YouTube hearlded a brand new world of creativity/media, then I am a banana ...
--
LONDON -- British Broadcasting Corp. said Friday it has signed a deal with YouTube, a unit of Google Inc., which will make clips of its programs available on the video-sharing Web site.
The publicly funded United Kingdom broadcaster said it will offer branded "channels" on YouTube, some of which will be funded by advertising.
The BBC's director general, Mark Thompson, said YouTube was "a key gateway through which to engage new audiences in the U.K. and abroad."
The deal will create a channel called "BBC Worldwide" on YouTube which will show hit shows, including Top Gear, Spooks and nature documentaries presented by David Attenborough.
It also will create a channel to be called "BBC World," that will show news clips from the BBC's commercially operated international news channel. The corporation will make available clips from some current popular series such as Doctor Who and Life On Mars.
The BBC said in a statement that the partnership "reflects YouTube's commitment to work with content owners to make compelling video accessible online, and the BBC's commitment to increase reach through the partnership."
Some large media and entertainment companies have objected to YouTube's use of their material on an unauthorized basis. YouTube's Web site features video clips, both made by private individuals and from corporations. Viacom Inc. recently forced the company to take down more than 100,000 video clips from the YouTube site.
The plan is likely to be controversial in the U.K., where the BBC has been criticized by rivals for extending its footprint too far into commercial territory. The deal comes as the BBC Trust, the corporation's new governance body, considers whether to allow the corporation to advertise on its international Web sites. The BBC is funded through a universal license fee in the U.K. and advertising isn't permitted on its domestic broadcast platforms or Web site.
BBC Signs Content Deal With YouTube - WSJ.com
--
LONDON -- British Broadcasting Corp. said Friday it has signed a deal with YouTube, a unit of Google Inc., which will make clips of its programs available on the video-sharing Web site.
The publicly funded United Kingdom broadcaster said it will offer branded "channels" on YouTube, some of which will be funded by advertising.
The BBC's director general, Mark Thompson, said YouTube was "a key gateway through which to engage new audiences in the U.K. and abroad."
The deal will create a channel called "BBC Worldwide" on YouTube which will show hit shows, including Top Gear, Spooks and nature documentaries presented by David Attenborough.
It also will create a channel to be called "BBC World," that will show news clips from the BBC's commercially operated international news channel. The corporation will make available clips from some current popular series such as Doctor Who and Life On Mars.
The BBC said in a statement that the partnership "reflects YouTube's commitment to work with content owners to make compelling video accessible online, and the BBC's commitment to increase reach through the partnership."
Some large media and entertainment companies have objected to YouTube's use of their material on an unauthorized basis. YouTube's Web site features video clips, both made by private individuals and from corporations. Viacom Inc. recently forced the company to take down more than 100,000 video clips from the YouTube site.
The plan is likely to be controversial in the U.K., where the BBC has been criticized by rivals for extending its footprint too far into commercial territory. The deal comes as the BBC Trust, the corporation's new governance body, considers whether to allow the corporation to advertise on its international Web sites. The BBC is funded through a universal license fee in the U.K. and advertising isn't permitted on its domestic broadcast platforms or Web site.
BBC Signs Content Deal With YouTube - WSJ.com
Thursday, 1 March 2007
The World According to John K.
John Kricfalusi, the mind that gave us The Ren and Stimpy Show, The Ripping Friends and The Goddamn George Liquor Program has a plan to make you watch the ads you see online. In fact, his goal is to make it so you won't even realize you're watching a commercial.
Kricfalusi -- better known as John K. -- isn't exactly known for bending to the will of studios or censors. This is, after all, the guy who was dismissed from Ren and Stimpy after producing an episode that ended with a character being savagely beaten with a boat oar. Now, he's devised a series of Flash-animated advertisements for VOIP provider Raketu. But this isn't the typical case of selling out. Kricfalusi genuinely wants to bring creativity back to advertising while promoting his animation. Plus, he gets to be way naughtier online than on the TV.
It all started a few years ago when he produced a series of web shorts for Tower Records -- for free.
This led to animation deals with Old Navy and then Raketu. The one-minute shorts hawking the virtues of Raketu feature some of Kricfalusi's most bombastic characters (including the hilarious George Liquor) and are punctuated by Kricfalusi's signature style of bright, entertaining and somewhat retro animation.
This form of advertising has been around for decades. Remember when Fred Flintstone peddled Winston cigarettes? But Kricfalusi thinks that his online offering, which carries his distinctive storytelling, will change attitudes toward advertising on the web, kind of like what HBO did for TV. Starting Thursday, you can be the judge.
That's when Kricfalusi's ads go live on , as well as his blog, all kinds of stuff.
Wired News sat down with John K. and chatted about the future of online advertisement, his new project with Raketu and, of course, the fate of Ren and Stimpy. (To check out John K.'s Raketu shorts, click here and here.)
Wired News: You make the cartoons for the love of it. Any guilt about making ads?
John K.: Guilt? This is America. I'm a capitalist. I would feel guilty if I didn't sell the product well and if I bored the audience. I have a duty to the sponsor and the audience. Making those two people happy is a lot easier than making a hundred TV execs happy while making the audience and sponsor unhappy. That makes me feel really guilty.
Wired News: The World According to John K.
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