Try broadband speed test

This morning my broadband was down, but when it came back it seemed to be faster than usual so I thought I would do another speed test. Needless to say I’m very happy with the results. I would be amazed if stayed at this speed for long, but it’s good to know what it is capable of.

Try broadband speed test

Why is my BT broadband so slow this week? If anybody knows how to contact BT, to complain then please let me know. I’ve spoken to my neighbours who have the same problem so it’s not just me. Maybe it is something to do with living in rural Somerset.

Update:

Try broadband speed test

This is more like it. BT must have fixed whatever the problem was.

My combi boiler has died Last year it kept on going wrong and I kept on having new parts put in. I think I spent about £800 on keeping it alive. Well it’s died again, and this time I’ve decided it’s not worth wasting anymore money on it.

How much will a new one be? £2000 plus maybe. I could probably by a life times supply of coal and wood instead. New regulations mean that a new boiler can’t go at the side of my house any more because the flue would be too close to the neighbours wall. If a new boiler has to be installed in my attic then there will a lot more plumbing work and a lot more to pay. Double misery .

I’ve learnt my lesson now. I should have got insurance to cover me for breakdowns.

iTunes store gives you a few seconds sample of a song. I’m sure most people would rather hear the whole song from beginning to end before deciding to buy it. If you only hear a few seconds of a song, you could easily make a few mistakes. A mistake would be deciding to buy a song, as well as deciding not to buy it.

When Spotify allow me to buy songs directly from them, there’s a good chance I’ll be doing this. As much as a like Apple, I don’t think it will be healthy for them to get a monopoly on the online music business.

My music tastes range over many genres. In one day, I could be listening to classical, techno, folk, rock, pop, anything that takes my fancy really. I’m starting to build up playlist, and discovering new music in the process.

I started noticing hayfever symptoms about a week ago (March 15th). I thought it was early and I was starting to wonder if my condition was getting worse, so I was pleased to see Dr Nicola Jones talking about this on the BBC. I suffer from hayfever early in the spring and I’m sure it’s tree pollen causing the problem. Dr Nicola Jones does mention that Birch trees are producing pollen early. We’ve had a long spell of dry sunny weather. Warm sunny weather should be making me happy.

Even Japanese monkies are suffering. What causes more of us to suffer from allergies? Can it be changes in life-style? Is it something to do with air pollution? Who knows?

Today I tried out www.spotify.com. I’ve been using it for about an hour and I haven’t heard any adverts yet. It already has a huge range of music to listen to.

Is this going to stop people from spending money on music, or is it going to increase the amount of money the artists receive? Only time will tell.

The only thing I don’t like is that I can’t put the music on my iPod and take it away with me.

If you enjoy listening to music, and discovering new music, I’d definitely recommend it. The guys at last.fm need to watch out. Spotify is going to be big!

I recently registered on chi.mp thanks to a post on fruitbytes. You can view my profile at chriskent.mp. I now have 5 3 invites to give away, so if you’d like one leave a comment.

It looks like a cool website. Not sure how it’ll ever make any money. I can’t say I’ve used it much since registering.

I think there needs to be some way of searching for people, like there is on billion7.

I’ve been listening to the song “Going Home” from “Sophie Zelmani” on last.fm.

She has a wonderful voice. Great for chilling out.

Eventually last.fm told me I’d been playing this song too much, and it wouldn’t play again. I’ve now bought it on iTunes, along with a few of her other beautiful songs.

There’s a few of her songs on her myspace page.

Do you read big blocks of text on the web?

Have you even thought about how you read?

Most people just scan web pages. I’m not sure why it’s different from reading a paper book, but I know it is. Perhaps it’s because we’re like channel hoppers. Rather than watching one TV channel for too long, we’re always thinking there might be something better on the next channel. Or is it just that there’s so much information we’ve got into the habit of looking for the key points, and sifting out the waffle.

Sometimes I wonder if this is effecting my writing. I often miss out words in sentences, and have to reread what I have written a few times, to get it right.

After reading scanning these articles it’s made me think about how I should write a blog:

• Web Usability Revisited
• Reading on the Web
• Content & usability: Writing for the web

The key seems to be, “keep it short and to the point”.