It's only been a couple of decades since the internet became available to the public and in that time it's become such a part of normal life for so many people worldwide.

I think back to when I was growing up, which was only one or two years ago… There was no Internet, we had computers and even bulletin boards that you viewed by dialled into them using very low speed modems; well low speed compared to today's standards. Last night I joked with my mother that I couldn't fathom how she and Dad managed to bring us up without the internet.

How different would we have been with access to all that information just being a click away?

So invasive has the internet been to our everyday life, that we are always carrying devices to access it; devices we sometimes use to make calls. Compulsively connecting with friends on Facebook, looking up when the next tram is coming, recording a TV show on our digital recorders at home, reading emails, taking and uploading photos, every spare minute is filled with any manor of internet powered task.

All this connectivity and convenience can become an addiction come dependence; some see this as detrimental and others of us like me embrace it and expect it at all times.

This in itself creates many first world problems.

When travelling overseas, data rates can be excessively high and left unchecked  a nasty little surprise form your phone company could be waiting for you in your letterbox upon your return home. I may have had one or two of those experiences; with what I thought was restrained internet usage I racked up a $2,500 phone bill.

Here is my sure fired way to travel, stay connected and do it at a reasonable price. Firstly, turn off data roaming; you do not want your phone to transfer data directly over the phone network for any reason when you are roaming.

• You will need to get yourself a Pocket WiFi device. These devices connect to mobile phone networks and then share internet access via wireless or WiFi for up to five devices. You can find these on eBay for quite a reasonalbe price; just make sure it isn't locked down to a particular phone network.
• Next you need to get a Sim card for the Pocket WiFi, it's easiest to do this when you land in your destination country. It pays to do some prior research and look up the available carriers and their network coverage. Locate one of the carriers stores, talk to a sales assistant and let them know you are looking for a data sim card for the the Pocket WiFi device. The sales person will advise you on the best plan for data.
• Make sure the card is activated before you leave the shop and you have instructions on how to top it up, should you need to.

I found in New Zealand that I could get a prepaid sim card with 500MB preloaded for around $30. Once that 500MB was used, for $20 more you get 2GB. Get the assistant to activate the card and make sure you keep the Sim Card pack which has info needed to top it up online, if needed.

Once up and running you will be able to connect up to 5 devices at a time to the internet at reasonable rates. This is perfect for checking emails, satisfying that Facebook fix and sending out any tweets; I wouldn’t download movies from iTunes but the odd YouTube video shouldn't use all your data allowance.

Good luck and happy travels.

Is that Acetone I detect on your breath?

Okay, so I'm very excited... The Ketonix, Breath Ketone Analyzer, has just arrived...

I heard about the Ketonix on one of Jimmy Moore's podcasts and mentioned it to my chiro, Dr Steve, so he purchased one of each model and we are now going to give them a go.

Since about November 2013 I've been trying to keep myself in ketosis and learn as much as I could about living a fat friendly, low carb life. Initially I was using ketostix to measure ketones in my urine :) nice, I know. But after a while it can be a bit of a drag, so I just got used to how it feels to be in ketosis and just used my gut.

But now we have the Ketonix, so lets see how this goes.

My thoughts on Apple

Apple make beautiful unique pieces of hardware, on the outside that is. On the insides, they are the same as everyone else's; Intel make their processors too.

The last time Steve Gates left (or was thrown out) apple dived, when he arrived back he bought with him a fresh view on usability and interaction along with some amazing design talent which revolutionised personal computing to what we know it as today.

I've been using most platforms extensively over the past 20 years and Apple don't really write the applications that are used everyday, like Adobe's Creative Suite or Microsoft's ubiquitous office Suite. And I know it's a shock to designers everywhere, but the applications work the same, regardless of the Operating System they are running on.

Apple's strengths are they look pretty and that has garnered them a cult like following; the other is their very compatible ecosystem. Their very tight and closed ecosystem is built by excluding other manufactures of hard and soft ware, reducing consumers choice and forcing us to use their profit centric innovations like iTunes.

For the record, I have more iPods than I can use, iPhones lying round and at work I'm surrounded by the Apple logo.

I can use any platform to achieve what I need in work or recreation. I do not like Apple's exclusionary business practices. But I see it as their major downfall; they will only be a niche product when the chips land, I call them a 20 percenter. They'll only ever have 20% of the market when the peak from releasing something new fades in to the back ground....

