The title of this conclusion is a quote by the Roman author Publilius Syrus from the 1st century B.C. I think what Publilius was implying is that things which attract a lot of attention have all the more chance of getting broken. Think about A-list Hollywood stars, the more prominent the star is, the more…
Category: Technology
Day 29 - boxed and ready
Tomorrow will be the day I conclude this 30 day Glass project, but even more ahead of time is the fact that I decided to box up the Glass already and get it ready to be shipped back to Google. What's interesting is that I didn't even consider returning the Glass until Google themselves wrote…
Day 28 - extreme reactions to Glass - face your fears
I consider myself lucky that I haven't had any extreme reactions to me wearing Glass yet, but I'd heard and read many stories online where the wearers have had some serious repercussions simply from wearing the Glass. Besides being asked to take them off in the local GP medical practice, I've had some moderately angry…
Day 27 - What the app?
Ok, so any device that gets release these days is more or less useless without the apps that can help in various daily tasks, and Glass is no different. The reason why platforms do this is because they simply don't want to develop apps as it would be too difficult and too expensive to cover…
Day 26 - Growing anger for Glass
It's extremely interesting the reaction the technology press has to Glass and surprisingly even early adopters of the beta product, have now backtracked on their positive reviews to essentially put Glass back into its box. The problem Google has with this product is that they tried to create a pre-qualifying criteria with the way they…
Day 25 - The hairdresser and the osteopath
This was going to be a slow weekend, simply because I had done my back in and was limping around like a 3 legged puppy. I've done this before and it's not at all pleasant, but I guess with age comes more health complications. Still didn't stop me from testing, so my wife insisted that…
Day 24 - Is Glass fit for Mindlogr?
Before this trial ends, I wanted to evaluate the Glass device for my main project Mindlogr. I've been working on this life logging platform for a while and the use of video on Glass intrigued me about its potential applications for Mindlogr. I had many concerns before the launch, from other developers jumping the gun…
Day 23 - I am superman
Over the last few weeks of testing this device on and off the streets, I've had many a comment that has surprised me because of how ridiculous it sounds, but none of them would prepare me for what I was about to chat about literally just down the road in my local newsagent. The world…
Day 21 - only 10 contacts, what's the point?
One of the most annoying aspects of Google Glass is the way they have integrated their contacts system. This is the address and contact details for which you can tell Glass to call, email or SMS. The idea is great, who wouldn't want to be able to do those things hands free, but there are…
Day 20 - Camera Quality of Glass sucks
Let's talk about the camera and how a last minute addition may have messed up Glass forever. When Glass was in its infancy, it did not support a video camera and the intention was pure and clear about providing information as and when needed. Later as camera technology kept on moving forwards at lighting speeds,…
Day 19 - Is Google Glass a fashion trend?
One of the main video clips that was used in the Google Glass teaser trailers was one where a model was walking down a catwalk and since then there have been numerous photos snapped at catwalks where the models are wearing the Glass. What's going on here is that Google are trying to attach the…
Day 18 - property investing mission to Reading
I've been reading a lot around the Crossrail lately and what's interested me the most has been the announcement this year that it will be extended to Reading and Twyford. This is of course a big opportunity as anyone in property investing knows that a new train station is always good for an area. We…
Day 17 - GP says No
I've been having some problems with my elbow lately and I know it's because of tennis elbow, a problem that occurs when a tendon is strained beyond a certain limit. It's probably a result of bad tennis backhand technique, so I decided to visit the doctors to get some help. There's no surprise that walking…
Day 16 - let's try without sunglasses again - human curiosity
Since I had to go back to pickup my car I decided to journey out without the sunglasses just to see once again the public reaction to them. As expected, I get noticed with them 10x more than I do when the sunglasses are attached. The range of how people notice it varies from glances…
Day 15 - public transport directions and Mercedes Benz
So I was about to go on a short trip today to drop off the car for its annual servicing at the car dealership. I was curious whether the people at the Epsom Benz service centre would recognise and know about the Google Glass, since Mercedes has a very good history of adopting high technology…
Day 14 - Outdoor tennis on a busy day at the club
So today was yet another tennis day for me, but seeing that the weather was good we decided to play outside. What's interesting today was that since Wimbledon tennis championships were over, all of a sudden the club was much busier. It meant that as I walked through this time, especially past the outside café…
Day 13 - let's talk about the form factor
This was to be another relatively quiet day apart from running some errands in our local town, so I decided to test with the main perspective of analysing the form factor which the Glass has taken. For those not in the world of computing, form factor refers to the physical dimensions, layout and overall design…
Day 12 - strawberries and cream
Today was the Wimbledon tennis finals and though we didn't have tickets to watch live, we wanted to catch the majority of it on the TV. We were having some family over and some new people who would have a go with the Glass product. It's been really interesting to see how different people try…
Day 11 - more gardening - hands free, does it work?
