How does the old saying go about those who can dish it out, but can't take it? Here are two simple tests for it:
If you say something you wouldn’t tolerate being said to you. That makes you a douchebag.
If you get precious when someone quotes back what you just said to them, verbatim. That makes you a hypocrite.
This includes outward and passive aggression. Don’t choose (tacitly or overtly) to be one of those people.
For the last few years, I’ve been using a TPG SIM and been relatively happy. My $18 for 1GB plan was long since replaced with higher data rates and prices, but fortunately they grandfathered their existing customers.
Things were going relatively well, until I started hearing rumours that TPG were to buy Vodafone’s Australian operations. TPG resells the Optus network; Australia’s second largest mobile operator. I used Vodafone in Adelaide in the mid 2000s, but their performance was never stellar.
Turns out, the rumours were wrong about business plans, but for customers the reality is the same. TPG have entered an agreement to resell Vodafone instead, with all their new plans defaulting to them. We're told existing customers will be offered a switch to Vodafone, but they’ll continue to honour existing Optus plans.
This raises the question of whether existing customers on grandfathered plans will be able to keep their existing price points and cap, while moving to Vodafone. Or if we don't want to, whether we can stick with Optus. Given our plans are no longer offered, it’s likely we may not be offered a telco switch at all.
I’m still happy with my iPhone 5S and would prefer to stick with what I have. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out, otherwise I may head over to Virgin Mobile, another Optus reseller.
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56:17 – Hap a doo de doob dee doo, Australia's latest heatwave, 100°F, dry versus humid heat, data centre trips, serial to RJ45 adaptors, Jaycar, Geez Louise, IT problems are like weeds, forgetting lanyards, VW Combis, a soup-free Campbells, 80s logos, couples on motorcycles, using dead people in advertising, leaving things after you go, common sense of purpose in public transport, introverts versus social awkwardness, coffee shops, jobs, pleasant water streams, leaving for the next generation, crazy house prices, the NBN, the Sydney Central Hungry Jacks/Burger King fire, media ignoring details, and stitching audio... stitching.
Recorded in Sydney, Australia. Licence for this track: Creative Commons Attribution 3.0. Attribution: Ruben Schade.
Released October 2015 on The Overnightscape Underground, an Internet talk radio channel focusing on a freeform monologue style, with diverse and fascinating hosts.
Subscribe with iTunes, Pocket Casts, Overcast or add this feed to your podcast client.
The Overnightscape Central is a fun weekly podcast hosted by the illustrious PQ Ribber. Hosts and listeners of The Overnightscape Underground participate in a topic each week, and you’re welcome to join.
02:44:29 – Clara, Jimbo, Chad, Doc, Ruben, and Frank share their ideas in this look at Imagination!! PQ is your presenter and also reviews the past week’s doings on The Onsug and tells you how to join in on the rampling!!
You can view this episode on the Underground, listen to it here, and subscribe with this feed in your podcast client.
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58:38 – Reviving old theme songs, having empathy for people (but it doesn't always excuse stuff!), the Indonesian forest fire haze in Singapore and Malaysia, needing more nice people rather than successful people, self preservation, Stephen Colbert's moving interview of Joe Biden, getting away from "left-right wing" labels, personas, children raising parents, power rendering people douchebags, hippies, remuneration irrespective of jobs, using cameraphones as cameras (iPhone 6s+, Nokia Lumia), traditional cameras (Nikon D60, FinePix S9600, X-T1, X-100s), podcast elitism, car bubbles, and impromptu birds.
Recorded in Sydney, Australia. Licence for this track: Creative Commons Attribution 3.0. Attribution: Ruben Schade.
Released October 2015 on The Overnightscape Underground, an Internet talk radio channel focusing on a freeform monologue style, with diverse and fascinating hosts.
Subscribe with iTunes, Pocket Casts, Overcast or add this feed to your podcast client.
Windows 10 has been controversial for reasons I'm relieved for. People are starting to take their online privacy seriously, and large players potentially abusing it under the guise of “adding functionality” are finally being held to task. This is a victory for everyone.
That's not to say there hasn’t been a struggle. Journalists like Ed Bott have dismissed legitimate concerns over tracking, and even deleted comments like mine that sought to question it. Companies have denied their tracking activities, or paid lip service with incomplete opt-out checkboxes.
