I am very excited that it's going to be winter in Australia. I like it being cold. (Actually it won't be cold, but it won't be boiling. It'll be comfortable.)
I've been so busy looking forward to the winter evenings, dark early etc that I totally failed to appreciate how hot it's going to be Hong Kong...
I realise there are ways of coping, but I really don't want to have to wear linen and sandals...
Monday, July 28, 2008
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Branded...
I finally went to the Minnellium Dome last night...
Yes, I know, only eight years late, but nearly everything they planned for the minnellium was late. And still doesn't work. It's a British thing.
In those eight years, I've flown over it, driven under it, sailed past it, tubed through it, but never actually been in it.
It's bloody clever actually. On a very narrow peninsula they've managed to thread the Jubilee Line under the Blackwall Tunnels - that's four tunnels under the Thames in total - and construct this very iconic building on top. (Although I suppose it's not really a building - just a big tent - and the buildings underneath it are fairly ordinary.)
And, of course, for about the last seven years of the eight, no-one in their right mind wanted to go there because it was an ill-conceived, publicly-funded white elephant full of crap. It was all cultural - Mind Zone, Body Zone, Spiritual Zone - and no-one wanted to spend their "lee-zhure" time doing all that nonsense, even if it was inside a triumph of civil engineering...
So what happened?
Well, firstly, someone decided it would be better if it were full of things people actually wanted to do - shop, eat, go to cinema, see Bryan Adams in November (OK, not the last one...)
Secondly, someone else decided it would be good if people could actually get there, so they built the aforementioned tube line...
But most important, branding happened.
Someone, probably in what Eddie Izzard calls one of those "4 o'clock in the morning, stroky-beard meetings", came up with the ludicrous suggestion of calling it after a phone company.
O2 is one of the most successful marketing exercises of all time. The phone company used to be BT Cellnet - deeply untrendy and lagging massively behind the likes of Orange and Vodafone. No clear identity and losing money and subscribers.
But now, the strength of the brand is overwhelming. It can be identified by the subtle blue fade of the corporate colour, the little subscript 2, the bubbles, Sean Bean being all northern and reassuring on the ads, etc.
And now, not only has it made the Dome very cool and trendy, every person who goes there (23 000 watching Kylie last night, not to mention all the people eating and drinking and watching films) gets the brand lasered right through their eyeballs into their brains at every available opportunity.
The branding is so successful that The O2 is the only fully commercial organisation to have what is effectively a free advert on that other icon, the tube map...
Now that is bloody clever...
Yes, I know, only eight years late, but nearly everything they planned for the minnellium was late. And still doesn't work. It's a British thing.
In those eight years, I've flown over it, driven under it, sailed past it, tubed through it, but never actually been in it.
It's bloody clever actually. On a very narrow peninsula they've managed to thread the Jubilee Line under the Blackwall Tunnels - that's four tunnels under the Thames in total - and construct this very iconic building on top. (Although I suppose it's not really a building - just a big tent - and the buildings underneath it are fairly ordinary.)
And, of course, for about the last seven years of the eight, no-one in their right mind wanted to go there because it was an ill-conceived, publicly-funded white elephant full of crap. It was all cultural - Mind Zone, Body Zone, Spiritual Zone - and no-one wanted to spend their "lee-zhure" time doing all that nonsense, even if it was inside a triumph of civil engineering...
So what happened?
Well, firstly, someone decided it would be better if it were full of things people actually wanted to do - shop, eat, go to cinema, see Bryan Adams in November (OK, not the last one...)
Secondly, someone else decided it would be good if people could actually get there, so they built the aforementioned tube line...
But most important, branding happened.
Someone, probably in what Eddie Izzard calls one of those "4 o'clock in the morning, stroky-beard meetings", came up with the ludicrous suggestion of calling it after a phone company.
O2 is one of the most successful marketing exercises of all time. The phone company used to be BT Cellnet - deeply untrendy and lagging massively behind the likes of Orange and Vodafone. No clear identity and losing money and subscribers.
But now, the strength of the brand is overwhelming. It can be identified by the subtle blue fade of the corporate colour, the little subscript 2, the bubbles, Sean Bean being all northern and reassuring on the ads, etc.
And now, not only has it made the Dome very cool and trendy, every person who goes there (23 000 watching Kylie last night, not to mention all the people eating and drinking and watching films) gets the brand lasered right through their eyeballs into their brains at every available opportunity.
The branding is so successful that The O2 is the only fully commercial organisation to have what is effectively a free advert on that other icon, the tube map...
Now that is bloody clever...
Friday, July 25, 2008
Mammoth...
I think it's the warm weather and the long summer evenings (both of which I really can't be doing with) which have resulted in my house becoming a haven for wildlife. (Again.)
