Thoughts from the Shelf

The IPhone has been a popular post topic on The Shelf, and after its launch on Friday early reports show O2 (the network who agreed the rights to sell the IPhone) could have shifted tens of thousands of units already.

With the Pay As You Go Market predicted to decline in 2008 O2 is focusing on signing customers up to contracts, and the IPhone is no exception requiring an 18 month commitment to the network.

With mixed reports on exactly how many IPhones have been sold over the opening weekend, it is hard to judge the popularity of the phone but O2 have stated that sales are in line with targets.

The Carphone warehouse, the only independent retailer to stock the phone, was apparently outsold by three to one by O2 stores.

At £289 with an 18 month contract people could be forgiven on passing on the IPhone, and could have explained the lack of queues outside stores that were a familiar sight when the IPhone was released in the states. But it seems this is not the case and O2 also expect to shift an additional 200,000 units over the Christmas and New Year period alone.

O2 expect ¾ of customers for the IPhone to come from rival networks, and with the majority of initial IPhone purchases being to customers who are new to O2 this defiantly seems possible. O2 currently are the largest UK mobile network with 17.9 million customers, and after beating off stiff competition from T-Mobile and Orange (who sell the IPhone in France and Germany) for the IPhone in the UK market, this figure seems set to only rise.

I often play poker online and Full Tilt Poker is just one site I hold an account with. It is much the same as other poker sites as far as playing online poker goes, and I have found the quality of players tend better than a lot of sites. As a result Full Tilt is one of four poker sites I regularly play.

There is a sign up bonus that is offered with this particular site where new players can get up to 100% of there initial deposit (up to $600) added to their account. Once an account has been set up there is also a referral bonus players can receive. Through a Full Tilt Referral Codemembers are rewarded for spreading the word to any new members.

Personally I prefer to stick to Texas Holdem however there are a range of other poker games available including the Omaha and 7 Stud.

There is a wide selection of tables to play on including the expected sit and go tournaments and straight up cash game tables. I have also found the freeroles are quite popular on this site and kick off fairly regularly.

I read news today about the governments intentions to increase the penalties for speeding so that motorists could loose their license after two speeding offences instead of four.

Under the proposals that were outlined toady, motorists who are caught doing 45 mph in a 30 mph zone could receive a £100 fine and six points on their license as opposed to the current £60 and three points.

Currently motorists are allowed twelve points on a licence over a three year period, but this increase in penalty points alters how many offences one licensee can commit over that period of time.

The increased penalties will also apply to drivers who commit speeding offences in higher speed zones. Drivers doing 70 mph in 50 mph zones and 94 mph in 70 mph zones will also receive the increased penalties under the proposals.

In a reversal the government shelved plans to lower the penalty for drivers who are caught speeding just over the limit.

I know people will say the bottom line is don’t speed, but as founder of safespeed.org says . . .

“A speed limit is nothing more than a weak proxy for the desired behaviour. Drivers will rightly be concerned that they will be faced with losing their licences for six months after two perfectly routine cases of driving safely. We all know that exceeding the speed limit isn’t automatically dangerous.”

I would be surprised if anybody can honestly state that when it is safe they don’t speed, even if by a few mph. I support any action that is put in place to make the road safer, such as speed cameras in accident black spots, but increasing driving penalties in such a way will only increase the estimated 4.5 million drivers who have points on their license and 21% of drivers who are only three points off a six month ban already.

I’m interested in peoples opinions on the new look The Shelf is sporting. The makeover came as a result of wordpress releasing an update, version 2.3.1 which came with fixes for over twenty bugs, on the 26th October.

As regular readers of The Shelf may know, there have been some problems with people hacking my hosting account and as a result The Shelf has had some down time. Whether this due to The Shelf using an older version of Wordpress (1.5 ish), or vulnerabilities through scripting errors elsewhere on the account I don’t know. Whatever the case a spring clean was long overdue, and the release of this upgrade provided the perfect chance to do so.

Upgrading Wordpress was previously something that I had put off for as long as possible due to problems that I had with my first upgrade back in January 2007. I made things worse by not making a back up of The Shelf as recommended prior to upgrade and as a result my blog was off line for some time. The hacking of my account kicked me into gear and I now ensure all add on scripts are kept fully up to date.

Touch wood I have had no problems since I have upgrade on a regular basis, and as long as you are careful with the wp-content folder and wp-config.php file, you should be able to upgrade fairly easily too.

At the same time as upgrading wordpress and mid spring-clean, I also decided to find a wordpress 2.3 compatible theme. The previous theme had been in place since the blog originated, chosen because it looked pretty more than anything, but it did return several JavaScript scripting errors when rendering in various browsers. My patience wore thin seeing these errors and I decided the time had come for a new cleaner theme, and what better time to do it. Of course headline picture of the San Fransisco Bay Bridge had to be kept and so the chosen theme was modified slightly.

