Simon Barker » Bookmarks

Apple iPad, Android Tablet, Leo Drops Google Buzz & Think Visibility (Bookmarks)

Simon Barker — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 00:29:10 +0000

Here’s some of the cool webpages and online stuff that I’ve found whilst roaming around the Internet recently and decided to add them to my online Delicious bookmarks between 24th August 2010 and 31st August 2010:

Think Visibilty is nearly here – I've been to all these three previous conferences including the the last one, Think Visibility 3 which was definitely the best one so far, therefore I'm definitely looking forward to seeing what they come up with for this one which I'll be attending next weekend!

New Twitter button and the end of tweetmeme – Interesting to read about the various different Twitter Retweet Buttons (including the new official Twitter one) that are available to us bloggers and how they vary in their counts and what other analytics that they provide – I think I'll be switching to the Topsy retweet button soon!

They aren’t called Dragons for nothing! James Caan’s investment practice in the den exposed – Business Matters – I've been a big fan of watching the Dragons' Den show ever since it first started and always enjoyed watching it and appreciated the opportunities that it gave to entrepreneurs, however hearing this story about the way in which James Caan allegedly conducts some of his dragon-investing (or should we say loans) is very disappointing to hear, especially when he replaced a Richard Farleigh who was a great dragon to have on the show.

Why Apple Shouldn’t Release A 7″ iPad Mini…Ever! – Ever since I got my Apple iPad tablet device, I've thought long and hard about its design and most specifically the screen size, most of the time I think that I'd prefer the iPad screen to be maybe an inch larger and have a smaller bezel – so would I be at all interested in an iPad with a smaller screen, I don't think so, I'd rather have a slightly larger screen on a thin mobile phone, perhaps up to 4.5" screen size. I don't think Apple should further segment their product range when it's really not needed.

Asus Eee Pad scheduled for March ’11 launch | Android Central – Well I decided to buy an Apple iPad on the release day here in the UK, it's definitely cool having a tablet device on hand to use when it's more convenient than a laptop or netbook, but obviously with Apple you've got limitations such as no Flash, so it will be interesting to see what an Android tablet can do and potentially at a cheaper price!

I Got My Binky Back! : LOL: The Life of Leo – Leo Laporte gets his Google Buzz working again, but has learnt his lesson of publishing content to something under his control (his blog) and then use social media to publicise it.

Buzz Kill : LOL: The Life of Leo – Interesting take on social media and micro-blogging platforms – is everyone just shouting out without listening to each other? An interesting article to read, especially after reading my initial thoughts about Google Buzz launch and whether we needed another social network?

Apple iPad, Android Tablet, Leo Drops Google Buzz & Think Visibility (Bookmarks) is a post from: Simon Barker

iPad Stands, Football Players On Twitter & Making Money With Skimlinks (Bookmarks)

Simon Barker — Sat, 14 Aug 2010 16:29:29 +0000

Here’s some of the cool webpages and online stuff that I’ve found whilst roaming around the Internet recently and decided to add them to my online Delicious bookmarks between 8th August 2010 and 14th August 2010:

5 Best iPad Stands Worthy Of Your Apple Tablet – Selection of 5 of the best iPad stands you can currently get for your favourite tablet device! – I just wish I could justify spending over £80 on an iPad stand! :)

7 Reasons Not To Use The New Tweet Buttons – Perhaps you shouldn't use those new Twitter buttons on your website as they're not the best option for promoting your site on Twitter.

Zath’s Technology & Gadget Roundup (31st July 2010) – Here's the latest Zath roundup of tech and gadget news, I particularly like the news of 100,000 Android applications have now been submitted to the Android Market – the future is looking good for us getting some top Android apps!

The Pencil iPad Stand | Geeky Gadgets – Have got an iPad? Do you need a stand for it, but looked around and they are either not good enough or are too expensive? Well now you can make your own for a very cheap cost using pencils!

Football Players on Twitter « Seldom Seen Kid – I'm really starting to get into using Twitter Lists to group similar topics/people/news sources. Well here's a rather handy Twitter List of various footballers around the world – rather handy given the new football seasons are now kicking off!

