almost witty

A long time ago, thanks to my ex-workchums at BBC Wales (thanks guys!), I bought myself a Freecom Network Mediaplayer - basically a hard drive which you can connect to your TV. I gleefully set about downloading about 350 Gigabytes of ancient TV programmes from your local friendly non-official sources, looked forward to my digitally converged future, and pretty much left it sat underneath my TV set while I watched endless repeats of Top Gear instead.

Then last night, I rashly invited my neighbours to come and watch the recent Doctor Who 2007 Christmas special (the one with the Titanic) with me.

First problem - my Sky Plus had inconveniently forgotten to record any of the Christmas programmes I’d set it to record. So instead, I set about downloading it off the Internet, transferring it over to my Mediaplayer, and we could all watch it from there. After 20 minutes of frantically trying to get the laptop to see the hard drive (by mostly rebooting endlessly, and sticking the USB cable in and out), the file transferred over and I thought all was fine and dandy for the big show.

So the doorbell was rung, dinner was ready, wine was poured, and we all sat down to re-watch Doctor Who. Except about half an hour in, the hard drive started spluttering and freezing. Despite numerous reboots, the device refused to work, although the file itself was fine. Bah.

Thus it was that after a suitable soujourn into town for drinks, we all stumbled back into another neighbour’s house at 1am, to finish off watching Doctor Who. On her trusty ol’ VHS tape. Analogue 1, Digital 0.

Can you recommend any handy devices that’ll let me watch downloaded videos on my TV? Preferably ones that come with a DVD player that’ll upscale via HDMI, and ones that’ll also record off a digital TV signal on demand. Oh, and if it can connect directly to my sound system, that’d be great too.

When you hear the word induction, what do you think it means?

I thought it meant my work colleague was going through a corporate induction, and thought it was a trifle odd since he’d been working at the company for quite a while. But I made a joke about it anyway.

He thought I knew that it was referring to his forthcoming baby, who may well have to be induced. And he thought it was a trifle odd that I’d make a joke like that, and wondered if I was being wacky for the sake of being wacky, or I’d gotten the wrong end of the stick.

I’m already developing a reputation. Three weeks into the job. Oy vey. But it’s still a good fun place to be at!

Way back in April 2007, I decided to open a Barclays Bank Cash ISA because of the huge amount of interest it offered. Of course, the application procedure was a tad complicated - it involved:

- filling out an old-fashioned pen’n'paper application form - no online banking here!
- taking that application form to my local branch, complete with two forms of ID
- waiting ages until there was a personal banker who could tend to my needs
- photocopying all my various forms of ID which seemed to take ages
- writing them a cheque as the deposit on my account.

Fast forward to mid-July 2007, and there’s been no acknowledgement from Barclays, and the cheque hasn’t been cashed. It’s been sitting there in my current account doing nothing except making me look embarassingly rich when I come to withdraw money from the cash machine.

So I phone Barclays Taxbeater Cash ISA, who inform me that there was a problem with my original documents, and they sent it back to my local Barclays Bank branch to get me to verify something. Two months ago.

Needless to say, Barclays Llandudno never got round to calling me. So I try calling them.

Strangely enough, you can’t call Barclays Llandudno. They call you - or you pop round to see them. Any attempt to get the people on Barclays’ national bank line to give you the Barclays Llandudno branch number or to connect you direct gets you absolutely nowhere.

And they say customer service is improving. Sheesh. And I’m not the only angry one either.

Thanks to a random link I stumbled across, I’ve just spent the last fifteen minutes giving into my inner fascination with apocalyptic fiction and browsing through Wikipedia’s rather substantial list of post-apocalyptic fiction, reminding me of the UK’s relatively substantial contribution to the genre - The War Game, Threads, Day of the Triffids, 28 Days Later and culminating in World War Z, a gripping account of the Zombie World War.

Right now, I feel rather ill, nauseous and sick right now (bit like radiation poisoning, I’d imagine). Which is amazing given that with the notable exception of 28 Days Later and Day of the Triffids, I’ve never actually had the courage to sit through the rest of the above. But I will have to resolve to buy World War Z, not least because the British government apparently starts its fight back against the zombies from Conwy, less than a mile away. So at least I have somewhere to run to when the zombie hordes invade.

Any suggestions on how I can wash my brains out? Because I don’t want to feel like this for the rest of the day!

Viral Marketing

Originally uploaded by Mark McLaughlin.

Picture the scene. You’re part of a guerilla marketing team dedicated to finding out new ways to promote a killer-virus movie. Thus, someone has the bright shiny idea of spraying biohazard signs all over London. Great idea, full marks.

But how do you tie in the biohazard sign with the movie? Ahaaa, you say, you’ll stick a web address at the bottom of the biohazard sign. This will signify to one and all that it’s not a *real* biohazard - because heavens to Betsy, sticking a real biohazard sign in London would just cause panic amongst the populace.

Two ever-so-tiny flaws with this plan:

1. Spraying isn’t exactly pollution or health-risk free, y’know. Plus, who’s going to clean it up?

2. Someone on the marketing team forgot to knock heads with someone on the web team, and erm… actually buy the web domain in question. So take a look at what www.ragevirus.com actually does…

Why can’t I get a job on a web marketing team? Please? I know web and I know marketing!

PS: Really looking forward to seeing this film! Although did it need a sequel?