Let me know what you think of the results

Notes on upgrading wordpess

Job Done.

Wordpress easy upgrade & Extended upgrade instructions are available.

As a fairly fit and active person I am constantly on the move and rarely spend my time off doing nothing. My weekends are packed with multiple football matches and I usually return to work on the Monday a bit stiff after over exerting myself throughout my weekend off. As is common with many people partaking in a similarly active lifestyle I also consume energy drinks, usually the glucose based brands, in order to stay refreshed and hydrated.

Although not often consumed I was however surprised to read an article on Red Bull this week, an energy drink plenty of other people consume regularly in a similar fashion to myself. Marketed as a healthy energy drink that give you wings, the story stated that Red Bull can increase the risk of heart attack for people with high blood pressure and heart disease.

Although using Red Bull as a case study, the survey the report is based upon does conclude there are heightened health risks with a range of energy drinks on the market. Such drinks are said to cause changes in the body in both heart rate and blood pressure which COULD put those with existing heart and circulation problems at increased risk. Why people with these conditions would drink such drinks bemuses me.

The experiment from which the results were drawn consisted of healthy volunteers consuming two drinks a day for a week, whilst regularly having their vitals recorded.

Within hours of consumption. . .

Is it just me or are the findings above what you would expect from that of an energy drink? Increased heart rate and increased blood circulation, therefore increasing the amount of oxygen an athlete can get into their body and thus helping their bodies cope with the physical strain of active sport.

The energy drinks industry is a £1.5 billion world wide market, and 3 billion cans of Red Bull alone were sold last year. The drink is banned in countries including France, Denmark and Iceland, and sold with warnings to children, pregnant and caffeine sensitive people in others. In the UK the drink contains 80mg of caffeine and 1,000mg of taurine, and is therefore marked with an EU standard high caffeine warning as is found in all drinks containing more than 150mg of caffeine except tea and coffee. Would this research lead us to beleive morning brew also puts you at increased risk of a heart attack?

Today software was unveiled by Google that could power mobile phones in the future, focused around the growing demand for mobile search.

The software is an open operating system called Android and is part of an Open Handset Alliance that is made up of 33 partners whose aims are to produce cheaper phones that offer a better mobile experience. Based on Linux and therefore open source, Google has built a series of tools to power the next generation of mobile phone.

The key selling point about Android is the open source nature of the operating system and therefore breaks away from the current proprietorial platforms currently used in mobiles such as Windows Mobile, RIM, Symbian and Palm. The open source alternative is due to be unveiled on the 12th November, however it is unlikely that handsets will be available until late 2008.

The focus of the software is its potential to provide a greater mobile internet experience where current models lack innovation. No doubt an advanced mobile browser will be released which currently restricts most mobile web experiences along with handset screen resolution. The wispers are of increased integration, where video, data sharing, and social networking will all be a more pleasurable experience on handsets that implement the Android operating system.

With these developments it remains to be seen whether the hype surrounding Android is anything more than just a PR exercise, as although Google has secured an impressive array of partners, and nobody doubts that open source will play a big part in the next generation mobile internet experience, none of the partners are exclusive to Android. At the current time mobile phone developers are still supporting a range of different platforms.

However successful Android ends up being Google has certainly made a statement about its intentions to become involved in the mobile market. After all the potential market is huge, there are currently more people with mobile phone access than there are desktop PCs with an internet connection, and as a result the mobile web provides the Google with the ideal opportunity it doesn’t want to miss.

I came across an interesting article today about a driverless car competition that was recently held, and spurred talk about how far away a commercially viable driverless car actually is.

According to the report 11 driverless cars took part in the race, where entrants had to navigate around a 60 mile urban environment avoiding other cars and safely navigating single and duel cartridge ways, junctions, buildings and car parks within a simulated town.

Of the 11 vehicles that started the race six completed the course with the winner BOSS completing the course in less than 6 hours, collecting a $2 million prize in the process. The race was held in the state of California on a disused US Air Force base in Victorville.

The race had been organised by the US military’s Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa), with the objective of developing unmanned vehicle for possible implementation in the battlefield. The technology could also be used in commercial driverless cars, and with General Motors partnering the winning Tartan Racing team, there are clear signs that large commercial companies plan to develop the technology for the commercial sector in the future.

Although most remained in look and appearance much like conventional cars, the participating vehicles were mounted with an array of sensors on the roof and each bumper corner. The winning model featured a unique revolving laser that rotated ten times a second building up a virtual representation of the environment around it, enabling the vehicle to effectively navigate the course.

