Harvest 2011

Currently camping at the Harvest festival at Jimmy’s Farm. It’s one of those slightly middle-class and middle-aged family-oriented things (which means the music is marginally more tedious, and the toilet facilities are marginally more hygienic). It also means that the food is terrific : there is an entire “street” of caravans selling a variety of street food (including a large shiny bullet-shaped american ‘van with “street food” emblazoned onto the side – it means something to viewers of the Food Network, I’m told, who get a bit giddy with excitement when they speak to celebrity chefs).

Neil Hannon (in solo Divine Comedy mode) had the dusk slot on Saturday evening, but rather inauspiciously it started to rain 10 minutes before he went on. (By the way, he came on wearing a college scarf, as though he had just arrived back at halls after a mid morning lecture). Midway through the set, the rain had turned into a ground-level cloud, and then something rather beautiful happened : a double rainbow, perfectly and symmetrically arching the stage. I hope someone had their wide-angle lens to hand, as I could only capture a portion with my iPhone…

Does mobile blogging still work

Sitting in the middle of a field waiting for Three Beards to arrive. They are very late. Totally Unacceptable. Also waiting for family to arrive from meeting the Fairy Queen. They also late. Also Totally Unacceptable.
Wondering if my WordPress for iOS is actually still working, as I have touched neither it or my blog in over a year. Let’s see, hit “publish”…

Will you haunt me?

A couple of weeks ago, I was feeling inspired to dust off the cobwebs in the studio, and get it ready for use after 3 years of neglect. I’ve relocated a couple of drum kits, set up some speakers in the live room, and built a small vocal booth. In spare moments over the past few days, I’ve been going checking to see what does / doesn’t work after the upheaval.

You may or may not know this, but recording studios are odd creatures, that sulk if they aren’t used regularly. They invite the cable pixies to come and tangle up your cables, call upon the corrosion fairies to ensure that any cables and potentiometors become intermittent and crackly and guitar strings become rusty, and enlist the software update elves to make sure that after applying the 51 critical updates to the various packages you own, nothing quite works as it should do. The other part of the equation, is that your human wetware quite easily forgets how all of this stuff works. I knew my way around Logic 6 like a pro. Logic 7 added a few areas of unfamiliarity, but was basically the same beast. Logic 8 was a complete UI re-write. It is arguably better, and makes more sense once you figure out how it wants to work. But it does mean a lot of head scratching. Logic 9 is like Logic 8, but without the bugs, and with a whole bunch of amp models and time-bending goodness. At the current rate, I’ll know my way around it by the time Logic 12 gets released.

Anyway, one of the things that I like to do before newly embarking on stuff in the studio is to make a test recording – either something entirely made up on the spot, or a cover version. You know, just to make sure that everything works, and I actually remember how to do stuff -this is important so I don’t get bogged down in technical tomfoolery when the creative juices are running. In this case, I’ve recorded a bossanova version of my favourite song by Cotton Salamander, a Cambridge band led by songwriter Martin Randle. The whole thing took around 2-3 hours, which is pretty quick by my standards, and whilst there are some rough edges (everything is first or second take), I’m pleased with the result. Hope you like it.

A Yurt at Bedtime

It is round. It is about 7 metres in diameter, and about 3 metres high. It has a very cosy wood burning stove in its centre. It has a large round window in the roof, and a couple of large wooden doors. It contains a bed and two futons. And two children who are excited and are having difficulty sleeping.

It is a Yurt, and we like it.

Bedtime story

The man had just put his children to bed, but no matter how many times he put his four-year-old daughter to bed, she would get up again after five minutes. First time, she needed some water, second time she needed a wee, third time she wanted to give me some books about fairies, as “they are Tamsin’s and I can’t read them”.
The fourth time, she had decided that her finger hurt and she needed a plaster. As the man predicted, her wound was invisible. “But it really hurts, Daddy”, protested the girl. Eventually, the man decided that it would be simplest and quickest just to give her the plaster, so he got up and went to dig around in the bathroom cupboard.
“Honestly Kalila”, he said, “when are you going to learn to stay in your bed and go to sleep?”
She looked at her feet, with a smirk upon her face. “When I’m about six”, she said.

Sunday afternoon

Inflated the tyres, attached the chariot, and navigated over drove and field, dyke and river, road and railtrack, to reach the Waterbeach beer festival. The festival is in it’s final day, and they are all but out of beer (about 6 ales remaining; they had 20something on Friday). But no matter. Sun is shining, kids have ice creams, and I have a slightly tipsy ride home to look forward to.

Kalila Ssh

I woke up this morning, and checked my phone (which I keep by the side of my bed). It was open on the ‘notes’ app (which I seldom use). It appears that 10 minutes before I woke, my 3 year old daughter had picked up my phone, opened the app and typed me a message.

When I got out of bed, I found her in the bathroom folding all of the flannels into quarters and making them into a quilt.

