A few days ago Google released their new communication platform, Buzz to the world. It’s an odd kinda contraption, a pinch of Facebook with a dash of Twitter and some fancy location aware features all mixed up in a big bowl of Gmail.
But just how could Google’s new service impact our daily lives?
-799140.jpg)
Sound and the Psyche
We live our lives being constantly immersed in artificial sound, so much of it is so intrusive it’s a wonder that we can block it all out.
The modern world is a cacophony of noises, unlike the natural world that our minds evolved to exist in. Communication between animals and nature has grown to co-exist over millions of years, each sound has become moulded by the environment it exists in, different species of bird have calls that exist within different frequency bandwidths, so the sparrow doesn’t get confused by the magpie or the finch.
Looking at the world around us, it’s easy to see that increased access to technology has made us all more productive, internet shopping frees up our time, internet banking helps to manage our money, and mobile computing and iPhones have taken us even closer towards a connected world.
However, at the same time it seems to have increased our need to procrastinate. Notice my use of need here.
Procrastination is a good thing, in moderation, it’s time off, like play or sleeping it allows our brains time to relax and let the subconscious, our real creative tool take stock of what’s going on.
Viva la Procrastination!
(more…)
Today I’ve updated the website, focusing on a more personal and honest attitude. This was brought about mostly because I felt the old version was not coherant with the way I’m working now.
Things have changed alot since moving to London, I’m no longer looking for work in such broad fields and I’m more comfortable in focusing in on my sound design work. Hopefully because of the update I’ll feel more inclined to update this blog, I’ve already got a few posts ready to go and lots of seeds of ideas for new projects to work on.
I’m aiming to update atleast once a week, mostly from my iPhone. this is in an attempt to condition myself Into using my laptop more for work and less for the Internet slacking off that blogs, news and Twitter promotes!
I’m sure you know what I mean 
Lou
Today universities are back in the press, BBC is presenting it in the usual format which seems to make up most of the ‘half news’ that constantly pours out 24 hours mediums such as BBC News 24. Person A changes something, Person B doesn’t like it and is invited on to give their opinion, then Person C counters and we move on… hmm does this sound familiar?
However there was in interesting statistic from the BBC’s reporting, almost 40% of young people now go to university, up from 4% a while ago. Being a fresh graduate this gives me mixed feelings. Whilst part of me thinks all people should be provided with every opportunity to go to university and broaden their mind in the way which university provides and have the chance to specialise in a field they’re passionate about I wonder what long term effect this will have? It already seems that here in Britain we have an attitude towards life that we deserve all our luxuries, that at whatever cost it’s our right to have such a broad, luxurious diet, to have the latest TV and the shiniest car, somehow we’re better than those who don’t (deserve) these things. But how will this affect all those people that go into university expecting to get a highly paid job in the field in which they studied? Do 50% of jobs really require a degree, we can’t just keep outsource the essential, but unskilled jobs needed to support our society.
Are we going to find that a majority of the people that leave university not being successful in their field become disillusioned only to find themselves still looking for work, but also being over qualified for the work that’s available?
University should be a place for safe, experimental ideas, a place which recognises the value of failure in creating masterpieces; a genius has to fall flat on their face before the apple falls on their head. This kind of attitude is what we need to be pushing, even more so in the creative subjects. Hitting grades and targets, whilst important training for the real world shouldn’t be the priority, we need to encourage unrestrained creativity and exploration, not churning out graded grey suits ready for the job centre queue.
So where is this going to lead us? Obviously we need to keep raising the bar at one point we didn’t have free education, people denounced teaching all children to read and write, time moves on and we need to provide better education and higher standards, one day a university education may become just as common and expected as college is now, and whilst in theory this is a good thing, is it worth the debt and the short comings of the job market?
A more educated and informed public is important, but at what cost, definitely not £20,000 per year like some universities want…
The Black Swan
Nassim Nicholas Taleb – author of ‘Fooled By Randomness’ and ‘The Black Swan’ today published in the Guardian an open letter to the UK’s main opposition party leader, David Cameron. In it he outlines where he believes Barack Obama has made grave mistakes with his handling of the US economic recovery by handing power and resources back to the very people that caused the so called “banking crisis” in the first place, and why the UK shouldn’t follow.
But what can we learn from this as creative individuals?
One week today is when it all changes.
It’s my move to London I’m talking about, I’ll be packing up and moving from sunny Scarborough (North Yorkshire) to London (Bounds Green to be precise). From here I’ll be starting serious freelance sound, music and web design work. I have a position at Iguana Studio in Brixton, here I’ll be doing studio tech, maintenance and production. I’ve also hopefully got some work lined up with another friend, advertising composer – Craig Botes, this will be freelance mixing and I’m going to be shadowing Mark Bradley at Village Productions (Dagenham), that one involves sound design and composing for animation.
On top of those I’ve now secured part time work for GoGen, this will be telesale-type work, working on behalf of charities, hopefully that’ll pay the rent allowing me to push forward with my real interests, music, sound design and web design.
Lastly, there’s a project brewing with a good friend of mine, Jake Hemming, this will be centred around providing primary school children access to more experimental methods of working with music. There’ll be much more info about that coming in the next few weeks.
I’m going to miss this place (Scarborough) though, the sea air, the beautiful surroundings and the friendly people, I know it’s going to be a far cry from London, but it’s just all swings and roundabouts.
Ok, so first blog post on my first version of ColoursToBe.co.uk, It’s been quite a week to get here.
So I finished my day job a week early, in preparation for the imminent move to London and decided I needed to use my new found free time to the fullest. So out came pen and notepad. I knew I had to take this week somewhere, but where?
Well I decided the best move was to stop putting off the creation of ColoursToBe.co.uk and get on with it. So I made a plan, David Allen style. Now 5 days later the site is up, people can browse a portfolio of my work, get a feel for what ColoursToBe is all about and contact me directly for a quote. All in all a productive week.
However the best bit was the immediate exposure of my work, suddenly people were complementing the site and my style, and I even got some enquiries within the first few days. That’s progress!
So I’m going to be moving the site forward, implementing some more database back end goodness and, refining the design, pushing the SEO and constantly keeping the content updating. So, please expect me to be writing about this journey, where London takes ColoursToBe and more info on my love of GTD.