Showing posts with label Kindle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kindle. Show all posts

Monday, 7 September 2020

In The Dark - #FruitfulSeptember #3


I am not coming to terms with being woken up by the alarm and it's dark. I'm sure last week it was still light when I got up. I know it's autumn but it seems to have been a very fast transitions from light summer days to what we have now. While I like autumn generally, I don't like grey silent skies.

At the moment there is a uniform greyness in the sky, which brings on the sad feeling of Seasonal Affected Disorder, although for me that's just a general lacl of motivation and positivity.

Tonight I will watch teh final episode of  "Veep" although I have plenty of other things to watch , and "Silicon Valley" will keep me supplied with caustic one liners even though there's not a Donald Trump type imbecile figure in yet, although there are a few Jonah equilavents to be going on with.
 
I'm also on the final chapter of "Venus on the Halfshell" and though I know what's coming , it's been a wryly amusing observation of the general human condition , so wil lnow have to get abother book to be going on with, although I am still reading "Imajica" on the Kindle  which , although it's my favourite ever book, I am quite happy to stop and start reading whenever I feel like it, although different devices seem to conspire to lose my place in the book . I have a Kindle and also the app on my Google Pixel 2XL phone, and you would think it would be fairly simple to maintain a book position give the state of technology today.
 
So for #FruitfulSeptember I will share "Blueberry Hill" by Fats Domino with you, and I know it's an obvious one, but there will be a few of those, but the thing is setting yourself the target in the first place.

Tuesday, 16 July 2019

An Acorn


Thanks to reading 2023 I am considering buying Yoko Ono's "Grapefruit" but it seems to me perfectly suited to an ebook reader, though is not (yet) available in ebook format. However the follow up "Acorn" is, so I bought it and have started skimming through it on my Kindle app on my Google Pixel phone , and am enjoying what I am seeing.

The only book I have ever read on my phone is "The Art of War" by Sun Tzu and that is a book that can actually be dipped into, although a polar opposite of Yoko Ono's writing. I am also trying to read "Ulysses" by James Joyce though that is much ard going.

The joy of "Acorn" and lot's of Yoko Ono's writing is that you can take a little or a lot and it will still satisfy. Some people will be left cold but we cannot all like the same thing.

I do hope "Grapefruit" is released as an eBook as I will definitely purchase it , it would be nice to have it with me most of the day, when I'm on the bus , or in a hospital waiting room (my annual diabetic check up tomorrow), but I do have "Acorn" , "The Art of War" and a "QI" compendium to keep me going.

So why don't we go with "Walking on Thin Ice" by Yoko Ono ?

Thursday, 2 August 2018

Post


Well I'm home after the Liver Biopsy, slightly fragile side and sore shoulders for some reason, but remember the right shoulder being a side effect of the Liver Biopsy.

It's quite amazing that  the rooms now have basic TVs although I was tooled up with my Kindle, my Phone and a Matt Haig book, "How To Stop Time".

So I spent some time reading then binge watched Nathan Barley abd was surprised and the number of name actors in it. Benedict Cumberbatch, Noel Fielding, Ben Whishaw and it's written by Chris Morris and Charlie Brooker and it's thirteen years old and I've only just watched it thanks to All 4,

Again it's been another example of how brilliant and efficient the NHS is despite being under such enormous pressure due to lack of investment.

I also found the 360ยบ Camera app on Facebook on my phone, so that is another plus from today. I now need two days of total rest before slipping back into real life.

Today I was worried I would have my lowest ever step total , but I have hit just over 3K although tomorrow and Saturday will both be very low, then it's a case of trying to catch up.

This morning I was going to share "Hospital" by The Modern Lovers (featuring Jonathan Richman) but that will do for me to sign off tonight. You can hear the Velvet Underground influence in this excellent brooding song, and it's a cool one to sign off with tonight.

Sunday, 8 October 2017

Running Out - Power and Signals


 Was just thinking habout how reliant we are becoming on mobile devices and how companies are pushing us to become more reliant on mobile devices. We can use them to pay for things, watch things , communicate in a number of ways but they are reliant on two things, power and a decent signal. So you may have your phone phone and think you can use it as your bus ticket, pay for your overpriced coffee or whatever but if the battery runs out then that's you stuck. Similarly of the signal drops then you may be stuck again although some apps provide on device data.

