Category: Design

Separating the men from the toys – the future of warfare and of sport?

Another thin picture (see also this posting) of unmanned aircraft, the MQ-9 Reaper:

Here. Bigger (recommended). Recent article, which includes another great photo here. Our guys said gimme in summer 2008, so they have them now? Thank you Instapundit.

Who would have thought it? The future of warfare is blokes flying radio-controlled toy airplanes. At present it’s still men against toys, with the toys winning, but soon all nations will have them, and millions of others besides.

This was how chess got started, wasn’t it? First men killed each other. Then, they said, why don’t we just use sculptures of men, and move them remotely? That way, nobody gets hurt. I think I smell a whole new sport here. Imagine it, fat blokes at an airfield having aerial dogfights, where the losers lose their airplanes, but nobody dies. Great TV! Watch those dogfights! Superstar controllers will be feted in the media. And, they won’t die. They’ll have dual scores: kills, and killeds. Nerd heaven.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Today I bought an Apple Mac keyboard …

For some months now I have been looking for a new, small computer keyboard, to replace the great wide clunky accountancy keyboard that you are usually obliged to use, complete with an extra pocket calculator stuck on the right that I don’t use occupying desk space that I can’t spare.

I’ve tried other small non-accountancy PC keyboards of the sort you can buy in Tottenham Court Road, usually made by a company called “Cherry”, but they are just as clunky as the big keyboards, and far too fiddly and generally horrible, not unlike the keyboard of the accursed Jesus (the Eee PC laptop that I am trying to forget and get rid of). Anyone want that? Might be good for a small and rather geeky kid with totally impoverished parents. Tenner anyone? Immediate next day delivery in the London area.

But now, I have this:

It’s an Apple Mac unclunky keyboard (this one I think), pictured there next to the dirty, clunky old keyboard I’ve been using until now. I saw it in a department store in Kingston this afternoon. I said: Will that work with a PC? He said: Should do. I said: Show me. He did. It worked. Bingo. Bought it. Took it home. Plugged it in. It worked. Bingo.

It’s beautifully solid, the opposite of clunky, and I am rapidly getting very used to it.

Is this how the Apple habit starts? You buy an Apple something. It works. It is nicer. Even the cardboard case that it came in is nicer. Everything about it is nicer than the PC equivalents. Even the price of this little keyboard was nicer, by a bit. And pretty soon you are converted.

My only problem so far is that I can’t delete the character to the immediate right of the cursor with just the one keystroke. That particular delete button seems to have been lost, along with that superfluous pocket calculator. To accomplish this, I now have to move the cursor to the other side of whatever I want to delete, and then delete it with the button, which mercifully remains, that deletes the character just before the cursor. I could get used to this, but would rather not have to. Anyone got any ideas about that?

Does that closer up picture of the new keyboard help at all? Hope so.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Eee PC and Brahms CDs

I was out and about today, so not much here. But look what I got:

I took one look at the Asus Eee PC, and immediately said yes, I want to buy one. It is small, light, and has a solid feel to it. I haven’t switched it on at home yet, but the guy in the shop showed me the screen, and it is way better than I feared. I had thought I might wait until the screen got better, but it’s already fine, I think. If this is what Linux can do, then look out Microsoft.

As for the Brahms CDs, these also are wonderful, and not just because they show you how small the Asus is. The first movement of the third of the string quartets, Opus 67, is particularly wonderful. Part of the secret is that the Quartetto Italiano (for it is they), always let the lower parts contribute strongly, and I really like that. But that’s not all of it. They play this piece with a uniquely lilting unanimity that I’ve never heard done better. It’s like one actor doing it, rather than four musicians. Amazing. £9 for the double CD, at MDC under the Royal Festival Hall. Strongly recommended. (However, when I played the sample (scroll down a bit at the Amazon page and pick CD1 track 5) of that same movement on my computer with its crappy speakers, it sounded very crappy indeed. At least medium fi really helps with this sort of music.)

I know. You wait months for a Classical Music posting, and then two come along at once.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Rolls Royces

Is there anyone in the world who reads this blog but not this one? Perhaps, but it seems improbable. On that off chance, this demographic should be sure not to miss this analysis of an epic car chase in one of those Confessions Of movies starring Robin Askwith.

That’s a seventies Rolls Royce going through a brick wall. It seems that Mark Holland also takes pictures off of his telly.

This is not a move I would care to try unless I owned a lot of Rolls Royces, and as it happens I don’t own even one. Frankly I think the wall would, in real life, have given a better account of itself.

But, I reckon the new German Panzer Roller would probably have done exactly that to it. For months I have been watching out for one of these in the streets of London, moving slowly enough for me to photo it. Nothing. Well, one, moving far too quickly. And then a few weeks ago I finally encountered one. It was parked outside the magnificently red bricked Westminster Cathedral (the Roman Catholic one in Victoria Street), ready to take away the Nigerian bride and groom from their magnificent Nigerian wedding. It was the best looking wedding I have ever chanced upon. Great hats. Ascot, forget it. It was as if the entire occasion had been organised for my entire benefit.

I may stick up more photos of that event anon, with hats, but I promise nothing. Sadly the light was not great, which is what has put me off doing this earlier.

I was expecting to find the new Roller overbearing and ugly. But I like it.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Hundred dollar laptop

This is a very cute design.

The $100 laptop computers that Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers want to get into the hands of the world’s children would be durable, flexible and self-reliant.

The machines’ AC adapter would double as a carrying strap, and a hand crank would power them when there’s no electricity. They’d be foldable into more positions than traditional notebook PCs, and carried like slim lunchboxes.

I reckon some quite old children might fancy that.

I have recently been trying to equip myself with the perfect bag for wandering around London with, on my photography expeditions. And I can tell you that a rigid handle like that is massively preferable to handles which are floppy, because of being made of cloth or floppy leather. Floppy handles crush the fingers. But hard handles can be hard to find.

Please forgive all the phallic innuendoes in the above. And I am now reminded that there is even a reference to “lunchboxes”. Good grief.

More reportage and links, from the BBC, here.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog