Technology At The Olympic Venues
One thing that has dissappointed me has been the information at the venues about what is happening elsewhere. For instance, I really didn’t realise yesterday how we had won the team show jumping until I got home.
Perhaps it’s because everybody relies on their smart phones. But I don’t! I would have paid for a medal update text alert. But I couldn’t find one.
The Rise of Gambling Spam
I’ve had the impression for a week or so now, that the amount of spam I’m getting from dodgy gambling sites has been grown somewhat.
On the 1st, to the 7th of August, I’ve received 26, 32, 25, 21, 35, 24 and 29 messages respectively. A few months ago, they were quite rare.
They are ideal practice for using the Delete key on your computer.
I must admit I do like the odd small bet, but then only when I have inside information about the nag involved.
The only thing I do with Spam is occasionally eat it, as I’m a coeliac and it’s gluten-free.
I have now found that most of this spam comes from a website called http://www.promotion-rewards.com,which is registered with a Slovenia address.
It Must Be The Silly Season!
I’m getting masses of spam, trying to get me to join casinos. I haven’t seen it at this level for a couple of years.
They say there’s one born every minute, but it would appear that most of them are promoting on-line casinos. I suppose it could be due to a large number of unemployed kids, who’ve just left university and this is the only job they can get.
It’s so sad really.
WordPress Change Picture Sizing
One of the things that annoys me is when people have a good system and then they change it for no good reason.
When I enter a picture in WordPress, I like them to be a particular size of 450 x 337, just like in this post.
I enter everything in visual mode and then once I’ve uploaded the picture, I edit it to get the right size. You used to just click the picture and then got an edit dialog, where you type in the size you want.
Now though the edit icon wants you to resize the picture using the mouse. It’s crap, as far as I’m concerned.
So now, I have to switch to text mode and change the values directly.
Why don’t people leave well enough alone.
Canoe Slalom At The Lee Valley – Video
I made up this video to give a view of what it is like at the Lee Valley White Water Centre.
It should be up later today. The trouble with video, is I can only make it on my old computer. And guess what M$ have upsexed the video maker, to make it more difficult to use. I want my old one back. When something works well don’t mess about with it!
What I Remember About The Opening Ceremony From Beijing In 2008
As a computer person, I remember the computer screens around the stadium, showing Microsoft’s infamous blue screens of death. I’m not the only person either. Perhaps they hadn’t paid the licence fees.
Let’s hope they use good old-fashioned technology tonight.
Now Nationwide Drops A Clanger
According to this report on the BBC and a message on their site, Nationwide have processed debit card transactions twice. It didn’t affect me, as I only use a debit card to get money from a cash machine.
This should never happen.
I have said that processing and senior management should be co-located and preferably at the same place where the programmers work.
As in this Nationwide clanger over 700,000 accounts were affected, it is quite likely that several senior managers or their friends would have been effected by the error. If those managers were worth employing, they should have been straight on to those responsible to find out what had happened. Co-location puts the fear of God into operators and programmers. Try doing that if they’re halfway around the world.
But at least in this clanger, Nationwide found out what had happened quickly and rectified it within 48 hours. But how much did the whole incident cost Nationwide and its customers? And as Nationwide is a mutual, how much did it indirectly cost its members?
I always remember Bob, the guy who taught me cost accounting, said that banks had a totally different approach to the way things added up. Perhaps things haven’t changed all that much!
Smart Bank Managing
When David was Metier’s bank manager, he did not put us in the bank’s database as a software company, but as a computer leasing company, as we leased the hardware and software as a package. He once told me, this was because those that be in the bank considered computer software to be decidedly high risk, but computer leasing, which was generally huge mainframes to FTSE 500 companies was a low one. He didn’t point out to those-that-thought they-knew-better, that some of the bank’s biggest losses had been in computer leasing. But then David had trust in his customers and knew those that would deliver. We did!
When David once asked me what was the difference between hardware and software, I told him, that the former hurts when you drop it on your foot and the latter doesn’t.
Verified By Visa Revisited
I have moaned about this crap before.
I have been fighting it for a couple of hours and in the end I managed to buy two extra Olympic tickets. Can the reason that so many people find buying these tickets difficult is you must use a Visa card and you can’t fight your way through this awful system?
I have just written to my credit card company, saying that after the Olympics, they can put their Visa card in a place where it will hurt.
Today I was adding a new password all the time and then when I tried it the next it was rejected, so I had to start again. Surely entering a new password every time you use the card is the most insecure way to use a credit card on line.
It might well be that the US version of this system works because everybody uses the last four digits of their Social Security Number. In the UK no-one knows theirs and anyway it ends in a letter. So perhaps the problem is that the system has not been properly rewritten for the UK.
Anyway it’s crap!
Another Good Reason Not To Use Facebook
It would appear according to this report on the BBC’s web site, that everything about Facebook, isn’t as it should be.
I wonder what is going to be the next social network phenomena!
The Anonymous Widower 