It’s Rick’s last day filling in for Gerry Ryan and making the mid-morning quality again. Everyone should email ( rick@rte.ie ) and text in 51552 thanking him and letting his bosses know we appreciate his show. Maybe, just maybe they’ll let him stay there.
Author Archive
Rick’s last day outdoing Gerry Ryan
Friday, August 15th, 2008Fluffy Links – Friday August 15th 2008
Friday, August 15th, 2008Check out Susan’s lovely Stony River Farm blog. Nice reading in it.
Nice post (yet another) from MJ about how to get funding in Ireland if you’re a business.
Teehee or oooer, you decide. CloudSteph points out RTE‘s Olympic gallery almost shows nudey bits.
Photobooth. Nice idea for events. But everyone has a camera these days.
Jim points out Fionn Regan is playing an intimate gig in November in Dublin. Avail.
Via Enda: No need to buy that app on the App Store to use your iPhone’s 3g to get your laptop online.
Ah handy. Make a toastie without cheese going everywhere in the toaster.
Polaroid kill off the polaroid and bring back… a camera with a printer?
A book on light and architecture. Check out the power station and roller coaster.
Mayhem. It’s like the Joker planned this.
Yup. Get yourself fired from Burger King by having a bath in their giant sink and stick the video of it on YouTube.
Via Sizemore – Far North trailer:
Especially for B’Dum B’Dum B’Dum
All Jazzed out
Thursday, August 14th, 2008Best of luck to Mister Jazz Biscuit.
Useful Irish Web Tools
Thursday, August 14th, 2008As well as GMail, Twitter, WordPress, Bloglines and Meebo, the other web tools I use on a daily basis and a few times a day are Url.ie and Jazzbiscuit’s Image Search. They’re invaluable.
Url.ie
If I’m linking to anything on Twitter or emailing something to not so web savvy people then I’ll use Cathal Garvey’s URl shortening tool. It rocks. The latest version of it too produces a Q Code thingy, you know those new barcode things that some cameras recognize and turn em into urls?
JazzBiscuit Creative Commons Image Search
Online pop culture anarchist JazzBiscuit has an absolutely fantastic image search service that brings back creative commons licenced images. I’ve been using it for months now to tart up my blog posts and add a bit of colour. Nice one Jazzy.
Try both out and bookmark them. They rock.
Any others worth mentioning?
Fluffy Links – Thursday August 14th 2008
Thursday, August 14th, 2008Phil has started doing some linky roundups. Link dumps are great. He points to this photo from Gavin and this amazing one too. Wow.
Irish SEO Watch, day what is it now? I have a terribly low opinion of SEO companies who advocate buying links in order to rig Google results.
Tropic Thunder sounds like it’s going to rock as a movie.
James Enck is back blogging. Fantastic. Except it’s cos he’s on the dole. Uberbolloxmegashame.
Wow, this is some footbridge.
Dog turd brings down powerlines.
Google happily censors their maps but photoshopping them badly is kinda sad.
Jesus. Aint it Cool News used to he hardcore. Selling out over Star Wars? Sheeeeit.
A fab book on how the street finds its own uses for things in Thailand.
Interesting take on piracy and getting coverage of the Olympics. Olympic committee continue with their “we’re dicks, here’s a takedown” tactics online too. They’ll never win. Or learn.
‘The Irrepressibles’ – ‘In This Shirt’
Moviestar.ie Irish Web Awards are go
Thursday, August 14th, 2008
Finally got the press release out the door earlier this morning for the Moviestar.ie Web Awards on October 11th. Nominations open very soon. Like the Blog Awards it’s a two stage affair. Stage 1 will see every nominated (and nominations are free) website get judged using a scorecard. Specific scorecards for each category will then be used in Stage 2 by the judges. An awful lot of work went into making sure that the scorecard was good enough to keep the staunch standardistas and the pragmatists happy and I hope that concentrating on these important areas will help push for better websites in Ireland.
The category list is here and interest in category sponsorship is already strong. Wahey! Not everyone will be happy with the list and will want their own niche included but for year one, we’re content with going with that list. Changes as always will happen the next year. Sponsors cannot be nominated either to ensure transparency. We hope the 11th of October will be a fun night. Leave the tux at home folks, it’s more fun without it.