Moneysaving Tries Moneymaking With Skimlinks | One Little Duck – Affiliate Blog – Interesting to see that the Money Saving Expert forums will now be trialling Skimlinks on their site – I wonder how successful it will be, I like the idea of it, but from speaking with some of my friends that use it, it's perhaps not a huge revenue stream? Have you had experience of using Skimlinks? What do you think to it?

THOR SDCC Trailer – I'd not really known much about the Thor comic book series until news of this film started to appear and references to it in Iron Man 2, from the looks of this trailer if could be another good Marvel comic book movie to lead into the eventual Avengers movie!

iPad Stands, Football Players On Twitter & Making Money With Skimlinks (Bookmarks) is a post from: Simon Barker

My Latest Delicious Bookmarks – Online Cool Stuff! (8th August 2010)

Simon Barker — Sun, 08 Aug 2010 12:55:50 +0000

Here’s some of the cool webpages and online stuff that I’ve found whilst roaming around the Internet recently and decided to add them to my online Delicious bookmarks between 15th July 2010 and 8th August 2010:

Schumacher says the hardest word : James Allen on F1 – The official website – Woah! I never thought I'd see the day that Michael Schumacher would be saying sorry and to Rubens Barrichello of people, but after his Belgium F1 GP antics he has done!

Cornwall: a taste of English countryside | Itchy Feet Blog – Have you got itchy feet too? If so or even if you don't, you might want to pay Cornwall a visit sometime, I certainly do after seeing this blog post and a great set of photos!

HTC Desire To Finally Get Android 2.2 (Froyo) Update – After running Android 2.1 on my HTC Desire for nearly 4 months, HTC have pushed out the official Android 2.2 (Froyo) update and it is good! Lots of cool little changes as well as bigger stuff like Wifi Hotspot Tethering and transferring apps to my cheap micro SD memory card. The update process was very impressive too – it only took around 15mins in total and didn't even need to plug in to my computer….whereas I did with my last iPhone update and it also failed so many times that it took 4hrs! – Here's to continued innovation and success of the Android mobile platform with the next update: Gingerbread!

Remove shortcut arrow from windows 7 icons – How to remove those pesky shortcut arrows from icons in Windows 7.

Marketers are downloading data on 100 million Facebook users | Econsultancy – Would you want to be on this list of 100 million Facebook users, who didn't keep tabs on their privacy settings? Just think how many marketing people could now have their details!

F1 Team bosses want change on team orders – Martin Whitmarsh interviewed on the controversial subject of Formula 1 team orders!

Actually I DO have an opinion on the Thesis vs. WordPress debate – Interesting take on what has been happening in the recent 'face-off' between WordPress and the premium theme framework Thesis.

My Latest Delicious Bookmarks – Online Cool Stuff! (8th August 2010) is a post from: Simon Barker

My Latest Delicious Bookmarks – Online Cool Stuff! (13th July 2010)

Simon Barker — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 00:43:40 +0000

Here’s some of the cool webpages and online stuff that I’ve found whilst roaming around the Internet recently and decided to add them to my online Delicious bookmarks between 10th May 2010 and 13th July 2010:

Sony Walkman NWZ-W252 Review » Coolest Gadgets – A good review of a new minimalist Sony Walkman mp3 player – they've come a long way since the original cassette Walkmans!

F1 tech changes to improve racing – New changes have been announced for the 2011 season of Formula 1, hopefully we'll see more overtaking happening, although I do wonder if overtaking using various devices designed for that purpose will actually be too artificial or 'gimmicky'.

Fascinating LEGO® Model of the Day: New Set Announcement: 10213 Shuttle Adventure – I used to play with Lego as a kid and now they are releasing a new model set in honour of the final Shuttle mission – I wouldn't mind spending an afternoon building my own Lego Shuttle! :)

The best 11 Apps available for Android « HTC Desire Fanatics – A cool site all about the new HTC Desire mobile phone and some good commentary on some of the Android apps that are currently available.

