I’m just in the process of downloading the latest version of Skype (new window), and I’ve just read that it includes Call Forwarding. Now that might not seem like a big deal, but I can tell you, it is a very big deal.
It means that you can now have a SkypeIn number (a real telephone number which rings on your computer) answered by a secretary and then transferred to your Skype computer, anywhere in the world. It means my Edinburgh phone number could be answered by somebody 24 hours a day, and a message taken or the call passed on to me if I’m available. It means businesses could use Skype as a virtual telephone switch. It’s free to make internal calls, and it’s dead easy to transfer calls.
I’ve noticed some call quality problems with Skype recently, but if they get that fixed, and the reliability is there, this is truly going to revolutionise not just personal telecoms but small business telecoms as well. Goodbye phone switches…
My shiny new Blue Icy Box (new window) hard drive enclosure arrived today from Scan Computers (new window). It’s a great little piece of technology, so simple, yet so satisfying. It was up and running in less than 5 minutes, it came with both USB and firewire cables and it just plugs and goes. No problems.
With the falling cost of hard drives, it makes external storage ridiculously cheap. A 200Gb external hard drive (new window) will cost you around £100 from Scan. But a 200Gb hard drive alone will cost you less than £60. The caddy ta £23 makes the whole package just over £80 with the advantage that you can upgrade the hard drive at any point in the future. Given that you can get a 250Gb hard drive for as little as £70, that makes a pretty cheap external storage option.
What’s more, because the caddy supports both USB and Firewire as standard, you can daisy chain multiple hard drives or other firewire devices together, so long as you’ve got a firewire card in your machine. Genius. But more than that, the blue LEDs on the caddy are just pure sexuality… 
I’ve just posted a very rough, first draft of my CV or Resume. Check it out here and please offer feedback as a comment to this post or by email.
I’m down in London for a week in advance of moving here, sussing the place out. I’m having a leisurely start, get up around 10, look out the window to check my car is ok, ahh, what a great morning. Laze around for another few hours, get up and ready to go, head downstairs and wham, not only are there tickets all over the damned car, they’ge gone and clamped the damn thing.
I’ve been in London less than 24 hours and I’ve been clamped. Welcome to the capital…
You can now order e-copies of my book from the wonderful service provided by those friendly chaps at Lulu.com (new window). Check out:
http://www.lulu.com/content/163563 (new window)
Whatever venture one engages in, there’s always a lead time to reaping the reward. I’m beginning to see that it’s true of most things in life. To get the most from a relationships takes time, to get the most from a job takes time, to gain something of real value takes time. Great things are not acquired in an instant.
So should we make an effort to hold on to what we have for longer? I mean, not to give up what we have for the promise of something better, in the future. For example, not to leave a current job until the next job is actually in place. Not to close an existing income stream until another is actually on-line.
Does that fly in the face of the “burn your boats” principle? Would that approach hold us back? An unwillingness to risk it all? Or does risking it all required the famine and feast highs and lows?
Or does it all come back to the simple truth, we only ever live in this moment, so to give up now for potential reward in the future is fundamentally flawed? Should we instead live in this moment wholistically, so as not to sacrifice the future for the sake of the present? Hmmm, food for thought…
You can now buy paper copies of my book, yeehaa! I’ve just placed my first order and am now eagerly awaiting my own name appearing in print through the door! Check out:
http://www.lulu.com/content/162303 (new window)
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