Category Archives: Tech

Psychology, Tech

Hey, What’s Your Name?

Google Home Mini

Image by antonbe from Pixabay

Our current group (party, gaggle, company) of smart-speaker voice assistants have real names, Siri, Alexa, Cortana and Google.  Eh.  Why didn’t Google give their assistant a name, a proper name.  She clearly has a personality of sorts, even if it is pre-programmed, and apparently now has feelings to hurt if you swear at her or speak impolitely.  If she was a real person she would, I’m sure, be embarrassed by her name and people would say “did her parents have a bad sense of humour?”

It’s not just me being flippant, for me it just doesn’t feel natural saying “OK Google” or “Hey Google”.  I’m sure they think it sounds cool but imagine if everyone who meets you and asks you a question had to prefix it with “Hey Joe” or “Hey Sue” or worse still “Hey Human” it would get boring very quickly, for both parties.  As for “OK Joe” – that just sounds unnecessarily aggressive.  I think it’s the “OK” or “Hey” prefix that niggles, just asking “Google?” would be a little better, to be fair.

If we are to, in the future, have a natural verbal interaction with technology it has to be exactly that – natural – not an excuse to crowbar the name of the service provider into the conversation.  At the end of the day you’re likely to know you’re using a Google device.  Their approach seems to hark back too much to the original Star Trek’s “Computer…”

Hey Google, please grace your AI with a real name, those of us who feel daft saying “Hey Google” might use it more.  Personally, having lived in Newark, and more specifically worked with a certain Mr Johnson for twenty years, a natural way to summon her would be to say “Now then Mush, what’s the weather like today?”

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Productivity, Tech, Work

No More Lines

This isn’t a campaign against schools’ repetitive handwriting-based punishments, nor against linear markings of any kind as such – they have their uses, keeping traffic apart on roads, for example.  No the lines I’m referring to are on paper.

When learning to write we had lined paper of course to keep us on the straight and narrow, to keep our exercise books tidy and stop the words flowing across the page like the Yorkshire Dales, but they naturally limit how much can fit on a page and how you can organise blocks of text.

I prefer to use plain paper notebooks now for writing notes.

At work I have an A5 plain-paper notebook and on each page I write things to do, notes when someone rings about something I need to find out for them etc and I have found that I can fit far more on each page this way, even appending information into a blank space to the right, or draw a fenced-off area in a blank space and write a small reminder or some other such snippet or list in it and not lose it. When a page is full any outstanding items are copied to the top of the next blank page and the process repeats. The bonus is that the information is retained in the book, unlike using post-it notes or scrap paper which gets lost or thrown away ten minutes before somebody asks if you’ve still got the information and you need to start sorting through a thousand paper balls and used tea bags.

For this blog I use a similar system but instead of a notebook I use a grey and green suede A5 six-ring binder that’s a nice addition to the desk and loose leaf paper that is removed and binned as soon as the notes are transferred to Evernote. I found I needed to do it this way as I usually think of things to write about when the computers aren’t on and I can’t risk that by the time I’ve started either of them up and then Evernote that I’ll have forgotten what I was going to… erm.. oh yes, say.

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Business, Gadgets, Language, Tech, Work

There’s No Answer to That

Telephone
Image by Here and now, unfortunately, ends my journey on Pixabay from Pixabay

The answerphone has been around for a while but I’m not sure that giving some people the ability to record their own answer message was a wise idea.

There are the ones who think it’s cute and sweet to get their kids to record the message – a real example, they sang “mummy and daddy are not at home, leave a message after the tone” really, slowly.  The rhyming is just about acceptable, the high pitched whine, not so.  Its OK if it’s nanna ringing but when you’re having to ring them three, four or eight times a day to try to arrange an installation or to try to get payment from mummy and daddy the little darlings’ singing gets irritating real quick. 

Though not as irritating as the man who was trying to sound like some kind of nineties “dude” –  please brace yourself – “Yo! Yo!  You’re through to Karl. If you wanna leave a message then you can, it you don’t then…” suddenly sounding like an eighties local radio DJ “…juuust hang up!”  I stifled my laughter, left a message and hung up.

The “insert name here” automated message can be interesting.  “Welcome to the telco messaging service…” the softly spoken woman intones, “DAVE” a gruff male voice barks, then the woman’s back”…cannot take your call, please leave a message after the beep”  One user completely missed the point and it went like this: “Welcome to the Sky messaging service, hi, I’m not available to take your call, leave a message after the beep, is not available to take your call, please leave a message after the beep.”  Hmm.