The day of the pad and the stick

I joined the line outside the shiny store, in a deserted shopping mall in Austin. Every so often, the would be whoops and cheers from within, and a happy customer would leave holding an Apple bag above their heads. Within 10 minutes, i was in the store, being assisted by 2 Apple sales people simultaneously. Within another 15, I was out of the store, having selected my iPad, reviewed accessories, paid for and set up the device (upon which I am now typing). Overall, a far better retail experience than buying an iPhone on launch day.

Later on the same day, I got to see several Chapman Sticks, played by Heartstrings. This is an instrument I’ve been lusting after for quite some time (but have never seen before, on account of being quite rare in the UK). Quite quite gorgeous things, perhaps even more so than the iPad…

Also, if you ever get a chance to see Uncle Fud, then do so.

In Search of a Niche

So 27th January has come and gone, the iPad has been announced (though not yet released), the world has now officially changed. Apparently. Depending on who you listen to, Apple have either
(a) released something which will forever change the way we consume media of all sorts, will do for the book and movie industry what the iPod & iTunes did for the music industry, and will become a more pervasive device across homes and businesses than the computer or the TV, or
(b) released a giant iPhone which can’t fit in your pocket, without a phone or a camera. Or
(c) released a ridiculously restricted computer which doesn’t have a keyboard, can’t run several apps at once, and can’t even display flash applications; I’ll buy a netbook, mate!
(d) a combination of (b) and (c). People who subscribe to this viewpoint will smugly proclaim that Apple’s winning streak is now over, and they’ve entirely lost the plot, building things that no-one actually wants or needs.

Most of the people who have come out with these differing views haven’t actually used one of these devices. The people who have used them seem to be converted by how “right” they feel, and agree with Steve Jobs that the iPad offers a better web browsing / book reading / video watching experience than a desktop computer, a laptop or a mobile phone.

I however, have not used an iPad, so I’m not yet convinced by Jobs, Fry and the rest of them that this device will revolutionise the way we read / browse / view etc. But, I’m pretty convinced that the iPad (or iPad-like devices) are with us to stay, though not perhaps for the “something that isn’t quite an iPhone and isn’t quite a laptop” reasons that Steve Jobs gave in his keynote.

So, here are 12 uses for an iPad, or iPad-like-thing. Some of these require support of third party infrastructure / ecosystem / hardware add-ons. Some of them rely upon Apple relaxing their legendary App Store approval policies. Some of them are a bit niche, and possibly not very interesting to Apple. But, all of them are currently areas where people are currently making successful products, which in many cases are more expensive than the iPad’s $499 / £350ish.

(1) Video screens for the kids on long car journeys. You know the sort of thing – they typically attach to headrests, and have some sort of DVD player floating around in the front of the car. A typical 10″ example has an online price of £235, needs DVDs, and has only a 2.5 hour battery life. The iPad has at least 16Gb of storage (that’s probably 5-10 feature films, or 20-40 if you go for the 64Gb model), and a 10 hour battery life. For £115 more. iPad wins.

(2) The folks in the front of the car like a nice screen too (controlling the in car audio, sat nav etc). Between the iPod app and Maps, you’ve got most of the required functionality out of the box – you just need a car charger and an audio cable. How long is it before someone establishes a standard for replaceable entertainment / satnav interface fittings? iPad wins.

(3) Whilst we’re at it with the car theme, we could have an app which taps into and controls the cars internal firmware / diagnostic systems, telling the user about fuel usage, tyre pressure etc etc. I had a guy come out to run some diagnostic checks on my car the other day, and he had a touchscreen Toughbook, running some arcane version of Windows, connecting to the car via USB, with drivers that crashed frequently, requiring him to reboot every 10 minutes. An iPad is around 1/3 of the price, has fewer moving parts to get damaged and go wrong, and has a far better touchscreen. I’ll be really surprised if we’re not seeing iPad-like devices for diagnostic technicians over the next few years. iPad wins.

(4) OK, enough about cars. Who has a digital photoframe? That’s right, lots of people. Many of these are small screen, cheap and cheerful things. However, if you want a nice 10″ screen like this Sony, you’ll pay around £230. However, you’ll only get 2Gb of storage for that, and no WiFi (so you can’t pick up photos from your computer, or from your Flickr account etc). You also don’t get a battery (so you can’t pass it around when Granny comes to visit). For an additional £120, you get all of this stuff, using just the iPad’s standard software. iPad wins.

(5) Have you ever seen anyone running around with a clipboard? Filling out forms and stuff? OK, I’ll grant you, a clipboard and a biro are probably around £345 cheaper than an iPad, but consider the costs of getting all of that form data into wherever it ends up (e.g. a database). An iPad can either collect all of this information locally (for later uploading), or if you are near a network, you can enter information directly into whichever online database you’re using. An added side benefit is that if you lose the iPad, its a heck of a lot easier to keep your data secure than it is if you lose your reams of A4 attached to a clipboard. For this reason, many people are likely to use a Toughbook or similar today (see #3). iPad wins.

