Russell Davies

muxtape to tape

We all love Muxtape don't we? (Though we're all slightly worried that some lawyers must step in and end it soon). But, in the continuing spirit of slowing the web down a bit, I thought it might be nice if you could get your muxtape on an actual physical cassette tape.

So, I've set up the complicated studio arrangement shown above and I've bought some cassettes. If you add your muxtape address below then I'll stick it on a tape for you, with another random muxtape on the other side, and the track names written on in untidy handwriting. When I've done it I'll get in touch, get your address off you and stick it in the post.

It doesn't seem worth charging for it, so no money will change hands, just do something nice for someone  else sometime.

Rules:

I'll work down the comment list in order. When I run out of tapes or money, or can't face doing any more, I'll close the comments on this post and that'll be it.

The quality will be what you can imagine from the set-up above. I'll try to remember to turn the alert sounds off on other applications but don't be too alarmed if some twhirl noises appear on your mix.

Happy to post anywhere in the world but everything will probably happen slowly, by the cheapest available post.

Er, that's it. Anyone interested?

search engines off

About an hour ago a song clicked onto the ipod and I was moved to issue this tweet.

Mr Tinley caught the vibe, which was nice. And it occurred to me that you could run a good pop quiz via twitter. And a second later it dawned on me that it would be no fun because ease of googling would ruin it. Which made me think that it would be nice if all the search engines would switch themselves off for an hour a week so quizzes could happen via twitter. Certainly there'd be revenue lost, massive inconvenience and huge global coordination issues but it'd be nice wouldn't it?

Then, a bit later, I noticed Ben had done it anyway.

zen and the art of burnout dominator

Arthur and I have been playing a lot of Burnout Dominator recently. V good game. In my usual inept driving game style, my thumb has been firmly on the X the whole time. Really pressing down hard, inducing thumb-ache. Which is of course pointless; you don't go faster by pressing harder. But you can't help it, it illustrates how persuasive the whole experience is to your brain, it's really hard not to press hard, hunch forward, screw up your face, the whole time.

Which made me wonder if Burnout Dominator might therefore be a good training tool for buddhist monks and those who wish to demonstrate control over their emotions and their bodies. If you can drive really hard and fast in Burnout Dominator and keep the pressure light then you've got some kind of zenfoo PS2 detachment from the real world mastery.

interesting tickets

Interesting2008 tickets will go on sale on Friday the 25th of April. 9am BST. I'll stick the link to where they'll be on sale here, then. Same deal as last time. £20 each. Only 300 of them (I think it keeps it nice and intimate). If you spoke at Interesting2007 you don't need to buy a ticket, you can get in free.

Er, I think that's it.

establishing shots in powerpoint

This is the opening title for Basil The Great Mouse Detective. We watched it this evening and looking at this opening reminded me how good movies are at getting us instantly into a mood and a frame of mind. Which then made me realise how bad most of us are at doing that with powerpoint/keynote. There don't tend to be many establishing shots in presentations, not many visuals designed to get us into the right emotional/mental territory.

(Don't worry it was only a fleeting thought, I'm not that obsessive about presenting, I then got on with enjoying the movie, which is definitely up there at the top of the Disney second division.)

But then, afterwards, I dug out a couple of other DVDs and looked at how they established themselves.

This is the very first shot, Series One, Episode One, of The Wire. Flashing blue lights reflecting in blood on the street. That says it all right there.

This is the first frame of THX1138. Fractured. Abstract. Close.

That's Les Bicyclettes de Belsize. You get it all from that combination of text and visual. Perfect. (Les Bicyclettes is out in the UK at the moment coupled with The London Nobody Knows, they're both brilliant and both barking mad in very different ways.)

We should pay as much attention as movie makers. We get people in a darkened room, we point them at a big illuminated screen and then we show them something horrible like "Whither Synergistic Frameworks? - A Presentation To VeryBigCo By ConsultrGroup.' Seems like we should aim for a stronger start.

And a better End. How many presentations have we all done which peter our into a '... well that's it. Thanks'. What you need is...

urbis bacon chips and beans

Urbis, the splendid museum in Manchester say:

"Inspired by the book Egg, Bacon, Chips and Beans Urbis (www.urbis.org.uk) will be running a small exhibition about Manchester Greasy Spoons - if you have any comments about your favourite (or worst!) Manchester Greasy Spoons, get in touch with us - [email protected]"

Brilliant stuff. I've not done that many places in Manchester, not really had chance, so I'm looking forward to what they unearth. Remember, email them, don't comment here.

guardian breakfasts

Very excited to have done some stuff for The Guardian today. There might still be time to get one at the newsagents if you're out and about. There's lots of eggbaconchipsandbeans stuff and some excellent words from Malcolm at the LRB. 30 years of reading it and finally I've done a bit of writing.

always in beta

I went to a thing called the Little Big Voice lectures a while ago, organised by the Howies folks, and handed out some always in beta badges. They decided to make them into t-shirts for their splendid t-shirt of the week thing, so if you'd like one you can get one. And, since 'always in beta' isn't really an idea anyone should own or make money off if you buy one £3 will go to the Open Rights Group.

thursday

Look Out! Danger of this.

wednesday

Pendine Sands