Idlemind - nickcoster.com

Well I have been spending a lot of time getting to know the inside of the website and how it all clicks together. Unfortunately all that this has really resulted in is me not writing anything af value.

The good news is that I have found a new content management tool called Word Press, and there are hundreds of templates that I can use to make the look that I want. I have to accept that I am not a webdesigner and will have to accept (with good grace) the skills of others.

This has also been slowing me down on other stuff as well. I should have been writing a whole bunch of copy for our new business website. But I’ll talk about that in a different post. As usual I hope to start writing more again, since I feel like there is a bunch of stuff backing up in my brain just busting to get out.

I listened to an interesting podcast this morning from Dave Winer this morning. He was talking about the reluctance to release pre-formed ideas out to others since the net effect was usually that they ended up causing him grief. This came from an imbalance of people saying negative things about the work or ideas that had been distributed. On reflection however, he went of to say that this was a necessary part of the process of both getting things to work and to start getting a concensus from others. ‘Go Quickly’ – he said.

Well that is how I want to re-invigorate what I am doing. ‘Go Quickly’.

Ok No visible changes here. I have just killed of the old home page. It wasn’t doing anything except getting in the way of sending people here.

I have discovered a new way of using my iPod. Before I begin I confess to being a big fan of shiny things. I am a sucker for beautiful design. This is even when my brain knows that I could buy something that has more storage, more features and a lower price but looks crap. I just can’t do it.

This is not to say that there is any thing wrong with the iPod. I bought the silver mini. It feels nice in the hand, the interface is simple and it holds as much music as I can listen to without getting bored. I am not much of a music fan. I tend to get a tune in my mind and I can play it to death, and I prefer to listen to one album at a time. For most artists this just doesn’t work when there are only 4 good tracks on an album, so they get ignored. I really like artist that build an album from beginning to end. This is the reason that I still love Pink Floyd. Their albums feel like a single song that goes from beginning to end.

The end result of all this is that I don’t feel the need to add a whole bunch to my iPod to listen to. So I have about 2GB floating around idle.

Last week I read a recent copy of Wired magazine and there is an article on podcasting. Now when I first read this I didn’t really think much of it. I figured it would be a great way for the shock jocks to publish a world of crap without having to worry about normal broadcasting laws.

Podcasting is basically recording a ‘radio’ style program save it as an mp3 so that it can be downloaded. Ok so far not a big innovation. The last big step that makes it difference is that these tracks are wrapped in a RSS feed, so that other applications can pick up the tracks and make them available as up to data content.

I followed the idiot-proof steps from the mag and started to download some radio feeds.

What I have discovered is a whole new world of content. Adam Curry who is interviewed in the article is amazing to listen to. He is an evangelist for this new format, but seems to carry his enthusiasim without boring the hell out of me. What is really cool is his belief in the value of the listener, and how important they are.

So far I have listened to Adam Curry, Dr Karl, Triple J’s – Hack show, Paris Hilton promoting her movie, movie reviews, American idol commentary, and that is all i have had a chance to taste so far. This makes my music redundant (at least for now). So now i am looking for the content that will fill my head. Now I love my iPod even more.

I hope to get back to more audio feeds. See ya!!