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Jeff Jarvis was on an absolute roll during the latest episode of This Week in Google, “A World of Gibbons” (#53, Huffduff). Some quotes, emphasis mine, with MP3 timecodes [in square brackets]:

[25:21] If you’re sitting in any organisation, and let’s not forget this is not just going to be governments, it’s also companies. At some point, as I said earlier on, and it’s a glib line, but the only sure cure for leaks is transparency. At some point you’re gonna realise that you’re better off releasing more information. That the more you hold secret, the more risk you have of leaks, and anything that looks like a leak looks like an exposé. Now that’s going to be a very hard lesson to get across to controlling institutions, but I think if we’re looking at a long term impact here on the culture. I’m writing about this obviously, so it’s on the top of my brain. But I think that this default of publicness versus a default of privacy and secrecy is what we’re grappling with here, and we get to a point where there is no mediator.

[33:26] So what the fear was, that they put forward is someone would come and scan your garbage. So what, they find out I’m 33 now, not 32? Then what? What does that do? We don’t look at the implications, but technology yields change and change yields fright and fright yields protection. And that’s a very small example of what Jay just said. Whether you’re a big institution, or whether you’re a survivalist, or whoever you are, there’s two responses to this world coming up: to embrace the change, or to try to fear it.

And the killer…

[34:22] Yes, we need secrets. But first you have to have the trust to know that those who are holding secrets are holding them for a reason.

Oh Facebook, just when I didn’t think you could get any better at encouraging interaction on your site:

Face recognition. Finding faces that aren’t already tagged. Presenting them, ready-to-tag, to the owner. This is pure genius for getting people to participate.

These two years I’ve spent at the University of York have been absolutely fantastic, and it’s impossible to overstate how big a part the media societies have played in me having so much fun. I’m working away from university on a placement this year, but before I start in the big and scary world of “real work”, I wanted to write a little about the things I’ve done at York that have totally completed the experience.

Nouse Website, Spring 2009

This was the first time I got involved significantly in something society-based at university, in the second term of my first year. Working with Ali and Mike, under direction and with massive effort from Chris, we recreated and iterated on the theme for Nouse, the student newspaper (if you know what’s right for you). It meant a load of late nights in the office, fixing things up and getting them ready for launch; my favourite tweet of the early morning “office HTML cluster-fuck” (after one such launch) has to go to Henry.

YSTV Video Production & Website, October 2008 – Present

Looking back, over the last two years YSTV is the best thing I’ve done at York. I’ve met so many more people there than I would have anywhere else on campus and I couldn’t be more pleased that I decided to get involved. From being Matthew’s bitch in the very first term (filming footage for the York Sport Show) all the way up to last term, working on the website with more people than I’ll be able to mention. Mark and Simon somehow managed to get me in front of the camera, though I’m not sure how that even came close to happening. Hopefully I’ll be staying involved in the website this year, from about two hundred miles away.

York Students In Schools, January 2009 – May 2009

I’m not sure why I decided to join YSIS, but I’m so glad I did. In the second term I was helping one afternoon a week in a primary school (Dunnington Church of England), and this year I’ve been assisting with ICT at All Saints RC School. All the teaching has been valuable experience, but seeing the ICT curriculum being taught in a real school, to real kids, has made David’s somewhat different approach so much more important. The teaching quality that I saw at All Saints was amazing, but when the syllabus dictates that you need to teach pupils how to print from Microsoft Access and exactly what that obscure button in PowerPoint does, there’s only so far you can go.

Do More Stuff

If there’s one thing that it was important for me to take away from here, it is this: you might not get on with every single person you come across (can you ever?), but there is absolutely no reason you won’t get along with most of them. You might even have fun.

Like Adam, I’d been waiting forever for the recent MacBook Pro update from Apple. The waiting had even got so bad that we discussed switching back and giving Windows 7 a chance.

Personally, I’m so glad I held out. The computer I owned before this one was a January 2007 white plastic MacBook, and the difference is more than incredible.