I use my Sony Xperia XA for recording my walking and yesterday went out without it. Incidentally the Pacer software since I installed it has only possibly failed to record properly one, and that may have been my fault, so I am well impressed by it's reliability.  This was one of the few times I have returned to get hold of my phone , mainly because I wasn't sure if I'd left it in the house or actually lost it. I piced it up and the power was on 12% . By the time I got to my destination it was still going on 2% power but must have switched off soon after. I didn't have a back up power pack and although I have one power cable which I could have used to recharge it on the bus, it was in another jacket.

Sometimes a pen and paper is actually better, and although I have the Kindle app on my phone and an actual Kindle Fire they are still dependent on power and signals.

I'm not sure what the answers are to these first world problems, unless someone makes distributed power a reality. Imageine how cool it would be if power was as distributable as a radio , tv or mobile signal. We would truly be a wireless society then although even more vulnerable to losing the source of keeping us up and running.

This could possibly be even extended to replacement body parts, imagine a heart running on distributed power. but I am really flying off  into the outer reaches of science fiction here and I am no Brian Aldiss, and I was introduced to the concept of distributed power by another of my favourite authors F Paul Wilson. I think it was Legacies. one of the excellent Repairman Jack series.

Anyway it's Sunday and I need to relax , so it has to be "The Power" by Snap. Have a good day everybody.

Wednesday, 19 July 2017

The iPad is Gone

It's grey and rainy and I am have hust been watching Ripper Street and Taboo, lots of grim , 19th Century violence and machinations.

Yesterday morning I had a dream , I think I was in Edinburgh, in some Polish shop but I had to go back to get a codec for a video but the only way out was via a hardboard catflap blocked by a China man on a trolley but I had to go out via side door into somewhere I had never been before , lots of high dark streets, then the alarm went off. I know this makes no sense but it was a dream and I can still remember some of it, so that's why I've written it down here. Some psychiatrist will probable get some insight into my psyche from that, or maybe not .. who knows.

Anyway for the last year I have probably used my iPad to charge up and update IOS and that's about it. I'd originally got it to play with Garageband and basically I just doodled with Garageband. I find my TASCAM portastudio and Audacity far easier to produce music with so I ditched the iPad and bought a Kindle Fire 8. All I've done with it so far is charge it up, but I  hope I will get more use out of it than I did the iPad. I just tried to install the Google Play Store but that wasn't successful and Alexa has talked to me.

I only have sixty thousand steeps to no to hit my million steps in three months in the Million Step Challenge, and after that I pledge to do 340K each month. It's a good way of keeping fit without the boring drudgery (as I see it) of gym membership,

Anyway I thought I would tell you about my dream and how I am no longer infected by Apple but we shall see how the Kindle performs. So a suitable record would be on of the Osmonds goodies, where they try to take on the Jackson 5 leaving you with "One Bad Apple".

Sleep well my friends.



Monday, 24 March 2014

More Blue Skies




It's the start of the week and there are clear blue skies and frost on the cars and rooves or is it roofs? Grammar is such a weird thing , especially English which is probably the most complex idiosyncratic language in the world. How do you pronounce the word "wind" . You need to see or hear it in context.

I was just on Amazon's Kindle store and noticed that Ebooks are subject to VAT. I'm not sure if paper books are, but I assume not if Ebooks carry that notice.

Still that's a minor thing , so I'll include The Strypes Taxman as a video (check out the drummer he looks about 8 in this clip.

Have a great day, it looks lovely out.


Saturday, 30 March 2013

A Little History Of The World

Every Home Should Have One
I've started reading this book by Ernst Gombrich and four chapters in I've convinced that any family that has children under ten should have a copy of this. It's written in a simple, generally jargon free manner and is likely to spark interest and questins from inquisitive minds.



It's nice to come across something positive for young children and also to able to promote it as I shall be doing on April 28th.




