Addiction

In 1994 I got my first Mac. It was a little thing that sat in the corner of the lounge. I got it after visiting a friend who's just got this new thing called the internet. I'd been round to her house, and we had a drink or five while chatting to strangers around the world on IRC. I was hooked. I went home and less than a week later I'd bought the Mac and gone online. I spent most of my free time getting to know people on IRC. It was amazing, this new technology. I was addicted.

I can't remember when my IRC addiction died, but it probably coincided with this new thing called Napster which I discovered around 1999. It was amazing. I suddenly discovered that I could download free music and save it on my computer. I spent hours and hours scouring for collections of singles and albums. Sadly, a lot of them were Kylie Minogue remixes, but regardless of musical taste it was bloody good fun. And free. Amazing. Welcome to my latest addiction. With an ever growing collection of MP3s on my Mac, I started to wish that there was something like a Walkman that would play them on the road. A trip to Argos told me that there were a few overpriced underspecced players on the marker so I never took the plunge.

Until Apple introduced this thing called iTunes, which was quickly followed by the iPod. My world changed. Physical media became a thing of the past and I spend hours and hours converting my existing CD library into MP3s to playback in iTunes and on the new iPod thing.

Around this time a site in Russia caught my attention; Allofmp3.com. What a gem. You credited your account with a few dollars, and could buy loads of music. Suddenly I was downloading music again like a man possessed. I bought entire back catalogues of artists work for mere dollars. It was ... addictive. The authorities soon caught on and the credit card companies refused to fund the site, so it died.

A few years later, along came Facebook, the slightly popular social networking site. Someone at work introduced me to it. I wasn't sure what to do on it but it was still addictive. Welcome to the next addiction: Facebook.

As it grew in popularity, I became more addicted, with all those apps about werewolves and vampires biting each other. Hilarious. (well, it was at the time).

A freelancer at work one week introduced me to newsgroups as a way of getting TV shows from the US. Bing! A new addiction. Or at least a variation of a previous one... downloading Music, TV shows and movies. Day in, day out. My Broadband provider (BT) eventually noticed that I was downloading on average about 20-30Gb a day! They capped my speed, which was (for an addict) the most disastrous thing that had ever happened to me! My fix of endless TV collections was being stunted. I learned moderation. Kind of. And eventually my full speed was returned to me.

Then Apple (again) introduced the AppleTV and movies and TV shows became available in iTunes. I realised I wasn't even buying DVDs anymore. When Apple TV introduced HD TV shows, that was it... I was downloading an episode a day. I may not have been watching an episode a day but I was downloading them. Addicted!

Then came along the iPhone. I could surf, download music, watch TV shows all on this little phone thing. Then along came the App Store. Addicted!

Twitter. Addicted. Nuff said. Still am. It'll wear off, I know. Something else will come along. Dunno what yet, but I know it will.

Now the latest thing for me is Last.fm. Addicted. It's combining everything; social networking, and discovering new music. Addictive. Addictive. Addictive.

I haven't even touched on Warcraft, collecting Agatha Christie reproductions, and a whole bunch of other addictions I've either had or have.

Sometimes I think I should try and give it all up, but it's too much fun and pretty harmless really. Plus it keeps me off the streets!

I'm sitting here trying to think of what the next online media file-sharing blogging social networking addiction might be. Last.Fm is making me think that eventually TV will end up this way. Why should we download shows and store them on our own drives when download speeds are good enough to be able to just stream whatever we want to watch whenever we want to watch it and on whatever medium we choose.

In the future will we all be walking around with (an Apple branded) device like the iPhone that does everything we want, media wise. We're almost there with the iPhone, and with a new one due out in a week's time rumoured to have HD video playback, I think that will probably be my next addiction.

Roll on next week.

How not to buy a Mac

My partner (Neil) and I live together in Leeds, and last year (with a good Christmas bonus from work) we decided to get a new computer. After lots of browsing online we decided to plump for a new Apple iMac, thinking with our budget we can max out the Ram and hard drive and give us a pretty good computer for home.

The Apple Store had just opened in Meadowhall in Sheffield (about a half an hours drive away), so we figured we'd kind of quite like to buy it from them. So we set off in our little 2 seater Mazda MX-5 down the motorway. It's amazing what you can fit in those little cars, and having seen the size of the iMac boxes was confident that it would go on Neil's knee in the passenger seat. Hehe.

In the shop, after talking to a very helpful salesman, we changed our minds. With the money we were spending on a maxed out iMac, we could buy a MacPro and have a computer that was much more upgradeable, plus we could buy a bigger monitor. AND it came with a free printer! We were very happy, and purchased it there and then!

Bimbos!

A lovely gentleman helped us back to our car with all the kit; a great big MacPro box, a 24 inch monitor, and a printer! We stood there looking at the car and the kit, feeling pretty stupid. Where was everything going to go? This was a 2 seater sportscar for gods-sake! The guy who'd helped us had trouble stopping himself laughing. Mind you, we were the same.

So... the MacPro managed to fit snugly in the passenger seat (with the top down - in December!), the printer filled the boot, leaving Neil and a 24 inch monitor standing there! Thankfully there was a train from Meadowhall to Leeds, so he suggested he take the train with the monitor. I would then drive home, drop everything off there, then go and collect him from the station in Leeds. A plan.

He hadn't brought his mobile phone, so he took mine (just in case he needed to contact me). I'd then collect his phone once I was home and he could ring me on that!

I set off up the motorway, and as I neared Leeds I realised that he had the house keys! I had no way of getting in and offloading the Mac and printer. I also had no means of communication to let him know!

What a berk!

Thankfully, we have a friend who has a spare key. I went to his house praying he was actually going to be home. I didn't have a phone to call him, so I had to park the car (with the top down, and a new MacPro in the passenger seat) and go around the back of the house to knock on the door, dreading some chav noticing the car and nicking all the contents. It would have served us right I suppose.

The friend with the spare key was in, and after quickly explaining the situation to him, and enduring the laughs, I raced back home (no, the Mac hadn't been stolen thankfully), dropped everything off and went to collect Neil from the station.

A happy ending. Eventually.

I'm going to get a bigger car before I upgrade again, I think!

2007, the lost year (and still counting)

Last Christmas (I gave you my heart? No!) we bought a new Mac Pro (there's a story there which I'll share later), and as an impulse buy, picked up a copy of The World of Warcraft too. Years ago when I was a younger man (and out and proud geek) some college friends and I played D&D, so I thought this World of Warcraft thing might be good fun now that I'm in my (cough) 40s.

I was hooked the moment I started playing. I did manage to keep my playing to about an hour a night (usually before going to bed). My partner, Neil, was watching over my shoulder one night, wondering what all the fuss was about, and said "Ooh, I might create a character and try it", so he did. And he was hooked too. He went out and purchased his own copy, created his own account so we could play together, and that was it... We played every night for the next few months!

After experimenting with various classes and characters over the year we settled into what we are now comfortable with: I'm a human, female warlock named Holli, and he's a Night Elf, male hunter. Yes, we are on opposite factions so can't even team up anymore, but we still play together.

Last night we were racing to reach level 62. He beat me by about 2 minutes!! Bugger!

So the addiction is nowhere near over, as we race towards 70 together! Our friends over the year have expressed concern about our health, jokingly of course (I hope) and we do manage to eat healthily (??), and go out occasionally, and entertain guests every now and then, and do all the normal stuff couples do. But I must say how much I've loved every minute of sharing this strange new obsession with my loved one this year just gone. I'm so lucky...

:-)

Roll on 2008.