The telcos are not always so much better – one which shall remain nameless tries to be a bit ladish and overly informal by saying “…when yer done, just hang up”.  Picky, I know, but such things grate with me sometimes.  The other network issue is the overly lengthy message, “…please leave your message after the beep.  When you’ve finished recording please hang up (no shit, I was going to wait) or to change your message press hash” by now the person I was leaving the message for is trying to call me back and I haven’t even got as far as leaving a message.

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Gadgets, Productivity, Tech, Work

From Paper to Pixels, By Phone

Documents

Image by Jerzy Górecki from Pixabay

One problem with email is keeping messages of interest beyond the confines of the email system.  Short of emailing them to another account it used to be difficult to save something interesting, useful or funny and the only option was to copy and paste into a word document.  I have many files of such amusements but also many printed emails of jokes and so on from previous workplaces.

Over the years I’ve tried to digitise piles of saved magazine articles and such like using a variety of desktop scanners and the one problem has been speed – the scanning process taking thirty seconds to a minute per page and then if I wanted to manipulate the text I’d have to run it through an OCR (optical character recognition) program to extract the words, taking even more time.

I’d finally decided to have another crack at the problem of a pile of funny emails stuffed in a box file and vaguely remembered seeing smartphone apps that can scan documents using the high-res main camera and save them as Adobe PDF files.  I searched and downloaded Adobe’s own app and it’s again amazing how technology has moved on.  As new phone cameras have improved in quality the images produced are crisp and clear so are perfect for document archiving.  When you start scanning the software automatically detects the edges of the document, photographs it, straightens it and then, best of all, before giving the option of scanning more pages or saving to PDF it OCRs the text too.

The end result is a portable document, or multiple pages in one file if necessary, which even has selectable text that can be copied into a word-processor document or spreadsheet, an ideal way of digitising and making all those previously fixed words editable and searchable again.  The very best thing though is it all takes a matter of seconds per page.  For anything that needs a bit more precision or detail – photos for example – I’d still use my high-res flatbed scanner.

It’s another example of how smartphones are becoming ubiquitous tools, the digital Swiss army knife, used to communicate, inform and amuse, entertain, create, record and archive.  All the processing power the scanning requires also underlines how far microprocessors have progressed, being able to do this in a tiny handheld box less than ten millimetres thick.  All the effort of scanning over fifty pages did leave my phone a little warm admittedly, so I decided to give it a bit of a rest and write this instead – on my big desktop PC.

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Gadgets, Music, Tech, Television

Timeshift

I can admit when I’m wrong, I don’t always like it but I can. When companies started talking about internet based on-demand TV I thought that the bandwidth requirements would overwhelm the technology, I was wrong and I’m really quite glad about that.

I haven’t signed up for any of the paid-for services but have found uses for the free ones. I’ve said before that I watch Antiques Roadtrip and as this is on while I’m at work I use the BBC iPlayer to watch it via a Roku on my TV, or on my tablet. Similarly I tended to relocate other shows to a time when there wasn’t anything else on the TV – or more recently on the radio, as I hardly use the telly anymore, or when I’m not busy doing something else.

It’s a far cry from when I was growing up – when the only technology we had to timeshift a programme was a VCR and a selection of tapes. The major problems, I remember, were remembering to set the timer; hoping that a power cut didn’t wipe the machine’s memory before it recorded whatever it was you wanted; finding a blank tape, or one you could reuse and ensuring that nobody wanted to record something else at the time. There was always the worry that someone would record over something you’d not watched yet. I do vaguely remember the broadcasters’ and manufacturers’ reminders that the VCR was only intended to temporarily timeshift shows like this.

After the VCR came other tech including hard-disc recorders, often including multiple tuners so you could record programmes from two or more channels at once, but these were soon rendered obsolete as well by streaming and catch-up services.

Recently I took advantage of an Amazon Prime free trial to watch Star Trek: Picard, and then signed up for a month so I could finish it – not being a binge watcher myself. This was an extreme example of timeshifting, being almost a year after it came out – a bit easier than waiting for it to be repeated on normal TV. Not that TV repeats are all bad – I usually end up watching QI a year after it’s shown on the BBC on the Dave channel, which has itself been so successful in repeating that it now gets referenced on shows such as, er, QI.

Catch-up and live internet radio is just as useful for listening to a show that’s on too early or late at a time when another show you’re not interested in is on. It also comes in handy when you’re listening to live radio, for example last week’s Liza Tarbuck on BBC Radio 2, and you miss something that someone’s said. In this case I grabbed my phone, fired up BBC Sounds and rewound the show by a minute. Which is one of the benefits of all these internet based services – radio and TV: you can go back and look at something again, pause it and write something down, or, most importantly, take a break and make a cuppa.

