roysworld: the world according to roy

technologist, magician, father. not necessarily in that order.


Science Versus Faith

19 February 2007

Great flowcharts by Wellington Grey depicting the scientific method versus the faith method. Science Vs Faith

Doctor Who and the French Dalek

15 February 2007

A rather hilarious clip courtesy of youtube

Snow, Snow, Snow, Snow

08 February 2007

We've got loads of snow! It's great. Here's a view from my back garden: Snowy Trees

Dickie Talks With Microsoft

12 December 2006

CVG Dickie got an interview with Microsoft Business Insights talking about cashflow and customer service. Here's a snippet: Cash flow is all about getting paid, and getting paid is all about sending out the invoices, right? Wrong, says Dickie Bielenberg, MD of the Customer Value Group (CVG). He says that all the elements of a business are interconnected, and cash flow is tied strongly to customer service. The problem is, when did your accounts and customer services teams last chat over a cup of coffee? Nick Saalfeld finds out more.

Christmas Skating

04 December 2006

Torville and Dean Dickie took us skating, followed by a slap up meal at Somerset House and guess who was there - Torville and Dean! Cool huh. See the whole flickr set

The future's bright, the future's made out of jelly

28 September 2006

I've been hearing about XGL for a while now, and with the new release of Windows Vista imminent, I was wondering how it compares. Well, there appears to be no comparison, XGL really rocks! Take a look at the following demo from YouTube, and if you want to give it a spin, try and get hold of a copy of Kororaa (I got mine as a bittorrent). Interestingly, you might assume you need a serious set of graphics cards to run this (I was at a conference this week where someone had 4 graphics cards in his pc!), but apparently not.

Art Deco iPod

10 August 2006

Retro iPod Some block on Flickr has posted pictures on how he refitted an old radio of his to be used as a amplifier and speaker for his iPod. Makes me wonder about some of my bakelite radios I have up in my loft...

Mary Loves Dick

27 July 2006

Mary Loves DickSo here it is, courtesy of YouTube, the famous Most Haunted "Mary Loves Dick" piece where Derek gets possessed by the spirit of Dick Turpins mistress in York. Watch for Yvette trying not to laugh, and the interesting comments regarding a bet when they think the cameras have stopped filming.

Mind Control Video

28 June 2006

Derren BrownFurther to my post about the Derren Brown tribute album Inside Your Ears, they have released a video for their song Mind Control. It's quite funny. Even funnier though is the full length show the video is taken from.

Paul Daniels Ebay Transactions

01 June 2006

This site has been paying close attention to Paul Daniels ebay transactions. It appears that he enjoys buying 1970's slasher movies and makes a few quid selling film cameras. If you're interested this is his ebay user page.

To Me, To You

10 April 2006

To Me - To You We took the kids to see the latest Chucklebrothers show at the weekend: "Doctor What and the Invasion of the Garlics". It had the expected "end of the pier" humour that you come to expect from them> There was an unfortunately long: "What's you name", "Yes thats right", "No What's your name", "What's my name", "Yes", "What" sketch that certainly outstayed its welcome. There were some seriously funny bits though including an incident with a ketchup bottle and impecable timing; and a humerous fit of the giggles when Paul accidentally said "that bloody baguette". As usual, they were joined on stage with their other brothers - the Patton Brothers. All in all a really nice day out, and we even got to meet them at the end.

The Best Ever Videogame?

06 March 2006

I've just watched the video demo of Will Wright's (creator of SimCity and the Sims) life simultation Spore. It looks unbelievable. It's a game that simulates the entire evolution of a system, starting at the cellular level through evolving creatures and cities right up to conquest of new Galaxies. The depth of the game looks astonishing, I can hardly wait for this one to hit the shelves, and for someone who rarely plays computer games that's saying something.

Spider-Man 3 - The Alien Costume

03 March 2006

The following teaser picture has been released for the upcoming 2007 blockbuster Spider-Man 3:Spider-Man - Black CostumeWhen I showed it to our resident Spider-Man expert Billy he pointed out this could mean only one thing - Venom. He went on to explain how Spider-Man's black costume is actually an alien symbiote and that Spider-Man manages to free himself from it by going to a bell-tower (alien symbiote's hate loud noises), and that it then merges with Eddie Brock to become Venom. Hardly seems worth watching the movie now.

