UK Thoughts

UKTHOUGHTS UPDATE

2005-01-12T23:11:00.000Z

UK Thoughts is moving up in the world!

The new site is located at ukthoughts.co.uk. Please head over there and check it out.

Thanks and see you there.

Dave

P.S. Don't forget to update your bookmarks.

That time of year again...

2004-12-22T16:04:00.000Z

Just a quick note to wish you all Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Hope you get everyting you ask for and stay safe!

See you all next year.

Dave

Some people...ba!

2004-12-20T22:33:00.000Z

This really annoyed me on Friday. Some idiots in my college have decided to make a "magazine" to be printed monthly - now that idea in itself I have no problem with, it's the way they have done it that aggravates me!

Take the layout for example: The whole thing is like a big jumble of fonts, all with different sizes. Obviously the loser who made thinks it looks really good, when in fact it is embarrassing for him just reading it.

When I design anything I adopt the motto “Simple. Clean. Hip.”, because as long as you stick to it like glue, 99.9% of the time the end product will be half descent. Take UK thoughts for example, I had lots of ideas for this new design, but not enough space, so I decided not to pack it to the rafters with stuff, but instead not include it until I find a way around the problem.

Next on the hate list is the actual articles, they very inaccurate and out of date - they have reviews of films over 1 year old! You may (or may not) know that I am a die hard Halo 2 fanboy, and surprise surprise just to p*ss me off even more there is a (sarcasm) really in-depth (sarcasm) review of Halo 2. It couldn’t be any worse, it is very inaccurate, badly worded and uses screenshots from the first game!

…but I am sure little Jimmy and co's parents are really proud and really gave it their all, so hats off to them (NOT!).

If anyone else had any experiences with poor design (websites, advertising etc…) I would love to hear them.

Cool wallpapers just for you

2004-12-08T22:02:00.000Z

To celebrate the new look I have some wallpapers for you so that you can have an uber cool desktop.

Download Wallpaper 1

Download Wallpaper 2

Download Wallpaper 3

Thanks to enhancedlabs.com for the wallpaper template.

UPDATE: New look up and running, normal service will now resume :D

Halo 2 is taking over the internet

2004-12-08T17:22:00.000Z

This story made my laugh. Halo 2 is being used so much by online gamers that the servers of ISP's cannot cope with all the bandwidth usage - it is just that good!

Read the story here.

2004 was the year of the blog

2004-12-01T16:54:00.000Z

Yey! The word 'blog' is apparently the top word of 2004.

SOURCE BBC NEWS

TOP 10 WORDS OF 2004

1. blog

2. incumbent

3. electoral

4. insurgent

5. hurricane

6. cicada

7. peloton

8. partisan

9. sovereignty

10. defenestration

Merriam-Webster defines a blog as: "a Web site that contains an online personal journal with reflections, comments and often hyperlinks".

Its list of most looked-up words is drawn up every year and it discounts terms such as swear words, that everyone likes to look up, or those that always cause problems, such as "affect" and "effect".

Merriam-Webster said "blog" was the word that people have asked to be defined or explained the most over the last 12 months.

The word will now appear in the 2005 version of Merriam-Webster's printed dictionary.

However, the word is already included in printed versions of the Oxford English Dictionary.

A spokesman for the Oxford University Press said that the word was now being put into other dictionaries for children and learners reflecting its mainstream use.

"I think it was the word of last year rather than this year," he said.

"Now we're getting words that derive from it such as 'blogosphere' and so on," he said.

"But," he added, "it's a pretty recent thing and in the way that this happens these days it's got established very quickly."

It can only be a good thing, right.

More soon..

Some cool photo stuff

2004-11-30T20:59:00.000Z

I have just set up FotoBuzz for UK thoughts. It allows you to add comments to a image and is really easy to implement for me :)

The picture is of Havana in Cuba, which I took when I went there in March of this year. Hopefully I'll use FotoBuzz all the time from now on...if it works.

Make love , not spam!!

2004-11-29T17:54:00.000Z

As a little update to a previous post, Lycos have released one of the greatest ideas I have ever heard.

It is a screensaver that sends requests to a know spam websites, and basically causes massive bandwidth costs (which is basically the transfer rate of data, 20'000 visits = 1 GB). What this basically means is that the more people who download it, the more sites that can be stopped. Brilliant!

