Doctor Who dvd review · 500 words
The Web Planet puts the first Doctor and his companions in the middle of a war between two alien races - the moth-like Menoptra and a hostile race of ant creatures known as Zarbi - for possession of the planet Vortis. With the help of a grub-esque people called the Optera, the Doctor discovers the Zarbi's hidden weapon; the seductively voiced spider creature the Animus, which plans to ensnare…
Continue reading →art design floppy · 9 comments · 750 words · Viewed ~8,064 times
I've built myself a framed set of imaginary software. This is not available to buy in the shops. Mostly because some of the artwork is not my copyright. All the parts are listed if you want to build it yourself. Parts Floppy Disks Printer Labels Frame Background As part of my Floppy Disk Walkman project, I asked my friends to send me a couple of floppies. Alistair and @gas_liverpool both…
Continue reading →Movie Review · 1 comment · 250 words
A man living in a futuristic sterile colony begins to question his circumscribed existence when his friend is chosen to go to the Island, the last uncontaminated place on earth. Kazuo Ishiguro's novel "Never Let Me Go" is a profound meditation on the nature of love, and whether clones can ever be considered truly human. It asks us deep questions about medical ethics and our responsibilities…
Continue reading →covid19 finance money · 1 comment · 400 words · Viewed ~397 times
I'm an ambivalent convert to FIRE - Financial Independence Retire Early. The basic gist is: Minimise your expenditure, Save 20x your annual expenditure, Retire early while maintaining the same lifestyle. That's it. There are a lot of crappy books about FIRE, but the concept is simple. So I try to spend a little less, and I try to save a little more, and I dream about stopping work while…
Continue reading →Movie Review · 250 words
Sir Guy Grand (Peter Sellers), the richest man in the world, adopts a homeless boy, Youngman (Sir Ringo Starr). Together, they set out to prove that anyone, and anything, can be bought with money. I get that this is a seminal film. But it doesn't stop it being awful. London at the end of the Swinging Sixties looks like a grim and miserable place. The concrete is drab, the weather is…
Continue reading →code Open Source · 3 comments · 700 words · Viewed ~4,078 times
A few weeks ago, I received an unsolicited email inviting me to try out an exciting new "quantum resistant" cryptography app called Cyph. Because I hate myself, I signed up. Of particular interest to me was the fact that the homepage loudly proclaimed that it was "Open Source" - and had a public GitHub repo. That was handy, because there were some glaring usability flaws on the sign-up screen.…
Continue reading →Movie Review · 250 words
Confident and opinionated, 17-year-old Megan is far too strong-willed for her unsupportive parents, who begin to worry she is a lesbian. Their solution is to send Megan to 'True Directions,' a "rehabilitation camp" run by homophobic counsellor Mary Brown. Soon Megan meets the equally defiant Graham, and the two form a fast friendship. Ironically, the more time Megan spends at the camp, the more …
Continue reading →Movie Review · 400 words
Once told they'd save the universe during a time-traveling adventure, 2 would-be rockers from San Dimas, California find themselves as middle-aged dads still trying to crank out a hit song and fulfil their destiny. What is the nature of reality? What does it mean to grow old without ever realising your full potential? Can love survive the confines of marriage? What are the true limits of…
Continue reading →beatles hack mp3 Raspbery Pi · 34 comments · 750 words · Viewed ~22,008 times
I have built the most inconvenient way of playing music! It is lo-fi awfulness and cyberpunk grungy. Thanks! I hate it! Ingredients Raspberry Pi USB floppy drive Audio Cable / Headphones USB Battery WHY?!?! As I discussed yesterday, it's possible to fit half an hour of speech on a single floppy disk. The best band in the world are The Beatles, and their shortest album is A Hard…
Continue reading →audio floppy opus · 13 comments · 650 words · Viewed ~1,783 times
An old 3.5 inch floppy disk holds 1.44 MB of data. According to my calculations, that's 1,424 KB blocks. For a total of 1,458,176 Bytes. Once formatted as FAT, you end up with 1,457,664 Bytes of storage. But how much audio can a floppy hold? (Here I mean wave based audio of human speech. It's trivial to fit more in using MIDI or speech synthesis.) I'm going to use "A Podcast Of Unnecessary…
Continue reading →gadget review USB · 5 comments · 450 words · Viewed ~2,904 times
This rather generic USB Floppy Drive has just arrived for me to review. It's sold by Dainty / ChuangZhiJLB - but it has the same internals as every other floppy drive on the market. It worked instantly in Linux and MacOS. Shows up as a USB drive. Shove a disk in there and your OS should automagically mount it. Appears to draw about 500mW in power. The disk read and write speed is pretty good…
Continue reading →battery gadget review USB usb-c · 5 comments · 500 words · Viewed ~282 times
The fine folks at Poweradd have sent me one of their gadgets to review. This is their 26800mAh USB-C power bank with Power Delivery. It's pretty similar to most normal portable batteries - but because it has USB-C-PD, it can charge MacBooks, Nintendo Switches, and other high-power devices! Let's take a look: In the box A big black battery. A weird hybrid cable. It is USB-A to Micro-USB…
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