Books stimulate the mind whether on paper or in ebook format and all children should be encouraged to read from as early an age as possible even if teachers don't like it .



Both my daughters knew their alphabet and the use of upper and lower case by the time they started school and amazingly some teachers said this was wrong. Luckily their primary school in Sunderland encouraged their reading and both had finished the Lord of The Rings by the age onf 10. I only started on the Hobbit at that age!


Sunday, 17 March 2013

Four And A Half Books



I'm not a fast reader , but am a great advocate of books and reading . As well as paper we also have the option of ereaders such as Kindles and iPads and other tablets. For some reason I've been reading a lot of music related books. One was Bass Culture (When Reggae Was Great) by Lloyd Bradley which was heavy going because of the small type, but nevertheless a great read but an obvious candidate to read on a Kindle.

Next up was Shaun Ryder's "Twistin' My Melon" autobiography , which was much as you myight expect veering between entertaining and annoying. I never regarded him as a style icon so his continual harping on over his designer label clothes became very wearing , but I did eventually hit the final page . The fact that I completed it must mean it's not that bad a book.

Next up was Keith Richard's Life. I think it's remarkable , I was expecting it to be on a par with the Shawn Ryder book , but , it is is coherent , unrepetitive , informative , and has a lot of humour and honesty in there as well as loads of practical tips for guitarists and songwriters , as well a bits by friends and acquaitances of "Keef" . Als the truths behind many of his escapades that found their way into Rolling Stones urban legend , such as Mick , Marianne and the Mars Bar and the fall from the coconut tree. Highly enjoyable and recommended.

Currenty I'm reading Tony Benn: A Biography by Jad Adams . Tony Benn is one of the handful of politicians that I have ever had any respect for , and the book is so well written that it makes politics seem almost interesting , with goodies and baddies and comedic episodes. It's another 500 pages but a great read , and surprising because it is not something I would normally have picked up , but was given it in a Facebook promotion. A brilliant read which I hope to finish this week.

Finally I have to read A Little History Of The World by  , which is my chosen book for World Book Night 2013. This is the first one where I haven't actually read the book , but I intend to have in completed within the next three weeks. It seems similar in scope to Bill Bryson's "A Short History of Nearly Everything"  which is what attracted to the book. No doubt when I am finished I will post back here.

Sunday, 24 February 2013

4:49 Sunday Morning

..and I've woken up , or rather been woken by an annoying tickly , chesty cough, In an Alan Bennett-esque piece of situationanist observation I'm sure I made myself a LemSip , well Boots own brand equivalent last night , but can't finsd any trace of it, and I'm still wondering whether I imagined it!!

Anyway it's one of those times where it's too early to get up and too late to go back to sleep. There's a thick carpet of snow outside and though it started to melt , it's now freezing , so not driving weather and the roads are very, very quite.

Was listening to an album of protest songs last nightfron the 40's and 50's from the likes of Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger and many others about the oppression of the average man by a combination of banking and government. It's funny how banks and governments should be there to serve us , but in fact just exploit us. I'm one of the lucky ones in that I am keeping head above water , but lots of people arent so lucky, with fuel and food prices rocketing and wages either staying static or jobs just going and then people expected to take minimum wage jobs.

In yesterdays paper there wasreported a push by the Tory right to curb union power by not allowing strike action unless 50% of the members turn out. Be interesting to apply similar criteria to bills but through Parliament . Nothing gets passed unless 50% of MPs turned up. Can you imagine a company functioning with it's members have such a blatant disregard for their work and responsibilities?

