Blog? What blog?

OK, so I might have forgotten about this blog.

I thought of it today when I found myself skirmishing with Facebook, and realised a "Notes" button had appeared on my Profile page.

I hadn't ever noticed anybody using "Notes", so I could only guess that it would be something like the "Wall" feature, where you type short comments to appear on your (or someone else's) "profile" page. But how would it differ? Hmmm...

So I clicked the "Notes" button, and got a page that said

No recently added notes to display.
Use the Publisher above to add your own.

"OK", I thought, typed a test note into the type-in box above the message (the "Publisher"?), hit "Share"... and thus updated the main "Status" message on my Profile page to say that I was experimenting with the "Notes" facility. Which, while true, was not the thing I most wanted to tell the world about myself.

After a few minutes guddling about, I discovered that the button I had clicked is for controlling whether notes (anybody's notes, I think) appear on my Profile page, and so, despite the message above, the "Publisher" was nothing at all to do with Notes. And, eventually, that creating a note involved clicking a button to add a new tab to my Profile, going to that tab, and then clicking the "Write a new note" button that appears on that page.

By this point I felt I had a pretty good idea about why I'd not noticed anybody using the "Notes" facility! Without being big-headed, I think I'm smarter than the average bear, especially when it comes to understanding the world about me and figuring out how things work. And I've been using computers for a good few years. But it had taken me over ten minutes to figure out how to create a note.

The obvious question is "what is the point of providing a feature without providing any instructions or pointers to help you use it?"

Part of the answer, of course, is that there is no point in taking care and time to write instructions, because nobody will read them anyway. The typical attention span appears to be such that everything has to be immediate and obvious, or it's too difficult. Which is why, of course, so many stand-up commedians have their share of jokes about the impossibility of programming a video recorder without the aid of a ten-year-old.

And yet, video recorders still had the plethora of features that nobody could use.

So Facebook's notes are are just continuing a fine tradition of potentially useful features that nobody ever actually uses...

Is this a hint?

So, a few Christmases ago, my cousin gave various people, including me, star sign mugs. I'm sure you can imagine the kind of thing: an image of their star sign, and a list of the attributes that the start sign is said to confer. Having read my mug, I got the feeling that it wasn't manufactured by native speakers of English. My cousin swears she wan't trying to make a point -- that she hadn't actually read the actual attributes associated with Saggitarians. Honest. Optimistic. Enthusiastic. Good humoured. Intellectual. Jovial. And tactless.

Hmmm....

Gmail's "Intelligent" advert suggestions...

I'm sure many of us have heard, or heard concerns, about Google scanning mail in order to target adverts.

Over the last few days, I've seen evidence that something about this mechanism is getting weirder / wilder / whackier.

This morning, alongside an email about travel arrangements for a croquet tournament in Glasgow, it offered me an advert for kittens for sale. Maybe it perceived a potential to build on an interest in chasing balls around.

A couple of days before that, at the top of my "in box" listing, it offered me a curious cardboard tube that allows women to wee standing up. Now, I can see this is the sort of thing that any woman might be interested in. But why tell me? Was I being prompted to consider it as an unusual Christmas present? Or given that one cannot engage with a health-conscious, independent modern woman by whipping out a cigarette lighter or offering a handkerchief, is this the kind of accessory every well-prepared gentleman about town ought to carry? Or is it just that Google doesn't think email content analysis is up to discerning the recipient's sex?

Weirdest of all, though, was when it showed me an advert for Toop Exhumation Services, along side emails about an HCI conference. Not once, but twice. Now, OK, the second one was an email acknowledging by attempt to unsubscribe from their mailing list, which I suppose has a vague sense of "ending" about it. But basically, I thought, if that's the state of the art of intelligent advert selection based on scanning my email...

But then I went on to think about appropriate cues for presenting an advert like that, I began to see the incident as a symptom of what is deeply wrong with our modern "e-mediated" lives.

You see, I don't believe there is a sensible answer to the question "what kind of email content would suggest an interest in an exhumation company?"

And because of that, I don't understand is why an exhumation company is advertising on Google at all.

OK, I confess I have only a rough idea what an "exhumation company" does, and I'm sure there are lots of subtle details that could distinguish one company from another. But why do they advertise to the public?

I can see that from time to time the Police, or the Coroner's office, will need companies to do exhumations. But surely there can't be more than maybe 100 people in the whole of Britain who are actively involved in arranging them. Can there? So exhumations is a market dominated by specialist buyers. And it is probably not a market that is hugely price sensitive --- I suspect that official bodies will pay "whatever it costs" to get the job done properly and sensitvely.

