Tag Archives: Web

RSS Feeds and Asides: Ways to keep up to date

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Just thought I’d point out two or three features of the site that may not be initially noticable. First is the RSS Feed of the page – like a self updating bookmark of all the posts that I’ve been writing. You can drag the link below onto your Safari/IE7/Firefox toolbar and it will show an alert when a new post is published. RSS Recent Posts Feed.

The other thing is the ‘Asides’ posts on the right hand side. Something I’ve been looking at doing for a while – these miniposts allow me to post little bits of info/news without writing a whole lot about them. You can comment on asides just like on a normal post. Click on the number (normally a ’0′) at the bottom of the ‘aside’ and that will take you to a full-post style representation of the content. It’s like a normal post but, smaller! Think of the hierarchy of posts as; full post, asides, then ma.gnolia bookmarks.

Oh, and there’s the ‘related posts’ thing. I just added that last week or so. Half for me to see what else is related, half in case the thing that’s related is interesting. It works by analysing the words of a post and linking to similarly themed posts. Clever!

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Boob ads. Really, they’re just hilarious

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Some breast-filled ads on mainstream sites have really been cracking me up recently. I know the ads that you see on any ‘gay-interest’ sites aren’t going to be subtle either, all airbrushed abs and prominent bulges in all the right places, but the boobs are going to the extreme. I’m thinking specifically about sites that host Bittorrent files, the place you’d go if you’re looking to download the latest version of Linux, or a movie, or a tv show or some music (all those last three illegally of course). The websites can’t get mainstream advertisers because they’d likely be accused of supporting piracy so the websites resort to donations (from people who are specifically avoiding paying for their entertainment – probably not many donations there) or rather less reputable advertisers; the gambling websites, the ‘busty babes’ websites, and the ‘FREE SONY PSP FREE FREE’ type companies. What caught my eye was this knockout photo, so obviously a joke, or digital manipulation as to be laughable. Perhaps that was their intention.

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The sweetest standing down ever: Bruno Bonnell of Infogrames

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Infogrames, who millions will remember from the beginning (if not the future) of the computer games revolution, but more than anything from the came Civilisation III, lost its founder and CEO Bruno Bonnell on the 4th April. The founder and company are splitting to ‘take this opportunity to launch new dynamics of change for the group’. In an interview with Le Monde (published and I assume conducted in French) that could easily have turned bitter (as the interviewer appeared to be hoping), Bonnell came off nostalgic. I think it’s one of the most eloquent and, overall, classy interviews I’ve ever read. If there are errors in the translation, that’s my fault.

Bruno Bonnell: “I am not shut-out from Infogrames”:

Responding to a question as to the reasons for his departure he replies:

We have had setbacks, but Infogrames is always there. Throughout, we haven’t lost our essence. The business est in the top 10 in all countries and in some amongst those in the top five. But it’s necessary to give it a new momentum.

Nous avons ensuite connu des déboires, mais Infogrames est toujours là. Nous n’avons surtout pas perdu l’essentiel. La société est dans le top 10 dans tous les pays et dans certains d’entre eux dans les cinq premiers. Mais il faut lui donner un nouvel élan.

In response to a question about private investment funds, and whether Bonnell fears for the company’s future as a result of their actions, he replied:

[The investment fund] Blue Bay has invested millions of euros in Infogrames when nobody wanted to put in a euro. It has two seats on the board out of a total of seven. Its desire is to give the means for which Infogrames yearns to develop itself and generate value. I’m sure that Blue Bay is there to strengthen the business. If I had a contrary feeeling, I would not have taken the decision to give it command of the business.

Blue Bay a investi des millions d’euros dans Infogrames quand personne ne voulait y mettre un euro. Il a deux sièges au conseil d’administration sur un total de sept. Sa volonté est de donner les moyens qui manquent à Infogrames pour se développer, et lui faire générer de la valeur. Je suis sûr que Blue Bay est là pour conforter l’entreprise. Si j’avais le sentiment contraire, je n’aurais pas pris la décision de donner les rênes de l’entreprise.

And on his future projects:

One thing for sure, I am not going to create a competitor to Infogrames. Moreover, I’ve decided that from today, I will not speak any more about Infogrames in order to let it grow undistubed.

Une chose est sûre, je ne vais pas créer un concurrent à Infogrames. D’ailleurs, j’ai décidé qu’à partir d’aujourd’hui, je ne parlerai plus d’Infogrames pour la laisser grandir sereinement.

Le Monde: Bruno Bonnell : “Je ne suis pas mis à la porte d’Infogrames”

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Waaaay Back

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My last post, on who I was when 18 years old, made me think of what my site used to look like. I miss some of those designs. Actually, the one I miss most was one I never really managed to get working, where the top looked like a post-it note and the whole page was designed to work like it was a piece of notebook paper. It sounds cheesy but I would have got it to look subtle. Anyway, working with blogger at the time was just too hard. Now I just don’t have enough time/patience. Maybe someday.

But look at Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine for sortroom.net. It’s amazing the changes! Most interesting to me is how some of my earlier designs looked a lot busier than my current or at least recent ones. It’s hard to make design look simple and yet put a lot of information out there. That is always my biggest challenge: not to give myself a headache!

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