I use a Mac. A lot of people use Macs.
We’re not all weirdos.
Honest

However there is nothing more annoying than a website that explicitly tells you that your choice of computer will not work:

If it was a simple bit of brochureware I wouldn’t mind as much, though I’d still think it was a bit odd.

However it’s not.

It’s the ecommerce site for Argos in the Spanish market. That they’ve chosen the rather odd domain argos-spain.co.uk is a possible indication of their online strategy. The Argos group owns the domain argos.eu as well, but it’s not doing anything at the moment, apart from possibly gathering virtual dust. (The .es would have been a more obvious and better choice, but a Spanish company has it)

Of course the funny thing is that the site does work fine on a Mac. It probably works fine on Linux as well, though I haven’t had a chance to test it yet ..

There are other oddities littered around the site, but this one amused me:

Doesn’t that look like a selector? Well you’d be wrong. There’s only one country in the dropdown, so why on earth is it a dropdown? And why “zip code”? Shouldn’t it be “post code” ?

And if you think I’m just some cranky raincoat who sits in his room all night trying to find broken websites, then maybe I should explain how I got onto the Argos Spain site in the first place.

Seems like someone has broken the Argos Ireland site quite badly.

If you try to go to the main page of argos.ie you immediately get redirected to the .co.uk, which isn’t much use as:

• all the prices are in Sterling
• the catalogue is different
• it doesn’t list the Irish shops, so you can’t check if they have the items in stock

Ah well ..

You can get to the Argos Ireland site eventually, but you have to get there via the UK site… and the URLs are “interesting” to say the least ..

Now if only they’d fix that redirect … 

Related Posts:

• Only In Ireland?
• Marketing Gone Wrong – The Titanic
• Some Lessons Learnt From My Burglary
• An Odd Amount of Media Coverage
• Cork Isn’t Near Dublin and Ireland Isn’t British

I’m not sure if the Muppets’ version of Bohemian Rhapsody would win any awards, but it is damn funny:

More Muppet madness over on their YouTube channel

Related Posts:

• A Different Take On Classical Music Perchance?
• Reliving the 90s In Germany
• Moby With Heather Graham
• Beardyman SuperMarket
• Google’s Answer To Privacy

Since I got such amazing and helpful feedback from people when I posted about kitchen knives (I finally ordered some Wusthof ones) I was wondering if people had any thoughts on woks ..
Not all woks are made equal.

I like stir fry.

I don’t like the way my wok seems to have a liberal interpretation of the concept of “non-stick”.

I’m sick of everything sticking to its surfaces, so I want to get a new wok which will be truly non-stick and not overly fussy.

Can anyone recommend an idiot proof non-stick wok?

Related Posts:

• Hampers Don’t Need To Be Boring!
• Low Fat Frying Rocks

This is a shameless plug.

Over at Blacknight we’re offering a really big discount on .be domain name registration from now until the end of the year.
Full details here

Other super duper domain discounts available here

Related Posts:

• No Related Posts

Image via CrunchBase

I’ve been trying out a number of different Twitter clients on the iPhone over the last few months.

I currently have three or four clients installed, but I keep coming back to Tweetdeck.
In many respects it’s because I like uniformity. I like being able to use the same software on my various desktops, laptops and mobile devices. That might seem a bit boring, but it helps me maintain some semblance of sanity!

The latest update to the Tweetdeck iPhone client introduces several new features and improves some existing ones. One of the ones that I really really like is the new “update in background” option. If you’re on a flaky mobile internet connection, like I am this weekend, waiting for your device to send an update can take several seconds, during which time your device is unresponsive. Pushing the update into the background means you don’t lose access to your device while the update is being sent.

Other features include access to “recent people”, “recent hashtags” and a bunch of other handy tweaks that they’ve somehow managed to squeeze into a handheld UI.

All in all the latest tweaks have made the user experience that little bit better and I honestly doubt if I’ll bother using any of the other Twitter apps on the iPhone in the future

Related Posts:

• JC Decaux Obviously Doesn’t Want Good Publicity
• Solving the iPhone’s Biggest Problem
• SIP Clients For Iphone?
• Logitech Harmony One – Quick And Dirty Review
• Nokia e71 Initial Impressions

We’ve been using Microsoft Exchange to handle the company mail for the last year or so.