If you want a copy of this, then go to the Lycos Anti-spam screensaver website and for more information on it check out the BBC News article.

Peace!

i (like) Tunes

2004-11-29T17:15:00.000Z

Well after lost of recommendations from friends I have finally downloaded iTunes, and, for the most part I have to say I am impressed.

The best part of it in my opinion is the ease of use, in the best part of 30 seconds after downloading and installing it I was ready to (legally) download! I love the fact that that I have a vast selection of high quality music at my finger-tips.

Each track costs 79p (US 99c) and is encoded in the format .aac - which, surprisingly enough is combatable with Mac's iPod. This is where the only draw back is in my opinion. I don't have an iPod. The .aac format is also encrypted so that I cannot convert the files to .mp3 using iTunes, and I cannot find a 3rd party application to do it for me.

Even if you don’t have access to a debit or credit card, you can still use it to listen to 30 seconds of a track, which is particularly good when you are trying to find out name of that annoying track that has been buzzing round your head for the past 6 months or so.

I will continue my search for a legal alternative to Kazaa and other ‘less legal’ such applications - Please feel free to suggest any. Oh and buy the way, you can buy me a iPod for Christmas, if you like ;-)

UPDATE: I have added a 'Now Playing' list to the sidebar - this shows my last 5 played songs from iTunes and is updated as the songs are played.

Vote!

2004-11-02T21:37:00.000Z

If you are a US citizen and eligible to vote, get out there and vote! Sure there might be some long ques but this is your chance to exersise your democratic right and decide who shapes your country (and the rest of the world).

With this election looking as if it could go either way every vote counts.

The reason I am asking for you to vote even though I am not a US citizen is because I believe that elections are key to a healthy democracy and that otherwise someone that no one wants in power ends up in power. This is how Labour got in power over here in the UK – over 65’s were the only group to really turn out in large numbers and can easily sway the vote one way.

Lastly good luck to Mr. Bush and Mr. Kerry – may the best man win!

Not so free freeview

2004-09-29T17:50:00.000+01:00

I have just purchased a freeview box from Argos for £59.99 and I have to say it has surprised me. Most of my mates have Sky and Sky+, but not everyone has the money or house to have the market leader in their home, but freeview is different, it lets you enjoy all the joys of digital broadcasting and channel line up without the price of Sky any other services. It has a lot of features such a EPG (Electronic Programme Guide) and the option for it to remind you of programmes you want to watch, as well as a connection to your VCR or DVD recorder if you want to record anything with a press of a button (using the 2nd SCART socket and Easylink feature).

The only problem is that there some encrypted channels such as E4 which are available only by paying £8 a month from the new service called Topup TV, which allows you to view a few more digital channels through your old ON digital box or using some new boxes coming out with a card slot.

I think this is an outrage that some company is charging for none subscription channels such as the Discovery channel and everyone else is stuck with these channels on their freeview box that they can never view because they don't have a card slot! What is the point!

Anyway I got aPhilips DTR 1500 Set Top Box, by the way.

P.S. Sorry I have not posted recently, but my ADSL modem broke so I have been unable to get on the internet.

Say NO to pop-ups

2004-09-10T21:49:00.000+01:00

Pop-ups - the curse of the World Wide Web. I believe that the only advertising that should be 'allowed' is text based that isn't "in your face", for example Google Adsense.

As with everything, there are pros and cons. I have designed a few websites since I took it up, and I have never (and never will) use pop-up / under advertising because I believe it decreases the user experience of a website and forces it on the user. They can be used in a good way as long as the user initiates them e.g. Site feeds under the header above, and on bbcnews.com. Another aspect of the 'pop-up' style is SPAM, which apparently makes up 50% of all e-mails, yes 50%, 1/2, whatever you want to call it.

Spyware, I mean what right to these companies have to invade on peoples computers and mess them up with completely irrelevant advertising....”Do you want a smaller penis? If so send your credit card details, including PIN number to us you can!"...Why!? I don't care!

I have found a number of good free tools to combat the "war on Spyware":

Google Toolbar - Blocks pop-ups and includes some other useful tools.

Spybot-S&D - Great tool for removing unwanted spyware and other stuff. Please feel free to make a donation.

Remember kids good-looking advertising is fine, pop-ups and Spam is not!

P.S. Hats off to Google, and MSN.