Also yesterday the UK's triple AAA credit rating was downgraded to AA by the banks , who , don't forget put the whole world in this mess AND were bailed out by the governments of the world. George Osborne said that was justification for continuing austerity measures (ie tagetting people on benefits and the pensions of those on minimum wage). Yesterday the Inland Revenue was trumpetting the success of it's anti tax avoidance measures , apparently a Liverpool hairdresser and a Northumbrian Pipe Fitter were the top ones recovering about £20K. Letters of congratulation were probably sent to Amazon , Starbucks and Google. I am not getting at those companies for legally avoiding tax , I'm accusing our governments (and this goes back a long way) for facilitating this: Check this article on tax avoidance (which remember is legal and encouraged and facilitated by goverments all over the world)  and here are some telling figures:
  • 1% - Income tax rate reportedly available to members of the legal K2 tax scheme used by Jimmy Carr.  Source: The Independent
  • 98 – Number of FTSE 100 companies operating out of tax havens. Source: ActionAid
  • £25bn – Estimated annual cost of tax avoidance, according to 2008 research. £13billion of this is lost to individuals and £12billion to the 700 largest corporations. Source: Tax Research UK and the TUC
  • 10% - Average rate of tax paid by top earners, according to a confidential HMRC study seen by George Osborne. Source: The Telegraph
Plus a few telling figures from  1227 QI Facts:
  • In 2005, the 54 billionaires in Britain paide less that £15 million in income tax between them. £9 million of that was paid by James Dyson. To put it in perspective it's like me and you paying less than 10p a month on our earnings.
  • In 2011 only 9 of the 62 owners of apartments in One Hyde Park, London (the world's most expensive block of flats) paid any council tax.
  • Over 600,000 companies are registered in the British Virgin Islands (populaton < 29K)
  • In 2009 Exxon posted $19 billion profits and received a $156 million federal tax rebate from the US Government

So you can see goverments and big business are still in cahoots , taking profits for themselves and leaving us to pick up the tab. Anyway it's time to go back to bed now...


Sunday, 20 January 2013

My First Kindle Disappointment with TV Cream and Roobarb and Custard



.. and in fact my first e-book disappointment. E-readers are great for having dip-in non linear books such as reference books , encyclopedias , Fortean Times series etc. I've not spent a great amount of money on e-books , but 99p for "TV Cream Toys: Presents You Pestered Your Parents for" , and excellent reference cum picture book off those things you had to have as a kid seemed ideal. I have the hardback edition and it is and excellent book The website is a brilliant and well worth a visit.

The e-book , well I am gery disappointed. I have it on my Samsung Note and all the items have a tiny unresizeable ratings graphic and only one or two have pictures , which are also tiny and not resizeable on my phone. So even at a pound the ebook is not worth the investment , if they add some decebt sized pictures then I may change my mind but at the moment it's a no!

So I added the titles from Roobarb and Custard which is very TV Cream....

Friday, 11 January 2013

Funny How



Funny how it's easier to moan , complain and find fault than be positive. I'm suffering from a very painful right arm , trapped nerve or pulled muscle or something and then I find my iPad is almost full!! 16 Gb taken up by games , copies of the Times and iBooks. Garageband takes up a fair chunk as well , but I still like the damned think , especially as I think I have finally got my Alesis IO Dock work. The sound of crunching metal guitars in Garagemand was music to my ears so now I can start using the iPad for the reason that I bought the damned thing , the create sounds!!

It's also a good ereader as well though I have installed The Kindle app on the iPad and on my Samsung Note 2 phone so I could purchase  "Life of Pi" and "1227 QI Facts To Blow Your Socks Off" for 20p each , a bargain even if they are e-books.

But there I go again finding positives in almost all life around me, which I suppose is the optimist in me . They say a pessimist is never disappointed , and have known loats of people who are only happy when they are miserable but I am definitely not in that group. I always believ that you can find good in all situations and take positives even if it is just to learn a lesson from something.

I watched "The Road" recently , and yes it's depressing and you can see all the bad things coming , but it has a remarkably upbeat ending and I would recommend it to anyone , and last night I watch a remarkbly enjoyable Iranian Football film called "Offside" which again I would definitely recommend.

So Funny How this post turned out , I started off feeling a bit under teh weather and now I feel musch better. Shoulder still hurts , but c'est la vie !!


Wednesday, 20 June 2012

The Art of ..... Knowing What You Are On About


A few days ago I posted this on facebook:

"In my e library I have The Art of War by Sun Tzu, Heart of Darkness by Conrad, Origin of the Species by Darwin so why do need to Facebook?"