“It has 64 individual lasers in it, and it spins about 10 times a second to generate about a million measurements of the world. That gives us a kind of point cloud which we can use to help understand where features are - cars, walls, the sidewalk and so on.” explained Chris Urmson.

Although a great day for robotics with so many vehicles completing the simulated urban environment, I don’t think it will be any time soon that we see driverless cars on public roads. A nice concept, and nice to see the developments in a technology that could have wide ranging applications in many fields, however the proposed 2015 deadline I think is a bit premature.

Looking for a alternative online gaming experience?

I logged onto rushmore online casino having been used to playing many other popular on casino gaming sites.

As you would expect with an online casino gaming site you are required to download some free software before you start playing, which in Rushmore’s case was extremely easy to do.

After quickly setting up a free account I was ready to deposit and play within minutes. With a range of promotions on offer including an $888 sign up bonus I couldn’t wait to get started.

The more you play with Rushmore it seems the more you earn back. With every bet made users are granted points that can be used for a range of gifts and bonus chips.

There are a range of over 90 games on offer, including my favourite table games Roulette and Craps.

Try rushmore online casino out next time you are looking for some gambling fun online.

In even more news on social networking, Google has released plans to launch OpenSocial application programming interfaces after losing an ongoing battle to buy into Facebook. Microsoft eventually beat Google to the punch and bough a 1.5% stake for $240, valuing Facebook at $15billion.

The launch of the Google OpenSocial APIs aims to provide users with the ability to use applications across a range of partner social networking sites similar to the way Facebook opened up its interface to developers in May. Google have recruited several of Facebook’s fiercest competitors in Myspace, Bebo and Xing who will provide guidance on platform standards and through OpenSocial APIs will allow developers access to data required to build applications across all participating social network sites. This integration across a range of social networking sites will save developers building individual applications for each.

The OpenSocial partnership also includes , Friendster, LinkedIn, Oracle, Plaxo, Salesforce.com and Google’s own social networking site Orkut, but with Google’s latest addition of Myspace, the worlds biggest social network, OpenSocial sites now account for 5.1% of all US visited websites. Without Myspace the OpenSocial consortium could only boast 0.097% of total US web visits with Facebook alone accounting for 0.96%. However Facebook remains the fastest growing social networking site increasing from 14m to 50m users a month from September 2006 to September 2007.

It seems both partners and developers are optimistic about the OpenSocial idea as for developers it lowers the cost of developing for individual platforms. For partners it is an opportunity to break down walls of Facebook and Myspace who have attempted to create closed web operating systems, grabbing valuable real estate in the process.

As a result of this partnership it seems Facebook is up against it, and in response is expected to unveil a new advertising strategy that is likely to involve selling targeted ads to members that will justify its $15billion price tag. But figuring out a method of serving the right ads in real time to the correct people is the challenge, and whether Facebook can develop such a system, justifying its price tag in the process remains to be seen.

“That’s a very difficult problem at large scale, with so many ads and millions of people,” said Greg Linden

There is no doubt that Facebook have a data gold mine, but it is exploiting it that could be the problem.

In relation to previous posts on The Shelf titled ‘the cost of social networking’ and ‘facebook leads social networking’ I thought it appropriate to comment on the latest competitor in the sector of social networking, Saga.

For most Saga would be a name that on face value would not tie in well with the concept of social networking, a new hip trend that up until now has be dominated by sites such as Facebook, Myspace and Bebo, whose extensive user base made up primarily of teenagers and young adults.

For a company that is more commonly associated with insurance and other financial products for the over 50’s, you would be forgiven for making the assumption it didn’t belong there. There is however on distinct difference between Saga and its social networking ambitions in that its aims to remain targeted towards the over 50’s much in keeping with other services the company offers, and certainly exploiting an untapped area of the social networking scene.

As more and more social networking sites are lauched, increasingly catering towards niche audiences in a saturated market, Saga does have the potential to grab the attention of a significant share of the market. Surveys have identified that a third of all time spent online is by the over 50s who individually spend on average 30% of their time online, but how many of these computer literate silver surfers find themselves requiring a social networking service remains to be seen.

Sagazone was launched in beta in February and attracted 13,000 members over an initial four month trial period. Focused around topics including gardening tips, recipe swaps and advice for the housebound, there are notable differences to other social networking services already available. If one thing is for sure it is that Sagazone expects to cash in on the increasing proportion of older surfers on the internet.

‘Now, rather than being a demographic to be avoided, the ‘grey pound’ is being hailed as a lucrative one.’ Quote from fair investment