Dell and Microsoft strike back!

2004-09-09T17:38:00.000+01:00

...but I was up to my head with work.... think it's time for an early night :-)

Why was the all-powerful, master of time management (bollo*ks) up to his head with work? Well, Those of you who know me will properly know that I recently (less than 1 month ago) splashed out on a brand new Dell laptop. I have been very pleased with this purchase, until now.

I was happily typing away to myself, when the egg timer randomly appeared, so I thought to myself "fair enough". Before I knew what day it was Windows Bluescreen appeared yapping on about some error and that I should restart my computer....so I did.

But, and this is a big but, when I turned back on it displayed a black screen with the words "hard drive not found". I thought "Mother of God". Anyway after some strong worded calls with a Bombay call centre to some girl called "Jesse" I finally gave up and accepted Dell's offer of a replacement hard drive.

Luckily (I suppose) it wasn't my main computer; otherwise I would be in deep s....

This hasn’t put me off dell, but will make me think twice about computing in the bath (please don’t try that, its sounds dangerous :-)and it might be to do with the fact I binned Internet Explorer and got Mozilla Firefox less that 24h before…hmmmmmmmm.

Stick with Firefox and you wont go wrong!

My bad!

2004-09-09T17:27:00.000+01:00

Just a quick note to say I fixed the CSS problem with the website. I would have got around to it sooner, but I was up to my head with work.... think it's time for an early night :-)

Shock! Horror!.....Girl gamers

2004-09-07T21:01:00.000+01:00

Although the world of gaming is mostly seen as a male past time, this is beginning to change.More and more girls are getting into games, but still the gaming industry still sees its self as an 'all male' industry. Admittedly I have only met one member of the opposite sex that actually plays Halo frequently, however that was her only good purchase, not naming any other games.*cough*Starsky and Hutch*cough*. During online game play I have met far less female games than male, although they are out there.

Women are one of the keys to increasing the appeal of interactive software as mass market entertainment, according to a new White Paper announced today by ELSPA (the Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association).

Examining the role of women, both as producer and consumer, in the dynamic computer and video games sector, Chicks and Joysticks: An Exploration of Women and Gaming highlights the opportunities and challenges facing the industry in appealing to the female gamer.

Girls clearly need catering for in the gaming world, and you never know one day we could all be playing Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball: Unisex

It...It's alive!

2004-09-07T13:07:00.000+01:00

I recently finished work on the new look version of ukt. It mainly uses CSS to give the look I want, and features a very nice rotation header. The header randomly rotates about 12 .jpg pictures and I will add / remove some as time goes on.

Hope you like it!

It' s all about the Blog

2004-09-05T23:12:00.000+01:00

I have been Blogging for some time now, and have used most of the Blogging programs out there, and I have to say Blogger is the best one out there. Sure, it has its downsides (no categories, archive index), but these are all in the process of being implemented, or there are several work arounds available.

Bloggers have a harder and harder task facing them each day. The task is to actually create a unique and entertaining blog (that is to get readers anyway), this is because the Blogger community is growing every day. Blogging is a lot like writing a diary, especially when some blogs never even get read by anyone but the author. One thing that is a danger to Bloggers, is the problem of making sure credit is given to authors of work they 'copy' and making sure they don't annoy any big cooperation's.

I can think of two instances where Blogger's have been fired for having a blog, but what has not yet happened is a Blogger getting sued or taken to court for some other reason related to the content they write. Although it is just a matter of time.

I, at least, hope I am doing a good job of keeping you up to date on current events .

Dave

Links

2004-08-31T22:38:00.000+01:00

UPDATED: 02/09/04

Below are some links to websites that I use regularly, or that I think you will find interesting. This page will be updated periodically.

Please note UK Thoughts takes no responsibility for the content or validity of information contained within these external sites.