My friend Josie replied , wittily:

"because the Art of War will take you weeks to read/fully digest and Facebook takes 10 seconds to realise there's nothing interesting happening...."

So I thought I should at least dip into it , and this is what I have found:

  • It's a slim voloume , 50 to 60 pages depending on translation or format
  • It's not really a book , more a reference manual of bullet points on how to conduct a war
  • You can read it in one sitting , but it will take a lifetime to understand
  • It is full of points that relate to everyday life
  • It makes you think
  • It is easy to read
  • It's out of copyright so you can download the ebook for free
 So thanks to Josie I have read the book and will be re reading it . It is remarkable and sensible and my version was remarkably easy to read. I suggest you get a copy now!

 

Thursday, 31 May 2012

Noteworthiness



Well this completes my goal to post to the blog every day in May

Twice today people have commented very positively on the Samsung Note. It has been superceded today by the Galaxy SIII which is slightly smaller.

The first was a charming lady at the Techno Tea Party who was asking questions about email. Then she got her phone out because the ringer was too quiet. The vokume was adjusted when someong rang. I got mine out and she was very impressed and forgot all about hers. Anyway I rang her,  adjusted her volume and showed her how to do it.

She loved the keypad on mine and was very impressed with the Amazon Kindle App and the fact I downloaded Bram Stokers Dracula very quickly. I think she might be upgrading very soon.

My Note compared with with works Galaxy S
Next was the ticket collectir who was wondering about it but was wary of the size. I told him you do get used to it, but he was still botheted about fitting it in his pocket.

The size of the Note has caused more guffaws than a Carry On film,  "Ooh look at the size", "It's rather large", "Will it fit?".

As yet I think its brilliant negating the need for a tablet as well as doing everything a pone should do and more. Here's the promo for it:




A slight addendeum , it makes a great e-reader but the Amazon Kindle App wont import ebooks (the real Kindle does) , so I had to install Aldiko that does allow imports so my phone now has a huge library on it as well

Tuesday, 15 November 2011

Kindles and Kobos and Bright Shiny Ribbons

I see WH Smith have brought out their own eReader , the "Kobo" (did you see what they did there , the anagrammatised the word "book". Part of the promotion push is that there are a million free books . Very strange that and the WH Smith eReader on my Advent Vega came with no free books , and the obly way to get books was to buy them. In a huff I installed Aldiko and am happily working through my free copies of Lovecraft , Hope-Hodgeson , Howard and other classics.

The Kindle and it's associated free software also bost and impressive range of free books . The Kindle boast a decent advertising campaign , the power of Amazon and lots of other things going for it. The Kindle is the same price as the Kobo , so what is the Kobo's selling point , the Kindle s ubiquitous and almost becoming a generic name.



We shall see how the Kobo goes but I see the bargain bin beckoning ........


Sunday, 16 October 2011

More Kindling



Just another thing occurred to me about the Kindle and eReaders in general. It’s similar to the digitisation of music. One of the problems about producing a book, like producing a record , is that there has to be a minimum initial run produced to make it worthwhile for the printer.

However in this digital age the book or album can sit on a server without a physical copy having to be produced. While this makes the item more open to piracy, prudent pricing and marketing could mean we see a lot more authors published , with a possible physical print run following a successful digital  debut. We’ve already seen this in the Amazon Kindle charts.

I think digital books are already a resounding success, and will complement rather than replace their printed counterparts and companions. My Advent Vega is a more than adequate eReader, so I won’t be getting a Kindle, but I think they are here to stay.

Sunday, 25 September 2011

Mininmalism #1

Minimalism , or laziness has been the order of the month for 2011, this being my second post despite various things happening and the run up to my birthday , but sometimes life gets in the way of things you plan to do . I still need to find a place that will hire me a reciprocal saw to dismember the tree that fell into my garden two weeks back. It's in manageable chunks , and the leaves have bee disposed of , but it needs chopping into fire friendly sized logs.

Some Winter Fuel!

The other thing is that I'd started this post based on some surprising facts about one of my favourite albums , but that will get it's separate post.

