IT interest

Is piracy dead?

2012-02-26T08:54:00.001-08:00

As I am sure you are aware, there is a lot of interest in the media around mega upload being shut down. Until very recently (apart from piratebay) the illegal downloading of files has been incredibly overlooked, almost just accepted as something that couldn't be stopped.

Megaupload being shut down caused a huge stir with companies such as file sonic, rapid share and file serve. All these companies allow users to upload files to their servers which can then be downloaded by others, often rewarding them for the amount of downloads they achieve. Most of the above sites have now disabled file sharing, except rapid share which has limited free users download speed.

Is piracy soon to be doomed? I don't think so. Torrenting and downloading from sites such as megaupload are quite archaic in Internet terms. There has just been no need for new methods, as they were fast,efficient and there was a case for arguing their legality. If all the aforementioned methods are removed, within week there will be a new method of downloading for the masses. Bureaucrats can not move as fast as those on the Internet, and until the Internet is governed by its own body, that isn't governed by all the different international regulations, I think there will always be piracy. This doesn't mean I agree with piracy. I am just trying to be realistic. What do you think?

-Matt

RBS spring internship technology.

2012-02-15T06:23:00.001-08:00

Today I had an assessment centre for the RBS spring internship technology programme. After asking around my peers I couldn't find anyone who had done it before, and google didn't seem to hold much information to what went on at these events. I am writing this in hope that it will help some others prepare better.

The first stage of application was a simple CV, cover letter and some questions. I got a response very promptly from this, telling me I had got to the next round and inviting me to take an online test. The test was logical reasoning, and contained 12 questions, each of which was on a 3x3 grid, of which one of the patterns was emitted. You had to look at the pattern and determine which one of the options fit the pattern best. You had 30 minutes to do the 12 questions, and I found it reasonably difficult.

None the less, I made it through to the final stage, which was to attend an assessment centre. This was located in southwark in London. The day began about 11, and there was only about 6 of us there. We were split into two and half of us had interviews and the other half did tests, and then switched.
I had my interview first and was asked questions such as:
Why finance?
Why Technology?
Why RBS?
What affect did the Recession have on banking?
What do you think of the current European situation?
What are 3 areas you need to develop on?
What is something you are proud of?
What is something you are passionate about?
How could you persuade others to take part in your passion?
Where do you see yourself working?

Apart from the questions about Greece, I think all of these questions are pretty standard for an interview, especially in the finance sector (but most will probably be used for other jobs). The interview lasted about 30 minutes.

After this I did a logical reasoning test. This was quite different to the one I did online , and I found quite hard, with time being a major constraint and I didn't finish it.

A few other things I found out:
If you get the spring internship then you are more likely to get a summer internship and then to be considered on the graduate scheme.
There was approximately 15 people there on the Day, and they had the potential to take 9 of them as interns. My interviewer reinforced though that if they felt only 6 people fit the criteria, they would only take 6, they wouldn't fill places for the sake of it.
Finally, I was told we were being compared to criteria, not each other.

I was successful and chosen for the internship.

I hope some of you find this helpful. -Matt

Wireless Britain.

2011-11-27T10:04:00.001-08:00

I spent 3 months in the Los Angeles/Hollywood area this Summer. It was an amazing experience, but being nerdy one thing that really wowed me was Santa Monica's city wide wifi. Whilst not completely reliable, it allowed everyone to connect for free on any device they wish. Before you connect, they simply ask you to support their city by buying a coffee or something. It got me thinking of the potential of the idea, and wondering how long it will be before we see wifi like this over here?

I know companies such as BT offer wifi in certain areas, and you can get it in most town centres as places such mcdonalds offer open wifi, but as far as im aware no council has physically budgeted and implemented wifi for a city in the UK?

Even if it put taxes up slightly, I think many people would be supportive of the idea. Mobile companies have restricted their "unlimited internet" to as little as 500mb under their fair useage policy (something I regularly go over) and this usally adds atleast ￡5.00 to the monthly price of a contract. If people knew when they left their house they would still be able to get wifi they could save a fortune by not paying that (it would make an average 24 month contract 120 quid cheaper), as well as having access to faster internet.

Im aware this will almost certainly remain a pipe dream, as the only companies with the correct facilities for influencing this sort of thing would be the phone companies like 02 and vodafone. Companies like this have no real reason and want to detract from their profit to do it. However, maybe Google might turn their attention to something similar in futre years?

-Matt

PS4 later than competitors next gen console.

2011-11-26T00:28:00.001-08:00

Rumours run amock today that the next generation Sony console will be released later than its competitivte counterparts. This happened in the current generation, with the PS3 being released over a year after the xbox 360 and Wii. Is this going to be detremental to the PS4s success or, like this generation, will it make litte difference?

The new wii console (dubbed the wii u) has already been announced. This came as no suprise as the wii, once the most successful console with huge shortages even 2 years after its release, has become a pretty out dated medium. The extentions to the 360 and PS3(kinect and ps move respectively) have made Wii's motion sensitivty system redundant, as they don't restrict to just arm movements like the Wii mote does. Furthermore, upon release, the Wii never shipped with HD graphics, a minor thing to some people, but to a lot of gamers it is one of the most important aspects.

Microsoft seem unlikely to bring out a new console in the next couple of years, releasing the kinect instead of a new console. Their marketing stratergy is revolved around pushing this at the moment, and aslong as its still selling, I doubt this will change. The 360 came out in 2005 and I predict a new console around christmas 2013.

Sony's release stratergy could be seen as tactical. The later release date allows them to see what both microsoft and nintend put out, and gives them a bit of time to fine tune their console meaning it should technically be the better console. However, Microsoft proved this generation that specification isnt everything, gaining popularity in the massed for its xbox live service.