News sites
Google News - http://news.google.com/
BBC News - http://www.bbcnews.com/
MSNBC - http://www.msnbc.com/
Ferrago - http://www.ferrago.com/
Latest Gaming News - http://news.cannonfodderclan.co.uk/

Website Tools
Microsoft Frontpage - http://www.microsoft.com/frontpage/
Macromedia - http://www.macromedia.com
W3C - http://www.w3.org/

Gaming
Official Xbox Website - http://www.xbox.com/
IGN corp. - http://www.ign.com/
Bungie - http://www.bungie.net/
Half Life 2 - http://www.half-life.com/

Tools
Google - http://www.google.com/
Gmail - http://gmail.google.com/
Altavista - http://www.altavista.com/
Meta Critic - http://www.metacritic.com/

Shopping
Amazon UK - http://www.amazon.co.uk/
Amazon US - http://www.amazon.com/

Political
Cost of war - http://costofwar.com/
Jib Jab - http://www.jibjab.com/

Other
Blogger Forum - http://www.bloggerforum.com/

Blogs
Hack a Day [beta] - http://www.hackaday.com/

Projects

2004-08-31T22:19:00.000+01:00

This is where any projects I am currently working on, or used on this site, will be posted for download / viewing. These may include videos, art work, or website scripts.

August 2004

There are no projects for August, please use the link above to get to this page in the future

September 2004

Random image header - This script is used for the main header of this site.

Mobile Phone's and health - After seeing a very interesting program on BBC One called 'Should I be Worried About...Mobile Phones' I have decided to investigate into this, I will post back my findings soon.

November 2004

[IN PROGRESS] Munshini - A clothes company needs a website to display their goods. So they called in the professionals (me).

December 2004

Toggle Fluid Page Width - If you click the two little buttons at the top right the width of the site will change from around 700px to 95%.

Snail Mail: Reloaded

2004-08-31T15:33:00.000+01:00

Gmail is in the new service from Google that provides 1000MB of e-mail space, while maintaining a simple user interface that we have come to know from Google. I have been using Gmail since it first when beta have to say it is the best e-mail service I have ever used.

There has been a lot of press about how Gmail reads your e-mails in order to display relevant, and wait for it, useful advertising without popping up in your face and taking up the whole page. I actually found myself actually 'clicking' an advert instead of spending five minutes angrily closing pop-ups.

An example of an e-mail I got from Xbox.com

Gmail also offers a search tool powered by the flexible, and proven Google search technology. I have not used the search much as I have not archived vast amounts of e-mails, but if after a long time using Gmail it will come in handy as a quick way to find an important e-mail I got 5 months ago.

Rivals of Gmail are going to have their work cut out when Gmail is released to the general public, and in the mean time if you want to become a Gmail beta tester I have 9 Gmail accounts to give away, yes nine! So if you want one, post your e-mail and a bit about your self below and I'll get back to you.

Olympic bye bye

2004-08-29T23:28:00.000+01:00

Now that the Olympic Games have officially ended, I would not like to be in Greek shoes. The Greek's have put on a tremendous games this time, and deserve full credit for finishing everything in time, and keeping security top notch, except for today's marathon, which I thought was a complete outrage (those drunk Irish priests eh!) and completely unfair on Vanderlei de Lima.

The spectacular closing ceremony was a show of Greek culture and climaxed with the flame extinguished and the flag lowered. It has been a good year for the people of Greece, first Euro 2004 and now the Olympic Games.

So back to why I wouldn't want to be the Greeks now, well it has to do with all that money they have invested for a 16 day event, which means they will be left with hundred's of 'Millennium Domes' from al these specially built complexes for swimming, volley ball etc.

I just hope that if London hosts the games in 2012, they don't make the same mistakes as other previous hosts have. It's such a waste of money for 16 days of sport!

Even more selfishness

2004-08-29T20:20:00.001+01:00

HP is releasing its own version of Apple's popular iPod, but disappointingly it has the same design as the regular one, only with a snazzy plastic cover. The price will be $299 for the 20-gigabyte model, or $399 for the 40-gigabyte model, which gladly are the same as Apple's current prices. Who would spend more for the same product anyway?

Hewlett-Packard Co. Released this undated photo of its own version of the iPod portable music player Friday, showing the fruits of a partnership it had previously announced with Apple Computer Inc.

The players will be available in early September -- the same month HP will release about two dozen other new consumer products, including a 42-inch plasma television and an all-in-one home theater projector, which were also announced Friday.

It seems HP want the smash hit of Apple's No.1 gadget success for their new line of products. This stylish MP3 now joins its family along side the iPod mini and regular iPod and are a sure bet to be snapped up just as quick.

And no, I won't be getting one.