I’d very much appreciate if people would spread the word about the Awards and encourage their web development friends and colleagues who have become cynical about award ceremonies to have a look at this.
Good weather for PuddleDucks to launch their blog
Wednesday, August 13th, 2008PuddleDucks have launched their new blog. I like it. They were one of the companies I gave a free blogging course to way back when. Every time someone I’ve trained starts a blog I’m chuffed. Good time to launch too, there’s a dude with a big white beard and lots of animals building a big boat contraption outside my window at the moment.
PuddleDucks did a wise thing, they started blogging in private, getting feedback from other Irish bloggers first before they went public. I’ve mentioned this technique before. It gets you great feedback before you jump in and it also gets the bloggers proud to be involved in helping you out and doing what I find myself doing and telling the rest of the blogging world that they’re good sort. A kind of “I can vouch for these kids, they’re cool.”
I must say that I think Aedan and Suzanne are naturals too at blogging and it’s cute and awwtastic to learn they started their business because of their son who liked the outdoors no matter the weather.
How do you think?
Wednesday, August 13th, 2008There’s a lot of thinking going on this week on this here blog. After today it stops. Right?
Well anyway. I was thinking about thinking last week and specifically how we think and remember things. When I do the odd bit of study for my Law degree and attend lectures, the only way I recall things is visualising the “story” I’ve read and heard about. Writing it down is all well and good but the text is only the crib notes for the visual masterpiece that I see in my brain when I commit it to memory.
I’d never put much thought into how I thought about things and how I remembered things but when i did some research (yeah I Googled) I found that visual thinking isn’t very common. So I asked people on Twitter how people thought. The answers varied wildly. How interesting.
Today is Leaving Cert results day with people doing really well and not so well and breaking down after years in the grind of trying to commit things to memory and then bringing them back and putting them down on paper. What ways did they do this? How do they put that information in and take it back out?
Do you see images? I see full in-depth movies with colour and wonderful layers if I have to recall facts about legal cases, I see the colour of uniforms, wonderful diamond encrusted rings and dark wooden floored barren houses when it comes to cases about the Law of Property. I see ginger beer and taste it and my stomach slightly turns at seeing a snail inside the bottle when I think about the Law of Tort.
As I mentioned in this blog post, I look like I’m daydreaming or switched off when I’m paying full attention. I guess I am daydreaming in a way.
What works for you? How does your brain work?
Media Training II – Die Corker
Wednesday, August 13th, 2008Update: Looks like this is now full up. 12 is max class size. Add your name and we might do a second one.
Finally got a date for the Cork version. This course has a bias towards tech/business media but most of the details will work for any area you want coverage for.
Wednesday August 27th in the Cork Airport International Hotel.
10am to 1ish.
Programme:
How a journalist in Ireland works
How to make contact with the media
How to build a relationship with the media
How to write a press release
Practical – Press Releases
Coat tailing – Surveys, news items, expertise, briefing documents
Media Campaigns
Interview preparation for print + radio + TV
Being Interviewed on Radio
Leave a comment if you’re interested and I’ll send prices etc.
Fluffy Links – Wednesday August 13th 2008
Wednesday, August 13th, 2008On Twitter? Why not do Laura’s Twitter survey?
Steve. You summed it up perfectly. Nice one.
List of bloggers who are happy to copywrite/edit business blogs. Want to be added?
Sick of Aer Lingus being late? Aer Lateness
DownloadMusic.ie has a nifty new player you can stick on your Facebook or iGoogle page.
A question of blog. George Hamilton is blogging.
I know how Shane feels. All this new music and most of it is pants.
Via McAWilliams: As if you can’t hate the iPhone owners enough, now you can install a free app to use your free web text from Meteor or O2.
Speaking all things iPhoneish. Some tips. More tips.
Some great Business Blogging tips.
Review iPhone apps while high. No, don’t. Bro.
Getting people to your site is one thing. Converting them into customers is another. 5 main reasons they don’t “convert”.
Via Alexia: