Feeling quite hyper after that little ding dong on Livesey. Might need a warm milk to calm down.

Be afraid, be very afraid…“@hnfirehose: SOPA author back and worse than ever: http://t.co/A4aI04Zs”

Pls let this be true… “@hnfirehose: Google to Sell Heads-Up Display Glasses by Year’s End: http://t.co/FCZKpiZY”

@lahaar yeah maybe I won’t quite put it like that. But that’s my argument, in essence.

@libz84 I’m waving! In the kitchen downstairs.

Off to the Beeb for a late night appearance on Livesey, defending computer games.

@fulljames Just a quick overview – have a good guy up here (http://t.co/gcURBbAj
) who might be able to advise.

Still seeking a junior superhero here @canddi – http://t.co/g03i8JB8. Know anyone who might fit @jamesp0p @kottiuk @damiangostomski ?

@fulljames I may I know a man who might… If that’s not too non-committal. Got a proposal?

@fulljames I may I know a man who might… If that’s not too non-committal. Got a proposal?

Blogged this: Instant Obsolescence – http://t.co/8U9GIZOV

One gadget in particular caught my attention because it is just such a perfect example of what you could call ‘Instant Obsolescence’. It is a gadget designed to transfer MP3s to a MiniDisc player. I have no memory of ever buying this gadget, nor of ever using it, but for a while before I got my first iPod I was indeed a MiniDisc devotee. I still think the MiniDisc has a strange, slightly retro-Sci-Fi cool.

I’ve talked about technologies similar to this before. Transitional devices designed to bridge the gap between different generations of technology. Like the LiveScribe Echo pen, which enables digital capture of paper written notes – a device for which i have recently discovered a group of absolute devotees. This technology smooths the move from writing on paper to writing on digital surfaces – if we continue to use handwriting at all.

MiniDiscs: Retro Chic

The difference between the LiveScribe Echo and this MiniDisc gadget is that the former is helping people to migrate from a technology embedded in our culture, that has hundreds of years of history behind it. I believe the digital pen is transitional technology but it probably has years of opportunity and use ahead. By contrast the MiniDisc barely achieved any kind of market outside the radio industry where it was used for both capturing audio and playing it back in studios before everything went digital.  In my experience the only place you might still see a MiniDisc deck in use is in a radio studio.

Launching an accessory for such a transitional platform with a small user base is ambitious: you have to get it to market quickly and capture a large proportion of the users if you are to make a profit. If, of course, you realise that the market is transitional. Launching an accessory that explicitly acknowledges the coming supremacy of an alternative platform – in this case digital music – shows either a great degree of confidence in your ability to execute, or a total lack of vision for what is coming.

The former option is the most interesting because it says a lot about where we have got to in our ability to design, manufacture, and bring to market electronic goods. We can translate an idea into a product in a matter of months – maybe less – in order to service a market that only exists for a minimal period. Modern examples might be cases or docks for the latest generations of smartphones, always due to be superseded within a matter of months.

These products are almost instantly obsolescent, or at best move very quickly from being on the shelves of the shop to being in the car boot sale or on eBay. But companies can get them to market so quickly and with such practical margins that creating products of such fleeting value is clearly profitable.

This has consequences. The approach of built-in obsolescence for consumer goods enabled costs to fall for us as consumers but dramatically increased the cost of technology to the planet, increasing the rate at which we burned through our supply of fossil fuels. The chance to profit from instant obsolescence has further increased the rate at which we plough through these limited resources.

@philghall Ouch. Sign me up for the plastic surgeon. Or at least a diet better than Ken’s.

What has happened to Ken Clark’s cheeks? Realise this isn’t sharp political insight but I’m intrigued. #bbcqt

@Richard_Howard1 @missjogood I own neither a beard nor a cap! I’m on the right (left of the pic).

“@MissJoGood: …LOOK…It’s YOU! http://t.co/cCGGxYLW” Triple A North’s class of 2012, inc @darrylmorris

It is officially warmer than Los Angeles in @CANDDi towers #sweaty

Talking Facebook privacy with BBC Radio Berkshire’s Sarah Walker shortly

Reviewed these: Digital Silence DS-321D noise cancelling headphones http://t.co/AGagx4C3

I’ve been testing a pair of these headphones for a few weeks now and I can confirm that they work well. What they don’t do is completely block out noise: you are still very aware of the hubbub going on, it’s just quieter. In fact these headphones provide very stark evidence of just how noisy the world around us really is. For example, air conditioning makes a hell of a racket. Normally your brain tunes this out, but pop these headphones in for a while and then turn off the ANC and you hear just how loud a sound you have been competing with, both when talking and listening.

There are alternative products on the market that cut out more sound: very expensive over-ear headphones from Bose for example, or much cheaper but more tight-fitting in-ear sets from the likes of Denon or Sennheiser. Denon or Sennheiser in-ear sets are my usual choice of headphone (I go through a lot) but they do have flaws. For a start you may not hear much from outside but you do hear everything going in inside your own head, which is surprisingly noisy. Being totally cut off from the outside world is problematic to: you can’t hear traffic for example.

Using the DS-321Ds I’ve found it much easier to listen to music or speech while walking around cities and train stations, without having to constantly pop my headphones out when there’s an announcement or I need to cross the road. They do have flaws: the deliberate design that stops them cutting out all external noise means they fit less well than my Denons and hence don’t always stay in the ear. The cable lengths seem a little odd too: too short a run from the electronics to the plug, and too little between the right-hand earphone and the mic/control button. And when the noise cancelling is engaged there is a very quiet but definitely audible hiss. But they are priced competitively for such a high tech rig (£59.99), and the fact that they have become my every day choice beyond the necessary trial period justifies a good four stars for me.