About

2004-08-29T15:40:00.000+01:00

UPDATED:
UK thoughts site

This website is my thought pad and my showcase of what I can do using digital media. It was designed using Macromedia web publishing products and I aimed to make it look professional, at the same time keeping it simple. The aims I stuck to during the design process are outlined in the following bullet points:

Try to get a close to valid XHTML as possible.

Don't over complicate it.

Use CSS to do most of the work for the look.

Try to get a close to XHTML valid as possible.

Simple. Clean. Hip.

I hope I have achieved this with V.2 of UK thoughts, and if you have any suggestions for it then please let me know.

UK thoughts site: Stuff used

Just in case anyone wanted to know how I did anything of this site I have created this bit to show them:

Listamatic – Used for the horizontal menu above.

Flash Clock – Can be seen in the header and made by me.

FotoBuzz – Used for some image related posts.

UK thoughts site: Site Updates

I will post any little/big changes I make to the site here:

20/12/04: It's snowing all over the site! and some elves have put up a merry Christmas banner!

About Me

Next up is me :-)

My name is David Longworth and I'm from Bolton (Peter Kay land to everyone else), I have been a web designer for 2 years and a journalist for various gamming websites in my time.

I have my own Xbox Live clan, with appropriately called 'The Cannon Fodder Clan'. So if you have Xbox Live please consider joining it. Another clan you should check out is Ukrockers - since I joined over 1 year ago, I was the 1st none staff member (-: They have grown MASSIVE and support Playstation 2 , Xbox, Gamecube, PC, Dreamcast and the list goes on.

I am currently working of two websites for some companies, so when I have finished I will give you the URLs and you can check them out for yourself.

See you around and hope you like my blog.

Dave

Halo too much

2004-08-29T15:03:00.000+01:00

Any of you out there who own an Xbox will probably know about this sequel the possibly the greatest first person shooter ever. However some people who have know of Halo 2's existence for a long time now have been waiting for over 11 months for this game, and I for one am loving every minute of it.

"Halo 2 is a lot like Halo 1, only it's Halo 1 on fire, going 130 miles per hour through a hospital zone, being chased by helicopters and ninjas ... And, the ninjas are all on fire, too."
-Jason Jones
Bungie Studios

Bungie have been releasing a slow trickle of information since they announced Halo 2, the most interesting being the 'Bungie Weekly Updates' which let the general public get a sneak insights into the world of Halo 2, and the very talented people who work there.

Another one of the things they have done is set up a 'fake website' called ilovebees.com, which appeared at the end on a Halo 2 cinematic trailer.

On Ilovebees.com, is a number of clues about the Halo 2 story line (and some bogus ones too). It has been recently updated with some new links to various random sound files, but it use to have a count down clock on the main page, that seemed to be counting down to August 24th 2004 so many fans believed that Halo 2 would be released then, instead of November 9th (11th UK). August 24th came, and went with no sign of Halo 2, so the search goes on...

George Dubbahu Bush

2004-08-29T01:55:00.000+01:00

Although Iam not an American, I do believe that John Kerry should be the next US president, why? Well because Mr. Bush is a joke, he can't even eat without messing up.

I believe that going to Iraq had to be done, however not in the way bush did. The UK (who has experience in these sorts of wars) should have had more input along with the other coalition forces.

Here are a few links you might find interesting:

Anything on this site are my own opinions.

Kelly Holmes gets gold! (again)

2004-08-28T22:45:00.000+01:00

Well done to Kelly Holmes as she becomes the first Briton for 84 years to achieve the Olympic middle-distance double.

"I can't believe it - I'm gobsmacked," Holmes said afterwards

Kelly won the 800m gold on Monday, and can now add 1500m gold to her collection. Kelly's tactics of hanging back until the last second kept everyone on their seats, some even screaming at their TV.

It is a proud proud day for British athletics today, so expect to see more from Kelly in the future.

Did you watch it, if so what did you think?

Well Well....

2004-08-28T22:10:00.000+01:00

Another day another new blog to join the thousands already available through the one, the only push button publishing system Blogger.

This blog will be a place for me to publish my views on how the UK is run, and the good, the bad and the well the awful parts of the country I have lived in my whole life.

I will also post links to any good websites I come across in my daily crawl of the internet and the occasional news story I think you might find of interest.

This is where you come in, you can just come here and read my articles, or you can also post your views on the post via the comments system.

See you all soon!

Dave