Will this continue in to the future?

-Matt

Unrecoverable

2011-11-24T15:37:00.001-08:00

An article over at the BBC states that 75% of companies in 9 EU nations would not be able to recover if data was lost from their system. I found this figure slightly astounding considering the dependence we place on ICT systems in modern society ; if amazons servers went down for just an hour they would lose millions of pounds. With IT dependency on the rise, even small companies back up their pay roll information etc, you would think they would make sure staff were aware how to restore data too. After all, backing up is no good if you don't know how to recover.

Perhaps this is a niche field that is being over looked at the moment, that IT students of the future could be looking to fill?
A lot of jobs in the IT industry are overcrowded. However based on these statistics, system administration could be a skill definitley worth attaining.

-Matt

"Ethical" hacking?

2011-11-21T03:40:00.001-08:00

I read an article over on the BBC today about a hacker who hacked an American water main system and turned in on and off repeatedly to cause it to shut down. Although no reason was really given for the hack, I bet it emerges it is part of the recent fad of being a "hacktivist" that was started by lulzsec and anonomous -hacking to prove that systems that should be secure aren't.

I have very mixed feelings towards such events, and am never sure if they are doing good or not. On the one hand, they are exposing flaws in sometimes critical systems. Better that the water mains was taken over easily by an American citizen than by a terrorist,right?

But on the other hand, Im against the damage caused. In this instance, a problem was exposed, fair enough. But instead of reporting it, the hacker went ahead and broke the watermains. This to me sounds a lot like terrorism, whether it was intened to be or not. Damage was caused that will cost tax payers money to repair....but it also forces the system to be upgraded.

Can good things be born about of bad things?

-Matt

Are Patents stunting technological advances?

2011-11-20T04:16:00.001-08:00

This has probably been apparent to people for a while, but recently there has been an influx in media coverage regarding the matter. As soon as a company thinks up a method of doing something, they patent it. This means that other companies have to negotiate some sort of deal to use that feature or go without.

Ever since creation, Google and Apple have been in court over patenting issues, with apple recently being granted a patent for locking and unlocking phones with gestures. This puts every android phone since creation in breach of the patent, which is ridiculous. Another case is the Samsung galaxy tab, with apple won an injunction to prevent its sale in Germany as it looked too much like an ipad.Samsung has changed it a bit and are set to release it again soon.

Too similar?

I can understand why company's do want to patent their ideas, as they feel that have created something genius and therefore only they should have the right to it. However, it definitely stifles technological advances. Instead of suing each other over patents, companies should be working hard to do things better than their competitors, so consumers pick their product. This would lead to harder competition between companies and therefore more innovation to make sales.

In a world where your idea is going to get copied if its successful, it is important to get things as polished as possible before release. The ipad came out over a year before the galaxy tablet, yet still sells a lot more than the latter. This is down to two things; Apple's advertising and the fact that the ipad does things so well. It doesn't matter that it is "out of date", it still sells to the point where they're out of stock everywhere. So why do they feel the need to sue everyone?

-Matt

Does Google Music have a future?

2011-11-19T09:14:00.001-08:00

It was announced recently that Google would be created an itunes-esque music service. This seems a very late entry to the market, but this does not mean it should be dismissed. Google have a reputation for entering the market late and being successful (e.g the android operating system now holds a huge market share and google + is doing very well).

However, the service doesn't have the backing of all the companies as of yet (warner arent interested) and there is no real incentive to switch from itunes except a free song everyday (which is similar to the itunes offer of a free song every week). It makes me wonder if the service has a future, bearing in mind sony set up a service similar and it shut down after 3 years and there are other alternatives such as amazon,spotify,last fm and many others.

As aforementioned, google do have a huge market share with the android operating system, and this could be the saving grace for Google music. If they integrate it with the OS to make the whole experience of downloading music and putting it on to your device as simple as apple did, then Google music could be come a success, we shall just have to wait and see.
-Matt

Android or iOS?

2011-11-19T08:36:00.000-08:00

Since the dawn of true smart phones, I have always been an android user. my firth phone was a T-mobile G1, which I loved to pieces (pictured below). I wasn't immediately drawn in by the iphone, as I really wanted a physical qwerty keyboard.

This was once again an important issue for me when I upgraded, this time to the HTC desire Z:

Once again, the phone is fantastic, but I have recently become disheartened with it; this leads me to the purpose of the blog post.

There are so many different versions of android running on so many different devices, phone's become outdated so quickly. My phone is currently running gingerbread (2.3.3), but with the release of Ice Cream sandwich, my 6 month old phone suddenly feels in need of an upgrade. It has been stated that the Desire Z has the correct specification to have Ice cream Sandwich, but it is unlikely to ever get the update.

This seems ridiculous to me, its as if they want to force consumers to upgrade more regularly than contracts allow, all in the name of making a quick buck. This of course, is not Google's fault; it is HTC as it is up to them what software is put on what phone and when. With the expense of smart phones nowadays, it would nice to know you will get the latest software as long as your phone can support it.

This is the case for iphone users. Although iOS is very restrictive, something that put me off purchasing an iphone initially, you have got to hand it to apple for giving consumers value for money. Every single iphone, ipod, ipad receives the latest version of ios that the device can run. This means even if you don't have the latest iphone 4S, apart from Siri you do not lose out on the bulk of features and your contract seems greater value for money over the longer term contracts seem to be nowadays.

HTC needs to begin taking consumers interest into account, otherwise in the future I think there will be more than just me considering an iphone next time I upgrade.

-Matt.