The Obvious vs. the Subtle

This new notebook is obviously an improvement, you don’t need anybody to tell you that. The specification speaks for itself: 2.4GHz (up from 2.26), a solid state drive providing blisteringly fast boot times and application launches, and an NVIDIA GeForce 320M instead of the very tired Intel X3100.

It’s got an SD card slot, Firewire 800, a multitouch buttonless trackpad. The battery life lasts for a whole day of light use now, where it would have buckled by lunch before. I’ve had five hours of train journeys today where I’ve been watching movies and listening to music (brightness ~50%, no Wi-Fi, no Bluetooth), and it’s still 40% remaining. The build-quality and how solid the machine feels is second-to-none.

This is all great. But where Apple really shines is taking the smallest things they could possibly change, and improving them to provide the best user experience they can. Here’s a few examples:

• This model has a backlit keyboard, and with it an ambient light sensor. Which means they dim the screen and activate the keyboard backlight whenever, for example, this train goes into a tunnel, and brighten it again when the clouds reappear.
• Speaking of the screen brightness, it now fades between different brightness levels instead of obvious, staccato changes. And the LED backlight allows for great flexibility; it can go even brighter than previously when needed, but also dimmer for stealthy night-time web browsing.
• The speakers sound significantly better. They’re still tinny, laptop speakers, but a vast improvement.
• The headphone/line-in jacks have been replaced with one for both audio in and out. This change brings with it support for iPhone microphones and in-line remote controls when using iTunes.
• The MagSafe connector has been changed to be more like the MacBook Air, so it’s now much harder to knock out accidentally.

Take the screen brightness fading up and down. It might seem like a trivial point, but together with everything else, it adds up to what I believe to be the best laptop experience you can buy today. Don’t get me wrong, they’re expensive. You can get something for £400 from Acer, or £600 from Dell. And while they might look the same when you’re comparing gigahertz and revolutions-per-minute, I can assure you that they’re vastly different.

Russell and I are having the same problem with our wallets.

Mine’s a Barclaycard PayPass that’s giving me a headache, though. Might get one of those small tube maps that are made out of metal to fix the problem. He’s right that this is going to become more common though, especially as banks start rolling out more cards like this.

I’ve been in South Africa for two weeks, and am here for one more. There are so many fascinating things about this place, but for a geek the obvious place to start is comparing the technology here with back home.

First: everything’s mobile here. ADSL is a fairly new thing (MWEB have just announced their first uncapped package) and fibre is in the process of being laid (come on BT, they’re catching up), so using a 3G data modem to connect to the Internet is pretty popular. This makes it a great place for somebody arriving with an unlocked iPhone; we popped down to a Vodacom (South African Vodafone) store and bought a prepaid SIM card for R3 (27p) and 1GB of data for R289 (about £26).

Looking at costs for their mobile data, they charge anywhere from R2 (18p) down to 19c (1.7p) per megabyte, depending on your bundle size. Their top option is a massive 20GB for R3899 (£350), so you can get a sense of how heavily people must rely on it. With my gigabyte of data, I was paying 28c/MB (or 2.5p/MB). Compare that to O2, who wanted to charge me £6 per megabyte, and I’m left wondering why anybody would ever pay roaming data charges again. I enjoyed the “awww, see you soon” SMS that O2 sent me:

Please be aware it’s expensive using data on your iPhone abroad. […]

Oh nope. Using the data isn’t the expensive part, is it O2?

If I’d left my O2 SIM in my phone, with exactly the same usage, I would’ve been left with a bill for £6,144. Not the £26 I actually paid. 236× the cost. I want to stop writing the same thing over and over again, but just can’t get my head around it.

The curse of the APN

I’ve always hated dealing with phone network settings, mostly because it’s never worked. After some searching, I found that you need to change the Cellular Data APN on the iPhone to internet. After a quick call—and 24 hour wait—to the people who deal with Vodacom data on 082155 (asking them to enable the iPhone APN and tethering), you can change the Cellular Data APN back to iphone.vodacom.za (and as a bonus, you’ll then be able to tether).