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creativity, Tech, Work

The Universal Instruction Manual

DIY

Image by Steve Buissinne from Pixabay

I still have a copy of a book that was once the bible for anyone who built or fixed PCs, it weighed about a kilogram and was roughly two inches thick, could break your toe if you dropped it on your foot and doubled as a doorstop when a new edition replaced it. It was one of many such books, many of which are still updated and published today, which were the go-to place for guidance when the machine or network you were fixing wasn’t cooperating. I have similar books for DIY and cookery as many people do. I also used to maintain lists and folders of useful settings and tips that I’ve either found or worked out but I find that I’m referring to these less as the smartphone is taking over.

I recently set up my new laptop and there are a couple of things I like to tweak on any new Windows setup but as it’s been a while since I last did it I couldn’t remember where the settings were – especially as one, the setting for turning the Caps Lock key off with the Shift key as on an old manual typewriter, seems to keep moving to different dialogs. Not a problem, I just picked up the phone and searched for it and the answer was provided via Google. Other search engines are available, of course.

The internet is an amazing resource for learning in this way, I developed an Access-based database ten years ago by doing the same thing, searching for how other people have achieved the action I wanted, whatever your struggling with someone will have a suggestion or a whole tutorial. At work I’ve found instructions on changing the side indicator lens on one of the vans and at home how to reset the service indicator on my old car. Naturally there are instructions for exercise, positive thinking, painting, brewing, relaxing, productivity, using tools and how to do home repairs – as we noticed from the number of people during the first Covid lockdown attempting their own glazing. The other advantage of the internet is that you not only have words and pictures but video too.

As well as the amount of crowdsourced instructions manufacturers also have their product manuals online too, which is useful if, like me, you can never find the manual for something you’ve not used for ten years – like my car battery charger I needed during the first lockdown which is an old piece of equipment yet the manual was there on the manufacturer’s website, which saved me half an hour of looking through a large box of instruction sheets.

I have another book that is called “How to do just about everything” – well, the internet on a smartphone is like having a million page illustrated book in your pocket called “Now we really mean how to do everything”.

Of course not everything in life should be attempted without professional training – gas repair and dentistry come to mind – also not all the advice and instructions are entirely accurate or advisable and as the saying goes “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing”, but as with going to the pub it’s all about knowing your limits.

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Tech, Television

Remote Selling

Auction

Image by succo from Pixabay

I watch the BBC’s Antiques Roadtrip which, for the uninitiated features antiques dealers and auctioneers travelling around the UK and Ireland buying antiques to sell, hopefully for a profit, at auction. In between spending cash the experts visit interesting local places along the way.

I thought that this year’s series wouldn’t be possible due to Covid-19, because of closed antiques shops and auctions not being allowed due to social distancing but another online innovation and the production team’s ingenuity has saved the day.

Auction houses have, of course, accepted commission bids and phone bids for some time but over the course of the Roadtrip’s twenty previous series more have accepted live online bidding.  Having an audience of not just potentially a couple of hundred in the room but thousands across the world benefits the auction house and sellers alike, often the online bids well outstrip what those present in person are willing to pay.

In the case of the Roadtrip itself there is still plenty of opportunities for Covid-safe shopping but social distancing has meant that we are now treated to our experts travelling in separate cars and sometimes by bike and then sitting on the edge of a field or car park watching the auction on tablets, losing a little of the atmosphere of the past, with the auctioneer in an empty room talking only to webcams and assistants on phones, but at least we still get our entertainment. 

It’s even thanks to the internet that I can watch it at all as it’s shown when I’m at work and I watch it later on iPlayer.  As such as they watch the auction on their tablets I watch them watching it on mine, if you see what I mean.

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Business, Tech, Transport

Sometimes I Surprise Myself

Gift

Image by Pexels from Pixabay

I’ve recently received a little padded envelope, I knew it must be something I’ve bought on Ebay but I could not for the life of me remember what it was. I knew it must be one of those little cheap gadgets or decorative items that fill Ebay, Amazon and so on and are all too easy to buy but which one?

It is one of the unexpectedly pleasant side-effects of having a poor short-term memory, lacking concentration, or visiting Ebay or Amazon while mildly inebriated, or all three: being able to give yourself a surprise gift, not just at Christmas but all year round, as long as it’s not too expensive that is, or too large – it’s less of a nice surprise to be greeted by an unexpected Jacuzzi or life-size toy Tiger if you don’t have the space to appreciate it.

