Toto, I've Got a Feeling We're Not in Kansas Anymore

2006-10-07
Nope, not The Wizard of Oz. One of the characters in The Cat Returns is a crow named Toto, but he helps out Haru (not Dorothy) when she is kidnapped to the Cat Kingdom (rather than, er, Oz). Yep, this is a kid’s film. It’s entertaining and well-executed, as one would expect from another film from the Studio Ghibli production team, and light-hearted too, but there’s nothing deep, nothing glittering, and nothing rich like one might get from a Hayao Miyazaki film (such as Howl’s Moving Castle, which I wrote about the other day).

Howl's Moving Castle

2006-10-06
To see animation at its very peak, you need to see Japanese anime. Howl’s Moving Castle is another excellent slice of this from director Hayao Miyazaki. Miyazaki’s film is superbly executed in almost every way. The animation is mouth-wateringly rich and silky, supplemented by camera moves made possible in the age of CGI. It’s clear that he is using this technology to not only match what’s possible in live action, but move beyond it.

Why Developed Countries are Heading for Increasing Inequality and Centrists Might Not be as Balanced as They Think

2006-10-06
From time to time I listen to RadioEconomics. It’s not quite as interesting to me as EconTalk, partly because it doesn’t have the same focus on liberty, but an interesting discussion the other day with Dr. Diane Coyle from Manchester University brought me to two conclusions: Developed countries will suffer from increasing inequality if the current trend of outsourcing increases. Creative ‘knowledge’ work is becoming the province of a large proportion of the population in places such as the US and the UK.

The Consequences of Travel Delay

2006-10-05
A train I was on from Winchester to London yesterday was delayed because of faulty doors on another train. In fact, at one point, we actually managed to go backwards for a few miles to get to usable track. Despite sitting stationary for 15 minutes whilst the signalmen dithered and ending up almost half an hour late, South West Trains didn’t mention provide any reparations for passengers on the train. By contrast, my experiments in travelling by coach recently (primarily on National Express) have been very promising; they are cheaper than the train and surprisingly reliable for road-based transport.

IBM Bloggers

2006-10-05
I am now on the official list of IBM external bloggers. You can find plenty of my colleagues there also, blogging on a variety of IBM-related and other topics.

Semasiology Change - the Word 'Expert'

2006-10-04
(Using big words gives me a cheap thrill). Has anyone else noticed that the word ’expert’ is changing its meaning, becoming more generous? It seems like the bar for becoming an ’expert’ is lower than it once was (good examples can be found on the 6 o’clock news). Of course it’s hard to measure this other than empirically, but it’s fun to play the mental exercise - are you an expert in anything?

Perl Getting the Job Done

2006-10-03
Sometimes I think we in the IT industry forget that the point of computing is to make the lives of human beings easier; to do things for us and automate our work; not to introduce extra tasks (this premise is the thrust of IBM’s Autonomic campaign). I was reminded of this the other day when I was writing a set of Perl scripts to download podcasts for me by tidying up the output of goldenpod.

WebSphere ESB Fixpack 3 Released

2006-10-02
If you’re using WebSphere ESB, Fixpack 3 for version 6.0.1 has just been released, which fixes a variety of problems. You can find out more here.

Let's be Generous to SOA

2006-10-02
One of the troubles of working in the IT industry is that no-one ever agrees on what the next big thing means. This is partly because software terms tend to run out from between your fingers when you try to grab them, just like soft putty - want to try defining ‘blogging’? One example I’m thinking about a lot at the moment is SOA (Service-oriented architecture). The problem isn’t just that people don’t know what SOA means, but that there isn’t a single definition - every software vendor has a subtly different message.
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