This doesn't bother me much - I am not mottephobic - but there is a big difference between moth being at rest and still, and moth being flappy and confused and fast and in your face, trilling away like some tiny, winged pneumatic drill.
This one had an appreciation of art and sat (? stood??) long enough on The Great Bear for it to be captured using the time-honoured glass/piece of card technique often used on spiders. And then it got let out of the window.
It will probably twitter back in again if I put any bright lights on.
And then I might get fed up and swat it.
This doesn't bother me much - I am not mottephobic - but there is a big difference between moth being at rest and still, and moth being flappy and confused and fast and in your face, trilling away like some tiny, winged pneumatic drill.
This one had an appreciation of art and sat (? stood??) long enough on The Great Bear for it to be captured using the time-honoured glass/piece of card technique often used on spiders. And then it got let out of the window.
It will probably twitter back in again if I put any bright lights on.
And then I might get fed up and swat it.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
We fill your homes with lots of groovy things...! *
It looks a bit like they are building IKEA in Southampton like most people build IKEA furniture.
In other words, they're ignoring the instructions completely, not checking they've got all the bits and going with a bit of gut instinct and hoping for the best.
This can be the only reason they've put the name up on one side before they've finished building the other side.
Or perhaps they are taking the obvious marketing opportunity of getting the sign up early to suck people in with anticipation. As if the several million square metres of blue wall didn't give you the clue as to what it was.
The Swedes are coming...
* Mitch Benn...
In other words, they're ignoring the instructions completely, not checking they've got all the bits and going with a bit of gut instinct and hoping for the best.
This can be the only reason they've put the name up on one side before they've finished building the other side.
Or perhaps they are taking the obvious marketing opportunity of getting the sign up early to suck people in with anticipation. As if the several million square metres of blue wall didn't give you the clue as to what it was.
The Swedes are coming...
* Mitch Benn...
OZ -21: Apparently...
...people do person does read this blog, which is all very encouraging and spurs one on into making a bit of an effort.
With this in mind, I have invested time and coffee in producing the very nascent map below.
It shows the basic route and main destinations and its creation, in that it was bloody hard to do, gives the lie to Google's corporate "do no evil" philosophy (see number 6) and drives a cart and horses through most of its design principles (especially number 3).
(You can zoom in pan about and look at an aerial photo of Heathrow, if you wish...)
I intend to add those groovy little place markers in various colours and styles to bring some actual tourism to what is currently only flights, and they may (or may not) appear on this map (see number 5).
With this in mind, I have invested time and coffee in producing the very nascent map below.
It shows the basic route and main destinations and its creation, in that it was bloody hard to do, gives the lie to Google's corporate "do no evil" philosophy (see number 6) and drives a cart and horses through most of its design principles (especially number 3).
(You can zoom in pan about and look at an aerial photo of Heathrow, if you wish...)
I intend to add those groovy little place markers in various colours and styles to bring some actual tourism to what is currently only flights, and they may (or may not) appear on this map (see number 5).
Saturday, July 19, 2008
OZ -22: Countdown has begun...
With only three days officially left at work now (but probably about seven or eight left unofficially) and with some other people (who had sensible Easters actually at Easter) having finished work for the summer completely, I thought it was about time to start looking forward to the holidays.
The last time I did this properly was in 2005 when I went off to New Zealand and it's been really good to look back at the blog and the photos from them to remember what we did and saw, what with memory failing through age, early onset Alzheimers etc.
Being as I'm going nearly as far again this time, I have decided to "temperately"* interrupt this blog (no imposition as I haven't written on it since April and no-one reads it anyway...!) and produce a self-contained "interactive postcard" of...
(I really spend too much time on the computer...)
There are several good reasons for this:
The last time I did this properly was in 2005 when I went off to New Zealand and it's been really good to look back at the blog and the photos from them to remember what we did and saw, what with memory failing through age, early onset Alzheimers etc.
Being as I'm going nearly as far again this time, I have decided to "temperately"* interrupt this blog (no imposition as I haven't written on it since April and no-one reads it anyway...!) and produce a self-contained "interactive postcard" of...
(I really spend too much time on the computer...)
There are several good reasons for this:
- It's cheaper than phoning people;
- You don't have to master any foreign language to buy stamps for real postcards (in this case, Australian...);
- It's a good back-up for all the photos in case the memory card goes tits-up;
- It saves making a real scrapbook like I used to do when I was little (my OCD meaning that I would only ever buy John Hinde postcards...);
- It will give Ann Crocker something to read (I still have a dog in my boot that's hers... fluffy, not real, so don't phone the RSPCA...);
- It will divert attention away from the fact that I have failed Project366 (but kept going longer than some...).
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