5 things Julia Gillard should do in the next 6 months.

So it looks like it could be total annihilation for Federal Labor, in Australia, this September when Aussies go to the poll. Julia you have strayed from your Left leaning Labor path and fallen into tit for tat politics with Dr No of Australian politics.

Here are five things you can do to restore our faith in you, if they don't have the affect of getting you voted back in for another term; you will at least leave the country a better place than when you found it.

1. Gay Marriage: Of course this is going to be my #1 suggestion. You are a self proclaimed atheist, so you have no religious objections to Gay Marriage, you live in a partnership with Tim Mathieson and from what I can tell I don't think you are homophobic.
   It smells like political pandering to the small but vocal conservative religious right. Look out, it looks like you are about to be out flanked by the Liberals as they are all coming out in favour of it before you.
   Stop discriminating and start recognising our relationships and our rights.
2. Immigration: It is awful watching the Australian major political parties using refugees as a political foot ball and trying to appeal to the racists and xenophobes, who are also very minor representation of the populous.
   Why don't we start processing the backlog of refugees in Indonesia faster and also bring in at a minimum our international commitments. If the queue is moving, there will be less motivation of having to jump it.
3. Trickle up Economy: Stay the course with your social policies and don't get led astray. Has anyone else noticed how the Australian and US economies, which have stimulus policies, have bounced back faster and stronger than those of the EU, UK and New Zealand?
   Money does not trickle down in an economy, the Rich sit on it. If you feed the many at bottom of the pointy triangle of wealth, the money will eventually flow upwards, flatten the triangle and improve things for everyone.
   The National Disability Insurance Scheme will continue to be one of the great things you and your government has done.
4. Stop the Whaling: Get back into the International court with New Zealand and make motions against the Japanese to stop them from Whaling, there is no point of it and it's screwing up the ecology in the oceans.
   Protect our waters and keep them out, stop leaving it to the Sea Shepherd and the former Leader of the Greens, Bob Brown.
5. Beat Tony Abbott in September: The thought of having Tony Abbott as PM is not very palatable. His shear unpopularity is one the biggest things you have going for you coming into this election. Hopefully he finds it hard to keep his mouth shut for much longer.

Why I hate the cloud!

Well actually, I don't hate the cloud, I hate the use of the term. Just like the title of this article, the phrase 'cloud' is now being used as a marketing tool to get your attention. 

From as far back as I can remember, the internet has been represented as a cloud in network diagrams. The cloud metaphor seems appropriate as the internet is a mish-mash of networks and links which all inter-connect with each other; constructing this redundant hive or cloud like structure.

Humans and technology are evolving faster and faster, each egging the other along. One driver of technology is our perception of we will use and interact with it; rather than actual changes in technology itself.

Here's a little look back in time. Along time ago in this very same galaxy, computer systems comprised of these massive mainframes (which still exist) with 'dumb' terminals connected to them. All the processing was done in these massive building sized mainframes and the terminals were 'interfaces' to them. Bill Gates and Steve Jobs were the pioneers in a time when processing power was miniaturising and being packaged up into devices that we came to know as desktops; with the help of their vision soon desktops were a common sight in many houses.

In the beginning desktops were isolated units with data transfer most commonly performed through 5 1/4" and 3 1/2" floppy disks, SyQuest drives, Zip and Jazz disks; to name a few. Looking back it seems ridiculous and generations who never lived through it would understandably find it hard to comprehend.

With the expansion and normalisation of the internet, these desktops are now connected and massive volumes of data transfer doesn't register in most peoples concious. TV Shows and Movies streamed over the internet is becoming more common than hiring them from a video store.

Most work places (and homes) would now have a LAN (Local Area Network) or internal network, with servers, workstations and of course an internet connection. Business operations happen securely on these networks and communications like email traverse from the internet to the internal network.

Applications and how we store our data over the years has moved from centralisation on a mainframe, to being run directly from our desktops with data stored on a network drive and now we are looking at these two stages in evolution merging into a hybrid.

Web sites are now the locations where we store and present information to the world; goodbye Encyclopaedias as we new them. Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo and others of the like are internet based email services. Google and Bing are internet search engines. All of these are 'Cloud' based services and they have been this way now for over a decade.

The cloud or internet, is a wilderness with any number of people connected from anywhere on the planet with any purpose in mind. Like locks on our houses and trust pacts between the members of our social groups; we are building our own secure networks or clouds that exist on the internet; clouds in the cloud, dare I say it.