Arrived at the Great Firewall of China! | Itchy Feet Blog – The start of a travelling adventure to cure itchy feet! The first stop of the journey is Beijing in China and an encounter with the Great Firewall! :)

INFOGRAPHIC: The History Of Facebook’s Default Privacy Settings – I'm feeling more and more sceptical of using Facebook and as you can see from this webpage, they've been opening more and more of your information up to the whole internet as defaults for their privacy settings.

Time out « carocat.co.uk – Interesting to read about how someone's experience is of taking a time-out from the Internet – obviously there's good and bad points, but something that's good to do from time to time.

My Latest Delicious Bookmarks – Online Cool Stuff! (13th July 2010) is a post from: Simon Barker

My Latest Delicious Bookmarks – Online Cool Stuff! (10th May 2010)

Simon Barker — Tue, 11 May 2010 09:54:48 +0000

Here’s some of the cool webpages and online stuff that I’ve found whilst roaming around the Internet recently and decided to add them to my online Delicious bookmarks between 25th April 2010 and 10th May 2010:

50 Inspiring, Awesome & Stylish Mac Setups | Mac.AppStorm – Here's some great examples of computer workstations/desk set-ups despite the general Apple-ness ;) – it inspires me to have a tidier and smarter looking desk set-up!

Facebook’s Gone Rogue; It’s Time for an Open Alternative | Epicenter | Wired.com – Some very good points are raised in this article about Facebook and its "so called" privacy settings, I would love there to be an better option than Facebook – I'm becoming ever more disillusioned by it all!

My Apology To GoPark.co.uk Sucks • Tim Nash “stuff” Blog – Interesting blog post illustrating how you perhaps should (and shouldn't) go around contacting people over a typo – ie. perhaps threatening legal action shouldn't be in your opening email to the person – it might just get people's backs up a little.

31 Gorgeous Girls of ‘Entourage’ | Fork Party – Entourage is a great TV show, there's lots of reasons to watch it, but just a few of the girls that have appeared on the show! :)

Six reasons why Steve Jobs is wrong on Flash | PC Pro blog – Some interesting feedback here on what Steve Jobs wrote in his "blog post" on the Apple website as to why they don't allow Flash on iPhone and iPad. Personally I'd be more inclined to agree with what Darian has written in this article as to why Flash isn't used!

Game Couch: No More Lightsabers – I used to really like these Star Wars games back around 10-15 years ago, but since then I swear it's a case of diminishing returns – it's a real shame as the Lucasarts Star Wars games of old were guaranteed to be great games. Why is it so difficult to get good Star Wars games these days (other than BioWare's brilliant The Old Republic games series), have Lucasarts sold out on their main franchise just to make easy cash?

Next Jen, Blog Banter: What franchise shift bothers you the most? – I remember playing the original X-Com games, this article raises some valid concerns about what might happen to the franchise as it changes into a first-person shooter.

My Latest Delicious Bookmarks – Online Cool Stuff! (10th May 2010) is a post from: Simon Barker

Google Clicking Politician, Stargate Universe, An Independent Filmmaker & Monkey Island? (Roundup)

Simon Barker — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 20:22:18 +0000

Here’s some of the cool webpages and online stuff that I’ve found whilst roaming around the Internet recently and decided to add them to my online favourite bookmarks between 26th March 2010 and 6th April 2010:

Prominent UK Politician Encourages Google Click Fraud – Interesting with the UK election around a month away, a Labour politician is encouraging Labour supporters to commit Google click fraud! Yeah, these are the kind of people we want running the country!?!?!? But given the whole MP expenses scandal, what else can you expect from politicians?

Stargate Universe Review | Sci Fi UK – I'll admit it, I've been a fan of Stargate ever since I first saw the first episode of Stargate: SG1 (I saw the original movie, but the series managed to re-work the idea so much better than the people who did the movie), I also liked Stargate: Atlantis – it was all good fun action series that didn't take itself too seriously. However now with the latest series in the franchise, they've taken a whole new approach to it, it's darker, more serious and more character-based – it's certainly different, whether it ends up being better remains to be seen after only ten episodes so far – take a look at the Stargate: Universe season 1 trailer and see what you think to the look of it!