The best thing though is if you happen to have it delivered from the other side of the world too, that way you also have about a month to forget what you’ve bought while it’s sitting on a slow boat from, well, you know where…

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Business, creativity, Design, Tech, Typography

Simplicity is Not Always Easy

Wood type

Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay

Often an organisation or business will unveil a new logo, branding or slogan which is met by members of the public saying, like they also do when a footballer misses a goal, “I could do better than that” or “my six year old could do that with a packet of crayons.”
Such was the case with the London 2012 logo and the Scottish tourist board’s slogan of “Welcome to Scotland” which was ridiculed for its apparent simplicity – comments like “they spent hundreds of thousands on consultants and all they come up with is that, it’s bloody obvious.”

While it’s true that the end result is simple and obvious it was no doubt also the result of a long period of consultation on the wording of the message, then the design of the presentation of the message. Just because the end result seems obvious doesn’t mean it was from the start, hundreds of slogans were probably trialled on the public and expert groups and it could have been that something like “Get High on Scotland” combined with a talking Haggis could have been more memorable, made more of an impact and was now the slogan, the public would never have been aware that “Welcome to Scotland” had even been considered.

If a branding is seen as complex, showy, clever or edgy then the critical public feel that the money that was spent has been used, like it in some way involved more work, like a simple design would have been knocked out in five minutes between lunch and a few beers paid for from the budget. Was Kentucky’s slogan “Unbridled Spirit” which derived from the state’s big industries of horse racing and distilleries worth more just because it was a play on words and as such “a bit clever”?

Such armchair experts have never designed a logo. The last one I designed passed through numerous stages as it had to contend with people who really wanted to hold onto the old logo and then it evolved from two separate proposals that had elements combined into the final design. And I’m not even a professional designer.

Of course not all designs are successful, Nottinghamshire County Council’s “N” logo was dropped quickly due to negative public reaction, but again this was partly because the logo didn’t really symbolise the county but also because many people thought that the design’s simplicity indicated a lack of effort, that it was a waste of tax payers’ money. Combine this with the often repeated “it was just done on a computer” – by which they also mean “with no effort” (because the computer does all the work, of course) and the simpler logo will always seem worse value. I have encountered clients who insist on filling every square millimetre of an advert space with pictures and text because they think that white space is wasted space, I’ve been told that “customers want to see lots of pictures” and “the logo needs to fill the space” and so on, with my suggestions that white space helps to guide the eye around the ad and a cluttered design looks unprofessional went ignored because, well what would I know? As for distorting logotypes to fill a space so much that the end result would make the original typeface designer cry, don’t get me started.

There’s a video online that is a cartoon of a conversation between a designer and client in which the client keeps wanting to add more colour, more complexity etc, my takeaway phrase that I’ve used often was from the designer: “unbe-f***ing-lievable.”

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Fashion, Tech, Work

Oh For Fax Sake

Apparently the NHS is the biggest purchaser of fax machines in the UK. “What?” people cry, “why are they wasting tax-payers money on last century technology, it’s a scandal.” No it’s not, it’s because, fundamentally, it just works. Two machines connected by a phone line, you can send a message in seconds. In the pre-mobile days there were all kinds of fax-based services, one example that I’ve recently seen reminded of via a 1996 back issue was Fortean Times magazine’s FortFax service that allowed you to dial up and request articles be sent back to you.  

Of course though time and tech moves on and email has largely replaced faxing as I think people see it as obsolete because it’s an old technology, it’s monochrome and it’s paper based but at least modern ones use proper paper rather than the crinkly, fading thermal paper of old.  In addition companies only tend to have one fax machine so it’s inefficient to go to the machine to send a fax and have someone regularly empty it’s in-tray, so to speak.

For text you can, of course type out an email but it’s often still slower than writing out a fax unless you’ve been on Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing recently. The main advantage though is if you want to send a drawing as to email it you’d have to scan it, attach the scan to an email, type the email explaining what the drawing it and then send it to someone who has to open it, assuming they have the software to open the scan if it’s an Adobe document for example, then print it if they need the hard copy. With a fax you draw it on the paper, type the fax number and send. Simple and classic. I’m only moving, reluctantly, to scanning and emailing because the fax machine’s on its last legs.

I have found, admittedly that Email does has its advantages, like traceability and searchability and using templates for common emails like orders, quotes etc speeds up the process somewhat but it depends on individual circumstances. At the end of the day if it were still working and the people we sent faxes to still used faxes themselves then we’d still be using it – it seems that the fax has become a still useful, but niche, technology.

One day, like vinyl and 35mm film, it’ll become fashionable, probably amongst hipsters and their like, as an analogue, “authentic” communication method and there’ll be an app to send digitally crinkly and barely readable facsimile faxes, perhaps.

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