Often, I'm asked why don't we just put it in the cloud? we should use the cloud!

This is one of the most non-sensicle thing I hear every day. Do we have a Web site? Where do you think that sits? On the internet. Do we have an intranet site? Where does that sit? On our internal network. We have been and are utilising cloud based services all the time. As a hosting company we are a Cloud provider!

Our current evolution of perception is bringing us around to accept applications do not have to run directly from the device we are using, but they can be supplied over a network connection.

I find it a little ironic that we have come full circle and are moving back to a system where applications and complicated processing is being hosted on powerful servers and the interfaces are merely being presented on terminal like devices (albeit thousands of times more powerful than the original desktops).

This can scale in use and power, from having a desktop in our home that we remote control from a tablet which provides our in home AV experience. To a server in an office environment which provides a virtualised 'Microsoft Word' application on your desktop and massive server arrays which can be rented out per minute and used to render movies.

And where to now for the human race? With open minds we will find new and innovative ways to use our technology. But the one thing we need to keep in mind is security and privacy. The one thing I commonly see is a lack of understanding exactly what the implications are of our use of technology.

For what it's worth, my view on where tech is heading.

A couple of years back when I had the epiphany that I was no longer tied down to a PC as the centre of my personal technology and device network, it was a major paradigm shift.

No longer did I have to connect my phone, palm or fridge to my computer to keep my contacts and calendar in sync. Google Apps, which I had chosen to use, provided a free for 'home' users system to centralise and synchronise my data.

Yes, Exchange and RIM (Blackberry) etc had provided various aspects of this, but their services were mainly aimed at business users and in my opinion, at that stage, their offerings were still fragmented often required some form of physical connectivity to get all of my devices sync'd.

Up until then, avoiding duplicate entries was near on impossible without some third party tool or carefully thought out planning. And let's face it, none of us want to have to think about what's going on in the back ground, it just needs to work.

I have been reading articles and hearing comentaries recently with everyone talking about the cloud, apps, tablets, the end of the PC, i this and i that... I think that everyone is right, partially.

I think the most important feature for future technology is going to be interoperability.

No longer are we going to invest thousands of dollars in a piece of technology like a Desktop Computer that is our primary technological device that we interact with. We won't be buying one phone or tablet, we'll have a small phone for going out and a larger phone for everyday use; different sized tablets have their own benefits.

Technology is becoming more portable and disposable. We are going to expect to be able to pick up a friends tablet or phone and have our own personalised environment available. We will have multiple phones for different occaisions and it's not unreasonable to expect that we receive calls to our phone number on any of them; not to mention having the most up to date contacts details on each; We'll even have different versions of our personal spaces available at different times on the same piece of hardware; Our work profile on the tablet could be a lot different to the personal profile.

I just read this article on mashable stating how Windows 8 will not save the PC Industry (whose sales are falling) and how this could be a sign of the diminishing influence of Microsoft. They do go on to say that when the sales of Tablets and other devices are taken into account the IT industry is growing. This is the evolution of technology and it appears that Microsoft has seen this and is bringing consistency to any device that will be running their operating system.

Now I would say I'm open to all hardware and operating systems, I just want interoperability between everything that I use.

As a Systems Administrator or what ever it is that I really do, I have to design and provide a secure environment for our Company that the staff work in. The two biggest pains in my butt currenty are BYOD's (Bring Your Own Devices) which are owned (and understandably managed) by staff and OS X. Both introduce environments that are difficult to control using something like Active Directory.

Virtual applications running over the network from a server are already in use, internet (or cloud if you like buzz words) based services run through web browsers are also readily available and have penetrated our lives.

I see the amalgamation of our profiles and applications made available over the network and able to run on any device. Similar to the virtual machines people use to run Windows on Apple hardware (for example), but without being tied to and run from any particular operating system.

In the corporate environment, a profile or space can be provided for use by staff, with access to anything they need to perform their job. This space could be secure and isolated from the device that is accessing it.

Our information and how we use it needs to be released from the grip of any particular system. We need the portability; this is how our lifestyle, use and expectation of technology is evolving.

What's in the news today?

Three articles have stood out to me today... Funnily enough, all political.

An article on Romney gaffes... I hope he keeps it up, it would be a disaster for the planet if he gets voted in as president!