SEO Checklists – On-site SEO – Patrick recently spoke at Think Visibility 3 (March 2010) and gave a great talk on how to build good links into your website. This particular SEO checklist is a really useful document to read through and check that you've got all your bases covered on your existing sites and any new ones that you are setting up!

Telltale Games – Tales of Monkey Island – There are certain gaming franchises that will always mean a lot to you and Monkey Island is one of them for me. Ever since I first played the originals on my Amiga 500, I've enjoyed these games, so now that they've been revisited again in the form of these new episodic Tales of Monkey Island and also the Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition I'm definitely pleased to have more piratey goodness! If you also like Guybrush Threepwood, you can pick up loads of cool merchandise here like I have – can't wait to get my drinking vessel!

The Perils Of Being An Independent Filmmaker | SerenaObhrai.com – Serena Obhrai is not only a writer over at Zath, but also for theatre and short-film productions, as well as having been the director and star of her own zelda-inspired theatre production – take a look at her efforts at crowd-sourcing a short-film using Twitter!

Google Clicking Politician, Stargate Universe, An Independent Filmmaker & Monkey Island? (Roundup) is a post from: Simon Barker

April Fools, World Changing Tablets, Wembley Stadium & Facebook Features? (Roundup)

Simon Barker — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 17:40:51 +0000

Here’s some of the cool webpages and online stuff that I’ve found whilst roaming around the Internet recently and decided to add them to my online favourite bookmarks between 17th March 2010 and 24th March 2010:

Top 100 April Fools Pranks and Gadgets | Walyou – April Fools is almost upon us again, so while we await what the creative people on the Internet come up with this year, here's a great list of the Top 100 April Fools Pranks and Gadgets that are already out there. If you like this kind of thing, you can also check out Zath's April Fools 2009 Roundup!

How the Tablet Will Change the World | Magazine – How will the concept of having a tablet device change the way the world does things? Just take a look at this article, it raises some very good points about Apple's iPad and whether we need one? Are you looking forward to owning a tablet device such as the iPad (as a Kindle replacement?) or perhaps a more work-focussed digital journal tablet device such as the Microsoft Courier.

Wembley Stadium Tour | SerenaObhrai.com – Ever since the new Wembley Stadium was built, it's somewhere that I've wanted to visit, unfortunately I've not had the chance as yet, but when I do, I think I'll definitely want to try and get on a tour of Wembley Stadium as it sounds like a great place to look round regardless of an event taking place there or not!

10 Ways to Enjoy Doing Nothing | Real Simple – Something I have seem to have real trouble with and that is taking some time out from working without feeling too guilty about it, well here's an interesting read on how to enjoy doing nothing and how it's a good thing to be doing – thanks to Serena Obhrai for recommending this to me!

iFrame Buster Script! | Frog’s Digital Design Blog – In the last year we’ve seen more and more social bookmarking and short URL companies implementing framed toolbars round sites that they’d ordinarily seen visitors to. This means that you’re effectively losing out on having visitors to your site, you can’t track these people as they are still officially on the toolbar’s website (boosting their stats and advertising income), but by using this script on your website, you can stop these toolbars from working so people see your site properly in full!

Opinion: The 7 Least Used Facebook Features – As any Facebook user is aware, Mark Zuckerberg and his developers like to keep changing things around and testing out new features in Facebook, but do you use some of these "Least Used Features" yourself? Do you know they even exist?

Arc Keyboard – Microsoft at CES 2010 Video | Mel Carson – UK Internet Marketing Blog – Microsoft – Memoirs – Do you need a portable, wireless keyboard? I’ve often thought having one to use with my media center PC, laptop or perhaps it could make for a good input option for a future tablet device such as the HP Slate?

