Potpourri

The working title of this article was ‘Working Title’. It is little tidbits that are interesting but either too long, or short, for me to really get enthused about writing. So I’ve gathered them together, for your perusal.

VNUNet has an interesting article about the Top 10 IT villains, which would do Letterman proud on any night of the week. (don’t worry if you need, in several spots, a British-to-American English translation, dictionary.com is your friend)

Gmail, everyone’s favourite webmail service, turns five next week, and to celebrate, Google’s got a present for us all: it’s going to announce a big new Gmail feature on Monday. What is it? More storage? GDrive? Read on to see what we know.

Google is holding an event in Brussels next week to celebrate Gmails’ fifth birthday, where it promises to announce the next stage for Gmail in world domination.

Details are thin underfoot, but it’s unlikely that the announcement will be Gmail going out of beta however: “It has more of a European multilingual angle to it,” a Google spokesman said. We’re not sure what that could mean seeing as Gmail is already available in most European languages, so we’re hoping that’s to throw us off the scent.

Now, brace yourselves. Like the IKEA car supposedly being unveiled on Tuesday, this Gmail announcement is alarmingly close to April Fool’s Day. And we know that Google likes a laugh: remember the manned mission to Mars it had planned last year?

But everyone thought Gmail itself was an April Fools, and how we were all proved wrong about that. We’ll let you know if Google announces anything as Gmail blows out the candles.

The above came from Electricpig an up and coming British website that covers all manner of tech, apparently scooping other places a few times since its inception.

Harry McCracken, late of PCWorld, and now of Technologizer, shows that those who work in technology can have their very own Luddite moments, as he rails against things like  Bluetooth, RSS feeds, and direct-to-printer photo printing. He also adds in modern CPUs (post-486), but that’s just a small joke.

Actually, after the article that George Ou had in PCMag concerning the fact that Bluetooth and wi-fi don’t play well together, I really can’t blame Harry for that one. As for George, he has his own space now, and he never really fit in at ZDNet, he’s too much an independent thinker.

On My Digital Life, shown is the ideal keyboard for all the Felix Ungers of the world. It is claiming to be ‘the’ hygienic keyboard for those interested.

named Vioguard, this one will help allay any fears of sharing a keyboard. (more here)

Each of us, I think, has a small area of life where we, as Harry McCracken above, shows a little bit of the Luddite mentality. With me, it is my intense love for fine writing instruments. There is (almost) nothing finer than the feel of a great pen in one’s hand. For me, it is those made by A.T. Cross. I am almost never without one, when out of the house. When at a store, and asked for my signature, my pen is in my hand before the salesperson can notice that they don’t have to offer one for my use. (using a crappy pen is worse than using a crappy keyboard)

the Century, in 14k gold  (getting pricier every day)

While I love my great keyboards, nothing helps me think, while deciding on a course of action, like a fine pen and a fresh pad of paper. (I’m like Tom Cruise in ‘A Few Good Men’ only instead of a bat, it’s a pen) For others, possibly like me, you can feed the need by looking at the latest Cross offerings.

That’s enough for now. Humans have such annoying habits.

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