But I also guess they have some kind of tendering process and approved supplier lists and what not.

So why are these people spending money on advertising to the general public?

They are surely not expecting impulse buyers: "Your mail mentioning Aunt Agnes makes me realise how much I've missed her. It's a shame we haven't got more photos of her. Oh! Here! I know..."

I assume this does not happen.

Exhumation service is not obviously a business that has much scope for increasing its overall market size: it doesn't rank high on many people's list of "discretionary expenditure".

So are they just building general "brand awareness"? When the police come to you and say "new evidence suggests your father was murdered, and we're going to have to examine his body", you won't just settle for any exhumation company! Oh no! You know who you want...

So are they really trying to ensure that "everyone in Britain" knows their name, just in case they are ever involved in an exhumation? Or are they trying to reach a few dozen professional commissioners-of-exhumations by advertising to "everyone in Britain".

Neither of these would be a sensible basis for a conventional advertising campaign: the costs involved would render it completely un-economic. But on-line, it seems, the costs are so low that there is no obstacle. Anyone can afford to clamour for our attention, no matter how in-efficiently. And we're left to live our lives amid the resulting cacophony.

The culture that put adverts on the back of bus tickets is now scribbling in the margins of our mail.

It's enough to make you want to buy a cat! Oh... what's that written on its collar?

The trains we deserve 2

Last week, I took the train through to Glasgow for the evening.

I arrived at Haymarket station at just after 10 past six, and went to buy a ticket.

"Do you want to travel on the 6:18" asks the woman in the ticket office "or wait for the 6:33, when you'll be able to use a cheap day return, which is £7 cheaper".

I had time in hand, and getting paid nearly £30/hour to sit and read at Haymarket, rather than in Glasgow, seemed a good deal. So I bought the cheap ticket and set out for the cafe...

Only to be stopped by the ticket barrier: because my cheap ticket wasn't valid on the 6:18, I wasn't even allowed onto the platform until after it had left! So I couldn't sit in the station cafe to read. In fact, I couldn't sit anywhere: there are no facilities of any kind outside the ticket barriers - not even a bench to sit on. So I had to just stand in the ticket office for 8 minutes until the guy manning the barrier realised that the earlier train had gone, and let me onto the platform.

Since Margaret Thatcher has left us a railway system dedicated to maximising ticket revenue, having to pay more to travel on certain trains is what I have come to expect. But preventing access to seats and the waiting area seems to be taking things too far. Presumably they are doing this to stop people sneaking onto the wrong trains. Which would not, of course, be a problem if they were going to check the passengers tickets.

So rather than have enough staff to enforce the complicated ticket restrictions that they have chosen to impose, they force passengers (i.e. their customers) to literally stand around in doorways until they can be trusted to go near the trains.

Customer Service, Scotrail 2008 style...

Robert.

XDA / Windows Mobiles Woes 5

I had to do (yet) another re-boot on my XDA Orbit the other day.

Because I couldn't turn the radio off. The software application for
the radio became unresponsive. But even when I killed it, the
radio continued playing!

Really impressive.

Robert.

Windows Mobile Woes 4

The O2 XDA Pilot has a built-in FM radio, and I have just
used it to listen to a program.

No problem... until the program finished and I tried to turn
off the radio... and find that the FM Radio application is completely
unresponsive. I can't turn it off.

Fiddle, poke. Nothing. So I go to the list of running applications (so
easily found, under Settings / System / Memory / Running programs),
find the "FM Radio" and "Stop" it. Silence. Fine. Back to work.

Until a couple of minutes later, when the radio comes back on!

So it's back to the XDA and try to start the "FM Radio" application.
It won't start... but the sound stops!

Great. Just great! Back to work.

Until a couple of minutes later, when the radio comes back on AGAIN!

Try again. Same thing happens.

Bang head on table. Doesn't help.

Time for reset number 3, it seems.

Robert.

Windows Mobile Woes 3

Now, I've had my second forced reset since upgrading to WM 6.

The other day I turned on my XDA Pilot and found that the left-hand
side of the screen was not touch sensitive. The device was locked,
and was displaying the big numeric keypad for me to enter my PIN.
The buttons on the right-hand side of the screen entered characters.
Those on the left did nothing. And nor did the "unlock" button (also
on the left). Which was a bit terminal, really.

So I was down to poking the reset button.

After the reset, everything was fine. So, no hardware problem...

So, that's two resets in just on six weeks. Suggesting that WM6 is
in fact no better than WM5.

Robert.