April Fools, World Changing Tablets, Wembley Stadium & Facebook Features? (Roundup) is a post from: Simon Barker

My Delicious Bookmarks aka Cool Online Stuff! (15th March 2010)

Simon Barker — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 01:35:59 +0000

Here’s some of the cool webpages and online stuff that I’ve found whilst roaming around the Internet recently and decided to add them to my online favourite bookmarks between 10th March 2010 and 15th March 2010:

Best of Dilbert and the internet | JakeHird – I'm sure most people have at least once seen a Dilbert comic strip, but have you seen one about the Internet? Well how seeing a whole bunch of them collected together in one place, all about the Internet, check them out, there's some very good ones among this collection!

ITV HD on Sky HD – How To Guide – Having Sky HD running on a big screen HDTV looks great for all the Sky HD channels that there are, unfortunately when you then go back to a standard definition ITV picture (because ITV HD is officially only viewable on Freeview HD), it really shows up how much worse the picture can be, especially when watching a football game. However, the good news is that you can get around this and view ITV HD on your Sky HD box – just follow how to guide and you can watch all those ITV football games in glorious HD goodness!

Fantasy F1 2010 | F1 FTW – Just like last year, F1 FTW are running a Fantasy Formula 1 competition that is free to enter and has a prize for the winner – unfortunately I didn't win last year, but I did finish 9th out of 29, so in the top third if nothing else! So if you fancy picking a team and taking on the Zath F1 team, then head on over to F1 FTW before the first race of the season!

F1 Calendar 2010 – Formula One Race Times and Dates for Google Calendar, iCal & Outlook – In the last couple of years I've really started to enjoy watching Formula 1 again (the first time since Damon Hill retired) and now the new 2010 season is nearly here. This calendar page allows you to download all the dates and then import them into your calendar of choice, mine being Google Calendar, I'm now ready for the season, just a shame that we won't get to see Formula 1 in HD until maybe next year if we're lucky!

Porsche 918 Spyder Hybrid Concept Car – Now how's this look for a hybrid car? I think I'd live with that Porsche, just a shame it's only a concept right now, but hopefully we'll see more environmentally-friendly sports cars in the future!

My Delicious Bookmarks aka Cool Online Stuff! (15th March 2010) is a post from: Simon Barker

My Delicious Bookmarks aka Cool Online Stuff! (10th March 2010)

Simon Barker — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 22:12:22 +0000

Here’s some of the cool webpages and online stuff that I’ve found whilst roaming around the Internet recently and decided to add them to my online favourite bookmarks…

Wayne unwillingly goes wireless for the weekend – An interesting blog post about what happens if you have an online business and you lose your landline broadband internet access…this reminds me I really need to figure out a better back up other than going to the local cafe to use their free wifi!

Apple Continues Its Crackdown On the iPhone App Store – It looks like Apple’s wielding its mighty axe again and removing apps from its App Store that it had previously approved, nothing like moving the goalposts eh? I’m guessing that removing these free website content apps is in preparation for the Kindle ebook reader replacement, the iPad? The less free options to compete with the iPad’s paid-only content the better? Or am I just being to cynical about this move?

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and Website Analytics Blog | Search Engine Chocolate – It may be over a year ago, but it’s still a blog post full of useful info, especially the presentation slides that have some good ideas for the use of advanced segments in Google Analytics! I now know what content my “engaged visitors” like the most!

Google facts and figures: Infographic | Frog’s Digital Design Blog – Google seems to everywhere these days, but just take a look at just how much they’re involved in now and how much they’ve grown in the past ten years or so, truly astonishing!

Parag Khanna maps the future of countries | Video on TED.com – Another great TED talk video to watch, this time it’s about countries/borders and how they are affected by trade and politics – it’s actually quite interesting how business can shape the world instead of countries directly. Also another TED video you really should watch JJ Abrams’ Mystery Box TED Talk, completely different but also interesting!

Google Buzz success or failure – In recent weeks I’ve already asked the question do we really need Google Buzz? – another social network being launching, but if you now take a look at some of the numbers of buzzes happening in comparison to Twitter retweets, it makes for interesting reading, especially considering the site in question specialises in social networks and media, surely their readers would be the most eager users of Buzz if the launch had been successful?

My Delicious Bookmarks aka Cool Online Stuff! (10th March 2010) is a post from: Simon Barker