Asma Assad... All is revealed... We should have known. 

 Go the Democrats, love your work.

Let's not name Victoria's land marks after homophobes.

Melbourne's new Tennis Stadium is going to be named after Tennis great Margaret Court.

When we name one of our land marks after someone, it not only highlights their accomplishments, but it also brings attention to what they have done with their lives and promote since.

Yes, Margaret has had some admirable successes, but if we are to put her in the spotlight and she uses that to promote her conservative and discriminatory agenda then that is inappropriate.

We are all entitled to our views, but we should be looking at the whole person when we celebrate a person in such a way as naming a stadium after them. I think it would be much more appropriate to name the stadium after a great like Evonne Goolagong.

Let's not celebrate discrimination, please sign this petition.

Change.org|Start an Online Petition »

My I Just Ate It To Do List...

I've just created a page on my Melbourne Restaurant Review Blog where I'm making a list of places I want to eat, recipes I want to cook and things I want to master.

This is probably the best way for me to keep track of these :)

Check it out: Food things I want to do list

The Mayor of Min Lokal

It didn't take much effort, but I am happy to say that I am currently the Right (Dis)Honourable Mayor of Min Lokal on Foursquare!

Min Lokal of course is my local coffee haunt! Amazing food and coffee... The service can be friendly and little cheeky, especially that Tim!

But check out the food at Min Lokal, you'll want to eat everything on the menu! I have.

I've just been asked if a friend should Jailbreak an iPhone

Jail breaking an iphone, or Android at that, will mean you can install apps and utilities on it that Apple, the manufacturer or Telco has blocked or not yet approved/released...

This was one of my original bitches about the iPhone; the Steve Jobs censorship feature... That's why I opted for Android, so I didn't have to Jailbreak it to install what I wanted to install on it.

When I found out I couldn't upgrade to the new versions of Android on my Vodafone molested HTC Magic; I jail broke it so I could install the new versions. Essentially it's what made my phone so slow it was unusable, but this was more due to a combination of the Operating System port and the shit hardware...

Jailbreaking phones works, I've done it several times for other ppl... But if you upgrade the iPhones Operating System afterwards it will remove the jail breaking. Jailbroken iPhone Operating Systems are usually released some time after the offical release. You will need to wait for the Jailbroken version to be released.

I am pretty sure that your warranty is affected if you Jailbreak the phone and we all know that Apple hardware is not 100% reliable, especially the week after the warranty expires.

Personally I'm over the issues I had when I fucked with my last phone; I can't be bothered doing it again.

If you are thinking about Jailbreaking a phone, here are some questions you need to ask yourself:
- If there are apps that you just have to have and can't get from the apps store; go for it.
- If your telco has molested your phone; do it.
- If you bought your iPhone because every thing just works; don't do it.
- If you like to fiddle with computers and looking for a project; then do it, it's good experience.

Here are some pointers:
- Search the net and find some detailed instructions to follow, lots of people have done this already, their experience is invaluable.
- You can usually get phones de-bricked, but if you brick it, it's your fault.
- Backup your phone before hand so you can restore it if you need to.
- Have a spare phone ready to use if you kill yours.

13CABS is useless, call Silver Top!

Here is a review I wrote for the 13CABS app on the Apple Apps Store:


After a bad experience last year waiting 3 hours and 15 cancelled taxi's, I had been using Silver Top until now. Found this app and thought I'd give them another go.

This morning, 2 taxis's decided to pick somone else up on the way to get me. So after 40 minutes waiting I called Silver Top who were there in less than 10 minutes.

ONLY USE THIS APP IF YOU DON'T REALLY EXPECT THE TAXI TO TURN UP.

Install the Silver Top Taxi App. Not as usable, but if it's a taxi you want, they are the ones to call.

Tony Moynihan marries Vanessa McLean

Today my brother Tony married his girl friend Vanessa. I wasn't able to make it to London for the wedding, so I sent them this telegram:


Dear Vanessa and Tony,

First, I'll start off by welcoming Vanessa into our family and wishing her the best of luck :) she's going to need it.

I've know Tony all of his life, a large chunk of which has been across the Tasman, but the bonds of brotherly love are strong and geographical separation has not changed that.

I can still remember at primary school Tony sticking up for his older brother against the school bullies... A slightly embarrassing memory for me, but a good indication of his strength of character and loyalty.