(6) The iPad is also a games console. We tend to think of games consoles as being things like the Nintendo DS, or the Sony PSP. Or the Apple iPod Touch. The iPad is a different size, and can enable an entire different type of gaming (much like the Wii did for living room game consoles). I suspect that there will be many more 2 player games on the iPad, where two people play at alternate ends of the console. And not just arcade games – think chess, backgammon etc. iPad wins!

(7) Do you know how much Kiosks cost? And how much it costs to develop the bespoke kiosk software? Cut your costs down by 95% by deploying off the shelf hardware, and getting an off-the-shelf developer to assemble your software using a nice-to-use SDK! iPad wins!

(8) Remote surveillance stations such as this one by System Q typically set you back over £400, for a bulky system with a tiny little screen. Couple the iPad with one of a number of existing apps in the AppStore (some of them free), and you have a bright 10″ screen doing much the same thing. Mind you, you’ll probably want to place an additional security camera at the iPad, otherwise someone will nick it. Ignoring this last point, iPad wins!

(9) Better version of TV than TV. There are really three ways that people like to watch TV:-
(a) Live TV. Do this on the iPad by going to http://tvcatchup.com/ which currently covers all Freeview channels. There are many other alternatives also.
(b) Watching pre-recorded TV (e.g. iPlayer, or using a PVR). The iPlayer implementation for the iPhone is great, and should be good on the iPad also. SeeSaw will doubtless work fine too. And there is no reason why someone can’t develop an app which kicks off timed video streams (e.g. from tvcatchup) and saves locally – hence your iPad is also a PVR (and network bandwidth permitting, can record several channels at once). And unlike most PVRs, you can take it wherever you go (and watch it in bed!)
(c) Watching media content from a uPnP / DNLA server. Have you tried Boxee?. It is a variant of XMBC, providing a great interface for accessing all of your locally held movies / tv shows / songs / photos etc. Imagine Boxee running on the iPad. Want one? I do.
In summary, iPad wins. Three times over.

(10) Universal remote control. It is becoming more and more common for people to control their stereo / TV / lights / heating etc via Bluetooth or Wifi. Many companies produce their own dedicated hardware to provide a great experience (mini colour screen, information rich etc) for controlling specific hardware (see the Squeezebox Duet, for example which sells for £199, and provides a 6cm colour screen and controls your Logitech Squeezebox (available separately). Some companies also provide universal remotes which can drive products from different manufacturers, such as the Logitech Harmony Advanced Universal Control, which for £349 offers a “big 3.5 inch screen”. Hey, why not get yourself an iPad with an equivalent universal remote app? iPad wins. Again.

(11) The Korg Kaoss pad. OK, this isn’t a category, but the Korg Kaoss pad is an interactive FX unit / musical instrument / performance thingy. It has an RRP of £343, and a ~3″ light up touch pad. The iPhone has a wealth of free/inexpensive music making applications, and I expect many more to be written to make use of the larger screen & greater processing power of the iPad. Think multitouch virtual instruments the likes we haven’t thought of before. I’m quite excited by this one (just need someone to make a decent audio interface…). iPad wins!

(12) Etch-a-sketch. Will set you back the best part of £13. But the screen is only about 8″, and is monochrome. And you can’t save your pictures. Mind you, it is £337 cheaper. Let’s call this one a draw.

So, 12 niche products, and the iPad is a better fit for 11.5 of them. None of these areas have anything to do with PCs or Phones (although some geekfolk may coerce a PC / Phone / PDA into these roles today). So the iPad isn’t something which fits in between PC and a Phone – it is something else entirely.

Hot new sounds for 2010

Pat Newark, my grandad, died on Boxing Day, aged 90. He has been falling to bits for at least the last 38 years, but managed to keep going long enough to see his grandchildren grow up, and have children of their own.

In “The War”, he was a sergeant major type in “The Army”. Normally, this involves lots of getting cross, shouting at people, sometimes killing people, and occasionally getting killed yourself. None of these things particularly happened to my grandad (did I mention that he only died on Boxing Day?), partly because he was in the the Clerical Division (I made up the name, but I suspect it involved keeping your pile of foolscap very neat, and polishing your typewriter on a daily basis), but also because he was a pianist in a jazz trio. So, whilst his buddies would fly off to drop bombs on German people, he tinkled the ivories for other people to dance to. Make Jazz, Not War, he probably didn’t say. Anyway, one particular night, all of his other army chums were out flying in their planes, when they where shot at with guns until they were dead. As a consequence, he sometimes said that music saved his life.
He continued to play the piano for many years after that, but by the time I was born in the 1970s, he had started to suffer from arthritis, and (aside from occasionally playing my piano when he came to visit), I never really heard him play. A couple of days after he died, my uncle Roger Newark delivered a tape to me, featuring my Grandad playing back in his heyday, and I’m knocked out – that cat could play! Oww!
The recording is a piano solo – I’m not sure of the date / venue etc, but I shall try to find out (and see if there are any more recordings in the archive).
Anyway, Rest In Peace Grandad – the Spirit of Jazz will always live on.