Fucking Idiots and Flourescent Bags

A quick question before I start. Cyclists riding on the pavement? Acceptable or not? I ask both as a cyclist and pedestrian and with a certain weight of expectation that you'll side with me.

To my mind, it's only ever allowable when the path is also a cycle track, other than that I use the road for that is what it is there for. Imagine my surprise this morning when a cyclist nearly parked his front tyre twixt my cheeks and proceeded to ride off, muttering about a 'fucking idiot'. Who was this 'fucking idiot'? Was it the council for leaving gigantic potholes in the road? It seemed an odd moment for an outburst about an ongoing issue. A car or truck who had forced the poor cyclist onto the pavement? None were in evidence. Was it perhaps the member of Halfords finest who blutacked the bike together, thus causing steering issues resulting in this chap's transitory pavement ways? No. Of course it was me. A pedestrian, walking down a public footpath wide enough only for maybe 1.73* people, and taking up exactly my allotment of space and no more. Yet this 2 wheeled warrior felt aggrieved that I should be there and 'in his way', despite the ample, empty roadspace to his right.

Am I being harsh? Should I be forcing innocent 20 year olds to ride on the appropriate surface and highway? He wasn't wearing a helmet, he could die out there, oh god the guilt, what of his mother? I mean, I ride on the road but I have a helmet to protect my delicate bonce and a lovely flourescent bag to help drivers notice me. This poor wastrel could obviously afford none of these luxuries, unless he was ordering them on his iPhone as he cycled away. He was paying an awful lot of attention to his phone, that must have been it. Perhaps I am the fucking idiot? But I suspect not.

I have commuted by cycle for 2 years now and through taking sensible precautions and having an understanding of the rules of the road, both written and unofficial, have stayed safe throughout. It's not complicated, if there's a cycle path, use it. If not, get on the road where you belong.

Next week, probably, Cyclists and traffic lights. Grrrr...

*Results may vary according to the size of your ass.

The Kitchen Appliance You CAN'T cook without...

Honestly? What were you expecting? Chef Tony's patented deluxe salad mincery?

Something is technically wrong...

I'm currently planning my next phone upgrade. Day was a handset would take my fancy and I'd go get it. Then, as life, debt, and parenting encroached on my finances and requirements, I found more research was required to get a decent handset at a reasonable price.

Thus I ended up with my current handset a Nokia E71 on the 3 network. At the time I wanted a full qwerty keyboard smartphone and having owned numerous Nokias across the years, it seemed like the smart option. Over a year later I am at the point where I may not buy another Nokia again.

'Why?' I hear no one cry? Well allow me to elaborate.

OS: In the modern day there are 2 realistic choices of phone OS. Android or whichever iteration of Apple's firmware is currently out. Android provides the illusion of opensource with most of the benefits of a proper support & upgrade structure. iOS is designed with a hardware set in mind and has unparalleled support but Apple always knows best and therefore it is a walled garden, albeit a lovely garden, with a pond, and no wasps.

Symbian could have provided a genuine 3rd path for phone OS. Not all of us want 7 battery draining front screens [HTC Desire], to be stuck 2 versions in the past [Sony Eric X10] and I'd like to be able to install what I like on my phone, not what you to deem to be safe [Apple, obviously].
A true opensource OS for infinite customisation and improvement could have done well in that market. As it is, they've taken 2 years to get Symbian opensource and used the semi-opensource as an excuse to not implement any real change or improvement. Even when the incremental changes arrive they're not always for the better. My recent update in firmware knocked 5-7 hours off my battery life with no sign of any alterations for the better. If anything, my phone is now slower.
Recommendation - Spend a year stripping Symbian of all the crap. Ask the community what it needs and act on it [see Linux for examples]. Then release it as a base OS, with reasonable minimum spec requirements and let the public do the rest [similar to HTC's tweaking of Android]. Also a new name. Sparkthrust or some such.

Hardware - I can't think of a Nokia since the 7110 that made me drool like a kitten in a fish market. Every one I've owned since has been under powered for the expectations placed on it. Camera? Yup. MP3 playback? Yup. Web Browsing? Yup. Apps? Just. But try doing more than 2 or 3 tasks at a time and the whole thing invariably hangs. e.g. I'm web browsing in Opera Mobile and I get an email. I multitask over to my email to read it and click to retrieve the mail, mail retrieves and starts opening. It hangs, for at least 60 seconds, all I can do is wait. This is by no means isolated to Opera or Email, multitasking on every Nokia I've owned is broken. Nokia seem to design 'nice' looking units, decide on a spec and OS version and then put the cheapest chip and least amount of RAM feasible in it. See also the N97, N97 mini, the 5800. The upshot is that Nokia's are cheap by smartphone standards. The hardware failures are the result of building to a price point.
Recommendations - Get the OS right, work out what you think you need to run it and then add 30% to that. Give it 2gb of internal memory an AMOLED capacitative touchscreen and a decent battery.

Apps - There is no proper app for Facebook [it's broken], Twitter [no official], Flickr, Gmail [worse than useless]. Gravity Twitter client is the only app I will miss from S60 PLEASE port it to Android.
Oh and the Ovi store is fucked. Kill it and start again.

As I type this, