Anthony McG

Last night, courtesy of the good people at Movies.ie (sign up now, there’s free stuff and they’re sound), I saw Wall-E. Anybody who’s a regular reader here (all two of you) know that I was really keen to see this. I’m not ashamed to say that I’ve loved every movie that Pixar have produced and have them all on DVD. You may think that that has coloured my review of Wall-E but, as excited as I was to get tickets, I tried to be as objective as possible.

The film opens on an earth strewn with rubbish. Wall-E has been tasked with cleaning it up (along with hundreds of other such models) but alas he is the only one left of his kind. There is precious little “dialogue” in the first twenty minutes as Wall-E explores the rubbish piles and picks out souvenirs which he collects for his home. Shortly afterwards EVE arrives on Earth and Wall-E falls head over heels in love. I’m astounded by how Pixar can infuse their characters with such identifiable traits. The guys there really understand their craft and it’s a joy to see animated characters convey emotion as convincingly as this. As the plot thickens during the film, the pace rarely lets up as you’re introduced to human characters aboard the space ship Axiom. The human characters don’t have the same depth as the robots but I think that’s deliberate considering where the focus needs to be. What we do see of them though is highly entertaining, especially the scene involving them being knocked out of their hover chairs en masse.

I’m at pains not to reveal too much of the plot but I guarantee that you will be laughing and smiling throughout the duration. This is a modern animation classic and I will be seeing it more than once over the course of its cinematic run.

Damien asked us what we were ambassadors for. I’ve done some thinking and have come up with the following:

• Blacknight Solutions: My site used to be hosted in the US with Lunarpages cos it was cheaper. Unfortunately they messed me about and the server wasn’t reliable so I decided to move back. Blacknight were very affordable, reliable and I haven’t had one problem with their service. In fact, they go out of their way to help you if they can. I recommend them to anyone for hosting.
• Camera phones: This may seem ridiculous but I’ve honestly taken some cherished photos on my camera phone. It’s the nights you don’t plan that are often the best so having a way to capture it is great. This was one of the things that put me off the iPhone.
• Non-geeky terms: So much of technology is hidden behind acronyms and overly complicated language. It’s like a walled garden and, in most cases, it’s unnecessary. A point made by Sabrina Dent at CreativeCamp highlighted the barrier that a signup Wiki created at previous bar camps.
• WordPress: I’ve been a user since it forked off from b2 and, even though it has its faults, WordPress is still the best blogging platform in my opinion. Now, I’m not blind to the failings or ignorning the fact that some people have had problems getting listened to by the core developers. The fact remains that WordPress is easy for blogging newbies to pick up. I’ve seen it with some of my own mates.
• The movie Swingers: It’s funny, well written, has great performances and is the film which really introduced Vince Vaughan.

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I’ve been waiting to write this post as I wanted to get familiar with the player before giving my opinion. I’ve had it about two weeks now and I absolutely love it. It’s hands down the best bit of kit I’ve ever bought. It’s quite a lengthy post so I’ve stuck it in an extended entry. Click through for more:
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Well, it’s about a month old now but I love it. I had been contemplating getting a laptop for the past six months or so. My desktop machine is about 4 years old and, while it was pretty fast back in the day, the Windows XP installation has slowed down considerably. Another factor was the impending development of two web sites, where I would be meeting clients to show off work etc.

I had decided to go with a Dell anyway so their January sale provided the opportunity I needed. In saying that, I was seriously stuck in two minds on whether to get the 15″ or, the model I ended up getting in the end, 13″ screen. In the end I’m delighted I went for the latter as it’s very light and the screen (White-LED) is fantastic. Granted, I don’t have as much desktop real estate as I do in work or on my desktop but it’s not a bad trade off. Unfortunately, Dell don’t sell the model I got with Windows XP so I had to re-format and install it with associated drivers etc (excellent m1330 driver resource here).

The specs are in an extended entry for those interested:
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The ever fantastic Lifehacker pointed me at Desktopography.net today. They offer amazing nature themed desktops in their third exhibition and they’re all available for download.

Meanwhile I also found the Wikimedia photos of 2006 which are excellent (via digg). I particularly like this one of San Francisco Airport at night.

Update: Lifehacker does it again by pointing us to a collection of shots by the photographer who did Vista’s wallpaper images.