What Should I Read Next?

24 February 2006

Just enjoyed reading a book, and don't know what to read next? Try www.whatshouldireadnext.com. It uses readers recommendations to suggest books you might like based upon author and a title.I tried it out with two of my favourite books: Iain Banks' The Wasp Factory and Christopher Priest's The Prestige. Both gave a selection of other titles I might like to try, and at first glance they look quite promising. It did, however, recommend Jamie's Italy for readers of The Wasp Factory which seems a little off topic to say the least. Do the readers know something about Jamie Oliver hidden from the rest of us?

Inside Your Ears

20 January 2006

OK. This is weird. The members of the Official Derren Brown Forum have created a music CD called Inside Your Ears dedicated to their favourite bearded mentalist. The CD is available for download and includes such classics as "12 Bar Brown", "Loaded Gun" and my personal favourite "Yo Derren". You can't make it up.Cover

Life on Mars

11 January 2006

We were looking through our PVR recordings last night to decide what to watch on TV (we so rarely watch live TV these days), and thought we'd watch BBC1's Life on Mars. We nearly didn't record this as I'd decided I couldn't be bothered to start a new Sci-Fi series, what with Channel 4's Invasion and ITV2's Surface just starting. Just as my finger hovered on the delete key Paula convinced me to leave it for the time being and I'm really glad we did: the first episode was a stonker. If you've missed what it's about the BBC has (as usual) got loads of info and clips to watch. To summarise though: DCI John Simm is in the middle of a murder enquiry when he gets hit by a car. He awakes in 1973, still a copper and now withc a team investigating a very similar murder to the one he left back in 2006. He hears voices suggesting he's in a coma and imagining it all; but is he? I had been concerned that the show would be a bit too naff and play up to the seventies too much, but I reckon they've got the balance just right. I can't wait until next weeks episode. Check it out BBC Monday's 9.00.

Heist Controversy

09 January 2006

No suprise that Derren Brown's latest offering Heist has been criticised, this time by the GMB a trade union representing security workers. I would criticise it on the basis that I didn't think it was very good. Come on Derren, you can do WAY better than that.Oh and by the way the Fortean Times agrees with me - read their review here.

Acorah Meets Doctor Who

09 January 2006

Can you believe it: Derek Acorah has a guest role in the new series of Doctor Who (thanks BDO) SFX quotes an interview for the Manchester Evening News where Derek says he has "just filmed Doctor Who" where "The Doctor finds that spirits and ghosts have invaded the whole of the galaxy so he gets me along to see what we can do about it".Weird stuff. The scene - inside some spaceship, all filmed in green-middle-of-the-night-oh-vision. The Doctor looks sceptical with a clipboard, and taking readings with his Sonic Screwdriver. Rose looking bored finally glances up at Derek, and says :"What can you see Derek? Can Sam see anything?"Derek - finger pointing from forehead starts marching around: "Ex? Exter? Ex-Ter-Min-Ate. What does that mean Sam?"

del.icio.us tips

22 December 2005

I've been using del.icio.us for a while now. For the uninitiated it's an online bookmark tool, allowing you to store bookmarks in a global way, tagging them for later recovery. It's pretty useful actually (it's what I use to generate my "Looking At" links - amongst other things) and it's not going to go away as Yahoo have just acquired it.Ok so why am I suddenly blogging about it. Well, firstly I should have mentioned it ages ago, and secondly Slacker Manager has written a brilliant article entitled The Several Habits of Wildly Successful del.icio.us users. It's well worth a read.

The Best Toy Ever

20 December 2005

R/C UFO Billy got one of these remote control UFO's from his grannie a few weeks back. When I saw it in its box my immediate thought was that it would never work.How wrong was I.This is the toy I always wanted as a kid. It really flies - AND you can control it. OK it takes a bit of getting used to, the initial tendency is to ram it into the ceiling and then ram it into the carpet, but soon you will be hovering like a pro and crying like a girl when the batteries run out. The good news is that with about 5 minutes of charging it's ready to fly again. As you can see, Billy has hardly had a look in!If the man in your life doesn't get one of these for Christmas then you don't love them.

roy

Hello. My name is Roy. I live in rural Oxfordshire.

This is my blog. I write about things that interest me, make me laugh or that I want to remember.