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I’ve been switching between Facebook’s two feed modes, live feed and news feed, for a while now and up until now I didn’t really know why. Facebook introduced these options a month ago and it’s been confusing users ever since. So, what I’ve found is that by default I am shown the news feed which shows the most relevant information, but it’s often out of date, sometimes by a couple of days. That’s not good. Then you go to the live feed, which seems to be up to the minute but is bloated with Farm Ville and whatnot. That is also not good. The terminology “news feed” and “live feed” are also quite confusing, as you’d expect the “news feed” to be up to date and the “live feed” to be relevant. ...

The Drupal Zen sub-theme, Zen Classic, is to no longer be included with the Zen theme download. The Zen theme will now purely be a theme framework and starter kit. If the Zen Classic theme is to be continued it may be done so as a separate project. Although many people said it was bland I quite liked the simplicity of it, but since it’s been removed and I’ve been thinking of redesigning my site anyway maybe this was the kick up the butt I needed to put pencil to paper!...

Although the spam seems to be dying down a little on Twitter since they introduced their ‘report as spam’ option I’m still a little cautious about clicking some shortened URLs - SO many of the links seem to lead to spam (spam and more spam). The whole concept seems to have gone full circle as well with people using extensions like Long URL Please to make the short URL long again. Although I think this is a good a useful add-on, the whole process seems a little excessive. I can see benefit in using shortened URLs in printed media but, when it comes to the web, why are we making links short just to make them long again? I guess Twitter has a big part to play in this by restricting messages to only 140 characters, but surely there’s got to be a better way?! With this in mind, I’ve been trying to get some perspective on the issues. Shortened URLs: ...

Very interesting, thought provoking video. We are well and truly hooked into social media - there’s no turning back now! Source of video and data http://socialnomics.net/2009/08/11/statistics-show-social-media-is-bigge…

Very smart demo of the up and coming Spotify client for Google Android. Also featuring offline sync. Check it out!

A few years ago Shawn Frayne came up with an ingenious way of generating electricity on a smaller scale than wind turbines by using vibrations rather than rotary power. His invention, called the windbelt, works by oscillating a pair of magnets through a metal coil at the end of a belt which vibrates as wind passes over it. This physical phenomenon is know as aeroelastic flutter and it’s the same principle that caused the Tacoma Narrows Bridge to collapse. Prototypes have generated 40 milliwatts in 10-mph wind, making the windbelt 10 to 30 times as efficient as the best microturbines. ...

I’ve come across a few subversion hosting services which offer free accounts so I thought I’d share the links. Most of these seem to offer a limited free account and a range of paid accounts. If you’re working with subversion a lot and you come to rely on them then you may want to upgrade in the future - at least you can try them out first for free. However, if you’re developing one or two projects on your own you may be happy to stick with the free account. These details are for the free accounts only, and most offer a lot more for the paid account (for example, SSL access, more users, repositories, etc.). ...

Firefox has a handy feature which can check your spelling as you type in forms. To enable this go to Tools > Options > Advanced > Browsing and check ‘Check spelling as I type’. If this still isn’t working you may need to install your dictionary (even if your dictionary is listed under Tools > Options > Content > Languages). To do this, go to https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 and download your language, install and restart Firefox....

This image shows the space shuttle Atlantis in silhouette during solar transit on Tuesday 12th May 2009. Pretty cool! Photo Credit: (NASA/Thierry Legault) Thierry made this image using a solar-filtered Takahashi 5-inch refracting telescope and a Canon 5D Mark II digital camera. Photo Credit: (NASA/Thierry Legault)

Spotify is an online music service which allows you, much like Last.fm, to stream music to your computer via a downloadable app. You can play individual tracks or build, share and collaborate on playlists. The free version allows you to listen to unlimited music with the occasional ad. They come up about once every 4 or 5 tracks so it’s not too intrusive. You can also buy a day pass for 99p which gives you an ad free service for the day or sign up for a premium account and get unlimited ad free listening for £9.99 a month. ...