I had been afraid that Tony would never leave New Zealand, but someone special entered his life, he got off his butt and worked his way to London. That had been the biggest and is turning out to be the most rewarding decision of his life.

Just over a year ago, our grandmother passed away, I know that she would have been so happy that one of her grandchildren had been married off and that she finally had a granddaughter.

Which makes me think that it is kind of surreal that I am going to have a sister in law, a welcome and much needed addition to our Male dominated family. Vanessa, I hope you don't make his sandwiches in the morning and when it comes to the house work, make him do the toilet!

I love my brother and we see each other far too sporadically, but thank jehova for Facebook, I get to see what you are up to and some oh so unsavoury photos... Watch out, I set mother up with a Facebook account too, so the mothers mafia still knows what you are getting up to.

Vanessa, you have made a great choice and I hope you and Tony have fun together on life's oh so bumpy road.

I wish I could be there with you today to celebrate and I look forward to meeting Vanessa soon. I hope you guys have a spare room.

I know Mum and Dad are very happy for the both of you and with all of my love, congratulations.

Marky Mark

I'm a published photographer...

Well, okay, that might be stretching it a bit, but one of my photos was selected by Schmap, a Melbourne Guide mash up, to be used in their latest edition.

It is a picture of some boys playing soccer in Albert Park Lake... I was there with Stephen, Mark and Timbo from Sydney...

Too funny :)

http://www.schmap.com/melbourne/sights_prahran/p=141504/i=141504_19.jpg

Windows 7 you more than make up for Vista!

So... I got myself a Dell Mini 9 from Vodafone on a plan which includes 5GB/month and the Mini 9. It came with a scaled down version of XP, which I'm over. Although I hate Vista, I feel like XP is going back and I'm just not into that.

So I did some Googling and found that people had been installing Windows 7 on their Mini 9 with some success and they also said that it ran better than XP did, so I thought, thank god I had signed up to the Windows 7 Beta program.

A day or two after I got the Mini 9 I installed Windows 7 on it and gave it a shot. I found that it did run better that when XP was on it, I loved the new interface and for a 'low end' spek'd laptop it was great.

I can't wait for them to release Windows 7 I want to use it on every computer I work on.

Great one M$ you've got a winner in this one!

I'm back!

Well, since my last post, I've moved to Prahran and have started riding my push bike to and from work.

I got a Scott Sportster P2 and I love it. I now have the freedom to get back and forth from work and home in around 20 minutes. That is half the fastest time I have ever made it using public transport.

Vista is a sack of S**T!!!

Okay, I've had enough!

So I was an early adopter of Vista and I loved it, well, I love the improvements that they have made to the interface.

I'm used to all the changes and I don't like to go back to the XP interface...

But god knows what they did under the hood! It would have to be the worst performing operating system they have ever produced. I'm sick of the lethargic response I receive when I click on something, I'm sick of my computer locking up and trying to catch up with itself and I absolutely detest the fact that an application will turn opaque and stop responding...

I am over Vista, I'd rather use DOS.

Microsoft, Windows 7 had better be all it's cracked up to be and it had better work on my Laptop.

Grrrr on you for Vista! It's a DUD!

Happy Birthday to Me...

Well, today is my birthday...

I've had lots of my lovely friends give me beautiful birthday wishes, which I would like to thank them all for.

This year, my theme is moderation and control. So I am having a very quiet birthday for once and going out for dinner with a couple of friends.

Currently I'm enjoying a glass or two of sparkling Shiraz with Ange and Oscar. I've taken the day off and are looking for a new place to live.

Love to you all.

mx

Ha Ha Oscar

She's out.

Barack Obama - Evita - Madonna

I am so happy and so pleased that the American people have 'come out' and voted for Barack Obama.

It is inspiring that someone with such intellectual and balanced judgment has been put forward to lead his nation. A nation that has so much potential to lead the world in showing acceptance and equality.

And here is an insight to the camp side of my life...

It just so happens, that at this time of Obama I have been exposed to Evita.

Are we sure that Andrew Lloyd Webber is not gay?

I loved Phantom and I love Evita. Fabulous.

I've only just come to see the similarities in their story... Although there are some major differences.

They have both envigorated their fellow country man to fight for their rights...

Wealth and prosperity to all... It's not a communist thought... Just check out this link, I read it today and think it's great...

Either way, they have/will bring a great revolution to their country.

Obama, I look forward to the next eight years of your presidency.