Putting things into perspective

I often find it surprising how quickly people forget the past. Not that long ago life was quite different. My postman, for instance, did not drive a BMW. Porsches were for rich, intelligent, and successful people – not estate agents. I can still remember how awestruck I was when, as a little boy, I saw my first Ferrari. Today conspicuous consumption, or at least the signs of past conspicuous consumption, is everywhere. Today’s little Daniels, I imagine, barely bat an eyelid when a Bentley passes by.

For most of my childhood I received pocket money of 50 pence a week. One shiny little coin. Several weeks of hard saving would pass by before little Daniel could even afford a matchbox car. My first job, as a paperboy, required getting up at 6am every day, even before school, to deliver newspapers for an hour. Had I not been volunteering it probably would have classified as slave labour. My only solace was the beer and cigarettes it would afford me at the end of the week. That said, I didn’t have much time to enjoy them, as I usually spent most of my weekend catching up on lost sleep.

a fruit of my hard saved pocket money

My somewhat exaggerated self-pity pales into insignificance compared to my fathers childhood. Born in the 1950’s, into a poor area of London, unbelievably he did not have electricity in his house until he was 11. Bath time for my father was a weekly event, situated outside in the garden, even in the middle of the winter, with bath water shared with the rest of the family. Quite unimaginable given they lived just a few miles from central London. Unsurprisingly, given their reliance on candles and gas lights, fires were a continual hazard and not before long their house burnt to the ground.

When you consider that, a mere 40 odd years ago, there were people living in developed cities like this, it helps to put things into perspective. Despite the continual doom in the media, life isn’t that bad. Yes people are losing their jobs, and yes I feel bad for them, but it isn’t the end of the world. Yet. Unemployment might be increasing rapidly, but don’t forget it is starting from a very low base. In the UK, for instance, it is still substantially less than when Labour came into power back in 1997.

UK unemployment rate, source: DataInsight

Ireland, much like the UK, has also been taking its fair share of criticism lately. According to the Telegraph – “the Celtic Tiger is dead, and its cubs are thinking of leaving”. Well, for all the troubles Ireland is in at the moment, it is still measurably better off than even a few years ago. As you can see below, Ireland’s real GDP has doubled in the last 10 years. I doubt even the most pessimistic Cassandra expects Ireland’s GDP to fall 50%. Even if it did, it’s not like Ireland 10 years ago was an uninhabitable wasteland full of starving children and mass unemployment.

Ireland Real GDP, source: DataInsight

So life goes on. We still have many innovations - the internet, mobile phones, and cheap flights to name just a few –that we take for granted and that barely even existed 10 years ago. I still have my friends, a loving family, and a wonderful girlfriend. The UK is not about to sink. Ireland is not dead. Friends who lose their jobs will find new ones. Bad companies will get acquired or replaced by good ones. Undeniably life for some people will be hard, but I don’t foresee people in London going back to bathing once a week and living without electricity.

London takes a day off

Yesterday I made the mistake of flippantly telling my mum we had more chance of Santa coming down the chimney next Christmas than serious snow falling in London. Well mum, I apologise - I'll start baking the cookies now. Today has seen the most snow fall in London for 20 years. And everything is shut, broken, or suffering from 'adverse weather conditions'. Not that I'm complaining - it would be pretty stupid to invest in precautions for a 1 in 20 year event.

Rather than worrying about getting to work, most people seemed to be out enjoying themselves. Me? Well after missing out on a couple of snowboarding seasons due to lack of money, I jumped at the chance to get my snowboard out.

New Job!!

Have been looking for a part time job for a while - not earning any money and living in London is the stuff that gives bank managers nightmares (especially mine...). Thankfully I've just found something that is right up my street. It is a startup in the location / recommendation / web space which fits really nicely with what Phil, Chris, and I were looking at last year with Puls8. I'm sure I'll be pitching in with all sorts (I've heard that tends to be the way with startups), but my main task will be internet marketing - primarily helping drive new traffic to the site. I'm really looking forward to starting, and hopefully I'll be able to apply some of the concepts from my internet marketing course to a real business. Anyway, I may as well start now, so if you are reading this please visit Qype :)

Artistic...

I admit I have not been nearly satisfactory in keeping my commitment to the blog.. Most of my writing in the past few weeks has been for college papers, and I am in the midst of finals, therefore not too keen on doing more writing for the blog.

I tried to come up with an acceptable compromise between avoiding more writing and making a blog post. I know, at first this seems an almost contradictory task. A possible solution was to post cool pictures, but it is now too cold to go out and actually take photos. Still, my admirable ingenuity (!) (yes, thank you) paired with the Drawing I class I took this semester, aided me out of this rather difficult situation.

Thus, this week’s post consists of a few of my art attempts this semester:

The first couple are sketches of nude models we did in class. I know my anatomy is a bit more creative than required, which certainly shows in my naked man. His thigh is somewhat delicate to support his nicely-rounded belly. But what are a few inches here and there anyway?

The third drawing is me attempting to portray myself as a drama-queen. I end up with a crooked mouth and looking a bit like a cartoon woman.

Not to give the wrong impression though, I am quite affectionate towards my drawings. Taking a drawing class my final year was a spontaneous decision accompanied by a smirk from a professor in a more “serious” discipline. Now, I see scribbling and getting covered in charcoal as a cool balance tool, so very glad i did it :)

Technologic

What product have you used lately that is truly innovative? Hmm, tough question. I was asked this recently in a job interview and it had me pretty stumped. I mean an iPod is pretty cool, but its more innovative marketing than innovative design. Similarly I like my macbook, but at the end of the day its just a laptop. After a brief awkward silence I had my answer; last.fm and pandora.com. These two websites have changed the way I experience new music. Gone are the days of trawling the internet and magazines for new bands and artists. Now all I need to do is sit back and listen. For free! Both sites will recommend and play music for you based on your existing tastes. For instance if you like Gotan Project, then last.fm will recommend you try listening to Zero 7 or Theivery Corporation. More than just recommending the music, the site will play them back to you as a constant audio stream.

A huge community has sprung up around last.fm, and the site today has a wealth of information about artists and music. It can now even recommend live music events based on your listening preferences. The site is also open to software developers, who have written all kinds of cool applications to analyse your music taste. If you haven't used last.fm, give it a try, and add us as a friend :) http://www.last.fm/user/itsInotIhipIhop.

listening habits

http://www.diametunim.com/muse/

breakdown by artist
http://lastgraph3.aeracode.org

music taste breakdown by country
http://lastfm.net76.net/?user=itsInotIhipIhop

Daft Punk, Technologic, www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtdWHFwmd2o

Zdarlight

Austerity seems to be the theme for Christmas in London this year. Pressure from both the environmental lobby and, I'm guessing, the bank manager, has definitely dampened the usual exuberant waste of money and electricity that are central London's Christmas decorations. Thankfully this pressure seems to have sparked some creativity, and the decorations this year look a lot better for it. Gone are the over coloured, over powered, and under designed affairs of previous years. Regent Street, as usual, boasts the most elaborate decorations, which are supposedly giant stars - although i'll let you decide what they actually resemble!


Covent Garden has opted for a rather more creative installation. The dazzling chandeliers hanging from the ceiling are interactive and respond to passers-by. The team behind the lights, UVA, have previously worked on light shows for Massive Attack and Basement Jaxx, so they definitely get my support :)


Massive Attack and UVA aside, my vote this year goes to Carnaby Street. With a bit of flair, no extra lighting, and several inflatable snowmen they have managed to create a really captivating effect without the usual cost and electricity implications.


Whilst we are on the subject of Christmas, my New Technology Venture class managed to get in some early festive celebrations this week. We (including the prof!) brought beers into class from Sundowners, the weekly free LBS drinking session.


Digitalism - Zdarlight: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=8ePfIkGqHCQ

Raining Again

Most people have the impression that London is gloomy, very very gloomy. And if the past month is anything to go by, you could be forgiven for believing them. But one of the aims (or rather instructions from my dear blogging partner) of this blog is to give an insight into what it's like living in London, so I’ll let you into a secret. It actually doesn’t rain that much here. In fact, with its average rainfall of 29 inches a year, London has less rain than New York (47”), Chicago (34”), South Hadley (42”), and even Dallas (37”). Sofia has it beat, with 22 inches, but what’s 7 inches between friends :) ?

Another well perpetuated myth is that London and the UK in general are densely populated, over-developed, and covered in tarmac. One reason for this misunderstanding is people’s reticence to venture further than the M25, or if you are a student from LBS, further than Baker Street tube station. In fact only 10% of the UK is urbanized. Yes, 90% of the UK is countryside. In many areas this countryside, starts well before the M25. This isn’t even taking into account the 1700 parks and open spaces in London itself. Indeed. London was recently voted one of the greenest cities in the world, beating San Francisco, New York, and amazingly Barcelona.

In case I still haven’t convinced you, here is a picture of a forest where I like to go mountain biking. It's less than an hour's cycle from central London, and well within the M25…


Post title; Raining Again by Moby (http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=b1CDCOPD7uQ)