Sorry

I didn’t mean this to turn into a rant about the extortion racket that is my mobile phone provider, but that seems to be the way it turned out. I’d like to thank Vodacom for being so great, and wish O2 a slow, painful death. Hopefully, I’ll post more about being here some time soon.

Merlin Mann:

You’re gonna die, you’re gonna die, and nobody’s gonna care which version of the iPhone you used to make something on Twitter. […] I personally feel most alive when I’m making something. […] You can buy the jogging shoes, but until you put them on and walk out the door every day, you’re just a fat man.

And my favourite?

Reading all the sex manuals in the world is not gonna to do anything until you’re touching genitals.

I’ve huffduffed this interview, Marketplace of Ideas – Merlin Mann.

I did a pretty decent job of calling last year’s YUSU election results well in advance of the night (which was fantastic from a YSTV coverage point of view), so I thought I’d give this year a go too.

A Recap

Last year, I said it was between Langrish and Ngwena for President, and Ngwena took it. Student Activities was won by Rhianna Kinchin, so I called that one totally wrong. Democracy & Services was won by Bretts, Charlie won Academic Affairs, Ben grabbed Welfare and Emily got York Sport, so I got those four right. Still, what’s that? ^4½-ish/₆ ain’t bad.

President

This year, there are six candidates for President. We remove the joke candidate, David Hansen (whose two minute hustings video is absolutely superb, by the way), and we’re left with five. David Levene is too boring, Matthew Freckleton is too unknown and Roberto Powell is (in my own honest opinion) too much of a dick.

Down to two, Ollie Hutchings and current President Tim. I reckon it’ll be fairly close between these two, with Tim getting it as student apathy leans toward the incumbent-who-hasn’t-destroyed-our-union.

Student Activities

Of the four candidates, this will go to either Luke or Nick; they’re the two most visible and involved with campus day-to-day. Nick Scarlett will probably just get it. He seems to have had quite a large ‘following’ (well, of sorts) for as long as I can remember.

Democracy & Services

Chris Etheridge is the safe, stable, normal—and boring—choice; but there’s no way he’ll win. As somebody on Nouse commented during hustings:

Dear Chris Etheridge,
Please return my personality forthwith.
Yours,
John Major

So it’s between Sam Daniels and Dan Walker. This will be the closest of the sabbatical candidates, with Sam just edging it.

Academic Affairs

Jason Rose has too much YUSU-goo attached to him (which desperately needs wiping off), and Matt & Elanin are too unknown, so I think current Welfare office Ben Humphrys will get this.

Welfare

Of the three candidates, one (Andrew McIlwraith) has pulled out – or wasn’t running to start with; so we’re down to Laura or Peter Warner-Medley. Pete took part in York Come Dancing last term, and is generally better known, so he’ll get it. He also has the only other hustings video truly worth seeing.

York Sport

Another close one, but I think Sam will take this over Rob. No real reason, just a gut feeling; possibly more charismatic, slightly easier to imagine getting on with it.

…and who do I want? What, me?

I’d like Tim to be President for another year. He knows what goes on properly now, and everybody knows him; so there’ll be no time wasted and he can get the most out of the year for us.

I want Nick Scarlett to win Student Activities for his policies, Dan Walker to win Democracy & Services, any of Elanin, Matt or Ben (preferably) to be Academic Affairs Officer and Peter to be Welfare Officer.

I’d like to leave you with another comment from ‘Ernie Goldberg’ on Nouse, left during the Presidential Debate from this last week. It’s since been removed, but luckily I grabbed a screenshot at the time:

God why don’t you just all stop wasting everyone’s time. Trousers down, let’s see who’s biggest

Voting opens midnight Monday (in about twenty minutes time) and probably closes at some point before the results next Saturday night, for which YSTV will be providing live coverage all night long.

From a BBC News article today, “Schoolgirl fell to death from bridge after sex claims”:

[St Edward’s School headmaster Dr Andrew Nash] said he had later been told of “unpleasant comments” about Holly which had been placed online and in text messages.
But that was not something the school knew about at the time, he said.
“Facebook is something we worry about because it is so completely outside of our control,” he added.

At least he’s honest.

I don’t know where to start with this.