One of the minor annoyances with Outlook Web Access (OWA) was that it only made a very small subset of its features available to non-IE users ie. anyone using a browser other than Internet Explorer got a very small feature set.

This morning I logged on to our new install of Exchange 2010 and was delighted to find that they’ve finally reworked it so that it works properly on most browsers.

Admittedly you don’t get the full “threading” and “conversation” style experience that is available to Internet Explorer users, but it is a huge improvement on the previous version.

Update: Just noticed that the “threading” and “conversation” experience is present, but the way it loads it is slightly less obvious than on IE

Related Posts:

• Quick Reflections On Snow Leopard Upgrade
• Which Software Is Essential On Your Laptop?
• Microsoft To Offer Users Choice Of Browser
• Apple OSX Snow Leopard
• Playing With Lifestreams and SweetCron

Image via CrunchBase

I’ve had an iPhone for the last few months.
Since Vodafone don’t currently offer it I had to get it at a premium, but it was definitely worth it.
I’m able to manage email, calendaring, phone calls, twitter and a few other things all from a single handheld device.

It has two flaws:

1. The camera is terrible.
2. The battery life is pathetic

While the camera’s weaknesses are annoying they aren’t exactly “showstopping”. I’ve got several cameras that I usually have with me if I want to take decent photos.

The battery life, however, is a serious issue.

On recent trips overseas I’ve landed at my destination to discover that the phone’s battery has been almost drained entirely.

So what is the solution?

Personally I would hope that Apple invested in improving the battery, as it’s such a basic component. Since that won’t happen overnight the only solution is to use a “battery pack”

There are several iPhone battery packs on the market.

I opted for the Logic 3 Power Case.
It seemed to be a reasonably cost-effective solution to the problem (the battery pack costs about 45 euro).
It’s basicaly a stylish black leather iPhone case with a builtin battery (a 1200mAh Li-Polymer Battery).
According the manufacturer the pack will boost the phone’s battery life by about 3.5 hours, which should give you more than enough time to find a power source.
The aperture for the camera is nicely positioned and doesn’t obstruct the lens.
I haven’t had a chance to test it fully yet, but from what I’ve seen so far it seems to do what I need – or at least comes close enough.

Related Posts:

• Tethering iPhone on Vodafone Ireland (Part deux)
• SIP Clients For Iphone?
• Upgrading From An Ancient Nokia To Android Without A Data Cable
• Audio Dedication To Jobs
• Samsung Galaxy S vs IPhone

MacHeist, which I’ve mentioned a few times in the past, are running another crazy promotion.

This time round they’re giving away six OSX applications for free.

Free?
Yes. Buying the software would normally cost $154, but they’re giving it away free.

The bundle is only available for a week and so far over 100 thousand people have downloaded it.

Full details here

Related Posts:

• Apple OSX Lion Turns My Desktop Into An Expensive Paperweight
• iTunes Weirdness
• Apple’s 1984 Ridley Scott Advert
• Audio Dedication To Jobs
• Apple OSX Lion Keeps Re-Opening Documents!

I got back from Seoul late on Saturday night and am still trying to deal with the jetlag. I’m off to London, however, tomorrow, as I’m speaking at the Nominet registrar conference the following day.

I’ll also be meeting up with at least one of our suppliers while in the “big smoke”, so it should be fun.

At least I won’t have any roaming issues in the UK!

I’m trying to deal with the backlog of emails that accumulated in my absence, but they may need to be put off until after I get back …

Related Posts:

• Off To London
• Early Flights Suck
• Good Reads For Long Flights?
• Check Your Google Map Listing
• Ubuntu In Paris

Related Posts:

• The Irony Of Education
• Politically Incorrect Tshirt of the Day
• Funny Recession Christmas Tshirt
• Google’s Answer To Privacy
• More Twitter Tshirts