Also we've have Facebook's pointless revamp , making it almost unusable , crashing phone applications and stuff like that , making people very irate , not least of them me, I believe the iPhone app is well and truly shafted. Not a good "customer" experience.



I'm also getting more than a little bored with all these groupon clones , such as Voucher Cloud and LivinSocial. Both available from the Android App Store and LivingSocial insists I'm in Wolverhampton and won't let me change it , but is happy to send me offers from the USA and Eastern Europe. I'm all for saving money , but not when it costs me my time and sanity!!!

Oh and A Kindle has entered the domicile. And yes it is impressive but it's not mine, I'm happy with the reader on my Advent Vega!!

Saturday, 25 June 2011

Kindle vs Paper - The Final Verdict II


I am sold on E-Books , and I love paper , but was decided that I would buy myself a Kindle eventually. However that idea has just been blown out of the water. Why? You may ask.

Earlier this year after being tempted by the concept of Apple's iPad but well aware of the amount of Apple related garbage and baggage that would come with it , I purchsed an Advent Vega tablet which is Android based , and is an excellent piece of kit , but you cant actually add applications to it via the Android Marketplace as its a 10" tablet (too big) and doesnt have 3G connectivity built in . Marketplace has been implicitly promised and it does havethe WH Smiths e-Reader which will allow you to only read books purchased from WH Smiths.

This morning I visited Android Pit , which allowed install of their Marketplace App on my Vega and allowed me to install the excellent Aldiko e-Reader.

So no I have my e-reader , yes it's a 10 incher , but does the job excellently ,so I now don't need to purchase a Kindle because I have something else that will do the job. Yes the vega only has a 10 hour battery life and its backlit , but it does it for. It ends here , I can read e-books wherever and whener I want!!

Tuesday, 14 June 2011

Kindle vs Paper - The Final Verdict


Sometime in the pastI wrote an article on the fact that CDs were the MacDonaldisation of music , a situation amplified by the rise of digital music and sampled ringtones . A lot of the initial arguments for CD was that they were robust and offered far higher quality that old scratchy vinyl. This paved the way for downloaded music , and one of the huge benefits has been that long deleted music could be made available as it did not need to pressed on a run of CDs that may never sell.

Project Gutenberg is a labour of love that has seen a lot of out of copyeight books stored in digital format , which anyone can download for free.

I actually see that paper and ebook readers will co exist. The Ape of Wrath states that  "The push to digital is inevitable." , which is true because we want what we want , now and in a convenient  format. Paul Campbell the scriptwriter has been encouraging me to get a Kindle, lauding the device and extolling it's benefits. They certainly save space!! And they remember where you were in your book , and you can have it now!!!


To Be Read.....
Paper is convenient , cheap , robust , doesnt need power but does need light!! . Just wondering how much "gentlemen's relish"  is available on the Kindle for "under the sheets" perusal.


I will buy a Kindle before Christmas , but I have a few books to read before then , things to do , and by the time I get one there will be a Super Kindle. But I am sold on the idea , but I still like paper very much.



Sunday, 12 June 2011

Kindle vs Paper - Round 2


The Pullman books , and The Kindle App on my phone
While I can see the benefits of the Kindle , I stll think that books will be around for a long, long time. I just picked up a couple of beautifully produced editins of "Lyra's Oxford" and "Once Upon a Time in the North" by Philip Pullman. All the text and pictures could easily be incorporated in a Kindle edition, but there is no substitute for the gorgeous books.

Yes I think the Kindle will get stronger and stronger , but still feel it will complement the current book market , not take it over. I will probably get one eventually, but still wouldnt be happy thinking I could lose my book collection if I lost my piece of hardware.

Sunday, 1 May 2011

Kindle vs Paper - Round 1

This is a short post , basically a joke my mate Chris (the author of the Ape of Wrath blog) told me that he heard in a Comedy Club:

 

Suit on train platform with his attache case , laptop bag (on trolley) , answers his mobile phone and drops his Kindle which hits the platform edge on and shatters into a million pieces. Guy next to him drops his paperback copy of "Great Expectations" , bends down , pick it up dusts it off , and says "No Damage Done!!"


Sill not convinced , and still like my paperbacks