As a newly married couple we like to spend weekends chilling and relaxing, and these days for us that often means just doing our own thing at home. Since the weather was nice I decided to go and do a little gardening as I knew later in the afternoon it was going to rain. Gardening…
Day 10 -more tennis and further thoughts on the comfort factor
So again today I was going to play tennis and it gave me a chance to test it playing sports once again. I thought it would be interesting this time to more actively record videos and take photos whilst training. The same sort of reactions from people were experienced, and in particular one fellow member…
Day 9 - IKEA, more driving, and directions
Back to testing today and I needed to run out quickly to IKEA to grab a few household items. Of course any trip to IKEA is never a quick stop, if you've ever been to a store you'll know about their ingenious one way showroom style floors. They remind me of a game called Theme…
Day 8 - reflections on Glass after one week
Time really does go by quickly sometimes and at the one week mark I thought I'd take some time to look over the past 7 days and see how (if any) Glass might have changed my life for the better. Remember that the whole idea behind Glass was to take the user away from looking…
Day 7 - Post office and dry cleaning and general test with sunglasses
So today was going to be another quiet day apart from having to run a few errands which would give me a chance to test out the Glass in public again, but this time I decided to test the sunglasses snap on which came with the Glass package. After the initial fascination with the gadget…
Day 6 - What happened at the Garden Centre?
Relatively quiet day today so only had a few chances to test out the Glass. These days I spend mostly working on the Mindlogr project, and because it is in prototype phase right now, with the emphasis being on feature development, it means I don't get out much! Anyways, today I popped down to our…
Day 5 - A quiet sunday gardening and chilling
Today was a quiet day and usually I'd try to keep my head out of the computer and spend the time doing some gardening, cooking up a storm or chilling in front of the TV. Perhaps some household chores would also creep into this mix somehow! With that in mind I was reluctant to try…
Day 4 - Central London and the UK Public's reaction to Glass
So up till now I haven't had a reason to be travelling into central London, but that was about to change as I headed out to Goodge Street station where I would then make my way to Birbeck College for a Mensa IQ test. I had booked this a while ago before I got married…
Day 3 - Tennis and Google Glass
The main activity of the day which I wanted to test the Glass with was our group tennis coaching at my local tennis club. During my walk there I could test whether or not the voice recognition would work over the loud traffic sounds and it did, but only about 50% of the time. Quite…
Day 2 GGC - It's quite warm and fuzzy
So second day of having the Google Glass has been quite interesting. Firstly I was keen to see how the battery would last, so I charged it full at the beginning of the day and see how it panned out over the day. The battery lasted till about 9pm from a full charge around 11am.…
Day 1 - reporting on Google Glass and its UK release - my own 30 day challenge
I've been into technology ever since I was a kid, which ultimately lead me down the path of pursuing a career in computing. I've also been an avid fan of Star Trek for many years and so when the opportunity came to get my hands on the Google Glass, I did not hesitate! You might…
What to Look For in a Cloud-Based File System
(And how you could remove your company’s file server) Companies that provide cloud-based solutions have a tough sell to make. It’s difficult to persuade companies that they should give up their sturdy file server, humming quietly in its own room, between the kitchen and the ladies’. Many smaller companies have invested a lot of their…
Why you need to be happy being in solitude and what it means in this hyperconnected society
As I was doing my morning exercise today I was watching TED (again!), you do know I am a fan! I've always wanted to speak on TED's platform myself and perhaps one day I will talk about the World Without Offices there. Anyway's today I watch Sherry Turkle talk about being connected yet feeling more…
Livedrive = Massive Fail, a customers review
It's not often these days that you can come across a company which fails in so many ways that it's almost unbelievable they are operational, however in the past 3 weeks I have come across just a company that I think has failed on so many aspects that it's impossible not to warn other people…
What words don't you need rolling around your head?
You know as I'm waiting for my dinner to cook, I just looked over our company Twitter campaign and it really has been quite some journey this last 10 years. You see I'm right now doing a campaign to share more SEO information and in doing so, I've had to dig deep to really get…
How much time do people really spend in their homes?
For people who have a nine to five job and who need to travel a distance everyday to get to work and back, the amount of time they actually get to spend in their own homes is remarkably little. In an average week of 168 hours, you can calculate that 63 hours are spent getting…
Welcome to the age of remote working
I still think that in this current day and age of remote working, that not enough people are taking advantage of it. Right now I've just had a meeting with a cool trainer about setting up his online marketing and in the spare 10 mins on the train, I can write this piece. The technology…
What can we learn from online con men?
In any line of business, no matter if you are online of offline, there is no substitute whatsoever for putting in some hard work and doing the 10,000 hours which Gladwell talks about in his book Outliers. When I hear of all these so called "internet marketing" systems and programs which teaches people to become…