Microsoft’s Terry Myerson has responded to the backlash. The blog post doesn’t address all the concerns (or even most of them), and the tone is somewhat patronising, but it’s a start. They even took a thinly veiled (and justified) swipe at Google:
Unlike some other platforms, no matter what privacy options you choose, neither Windows 10 nor any other Microsoft software scans the content of your email or other communications, or your files, in order to deliver targeted advertising to you.
As Terry says, trust is earned.
The Overnightscape Central is a fun weekly podcast hosted by the illustrious PQ Ribber. Hosts and listeners of The Overnightscape Underground participate in a topic each week, and you’re welcome to join.
02:14:36 – A fabulous, international look at the Morning Meal and Cereal, too!! Jimbo, Rubenerd, Chad, Clara, Frank, and more!! PQ hosts and yaks it up, as well as reviewing the past week’s doings on ONSUG and telling you how to be part of the fun!!
You can view this episode on the Underground, listen to it here, and subscribe with this feed in your podcast client.
I love avaiation. I even entertained the notion of being a pilot for a year or so, before I dismissed the chance owing to my lacklustre reflexes. Let me just tap your knee. Have you done it yet? Yes Ruben, five minutes ago. OW, that hurt.
One of the more interesting carriers I discovered during my obsessive childhood research was World Airways. Below is one of their MD-11 freighters, taken by Brorsson on Wikimedia Commons.
Compared to regular scheduled airlines, World was largely a wet-lease and charter operation. I suppose in today's IT parlance, you'd call them Aircraft as a Service. They provided the aircraft, maintainenance and crew, and you gave them the destination and payload. Their most recent fleet consisted of Boeing 747-400 and MD-11 freighters, most converted from passenger jets.
World mostly serviced private clients, but they were also hired extensively by the US Government during the Vietnam War and subsequent conflicts. An old book I had mentioned their pilots were among the most skilled at avoiding rockets and such, scary stuff.
As a logo nerd and aviation livery enthusiast as well, there was also something haunting about both of World’s. I attributed their spartan look to the fact that they were usually acting on behalf of someone else, so they didn't want to draw too much attention. The same would apply to war zone operations. But the effect was downright eerie; maybe it was just me.
What I didn't know until some insomnia-enduced late-night Wikipedia reading was they ceased operations on my birthday in 2014. No more World.
I use the excellent eyeD3 utility by Travis Shirk to tag all my Rubenerd Show episodes. I record audio, run my shell script, and it does all the tedious ID3 tag work for me. It’d be virtually impossible for me to juggle my full time job, personal life and podcasting without this!
The only thing I’ve had persistent issues with is the release date option. According to the documentation:
-Y YEAR, --release-year YEAR Set the year the track was released. Use the date options for more precise values or dates other than release.
So I invoke it in my scripts as below, but the year still isn't reflected in iTunes or the id3-editor.
% eyeD3 --release-year 2015 file.mp3
The solution was to use all the date related options. Even if you include a fuller timestamp, iTunes will still pick up the year field correctly. The options are shown below in the same order as the documentation:
% eyeD3 \ --release-date 2015 \ --orig-release-date 2015 \ --recording-date 2015 \ --encoding-date 2015 \ --tagging-date 2015
A subset of these may still work, but I figure more metadata isn't an issue.
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01:03:29 – A late night train commute from Beecroft to Mascot, seeing the Sydney Harbour Bridge and Opera House, and various thoughts in between. These may include the first female Concorde pilot, The Mary Tyler Moore show, still chilly for a spring night, celebrating Sebastian’s birthday, the Anime@UTS club, Latvia, can’t escape plane sounds, idiots jumping onto train tracks, tabloid TV (A Current Affair, Today Tonight), embankments and cuttings as a geological fascination, epic road trips to northern New South Wales, Sydney Trains 160th anniversary, romance of travel, ocean liners, Malta, flag designs (stars, colour, Vexillology), the Nintendo 2DS, and getting back into Pokemon!
Recorded in Sydney, Australia. Licence for this track: Creative Commons Attribution 3.0. Attribution: Ruben Schade.
Released September 2015 on The Overnightscape Underground, an Internet talk radio channel focusing on a freeform monologue style, with diverse and fascinating hosts.
Subscribe with iTunes, Pocket Casts, Overcast or add this feed to your podcast client.
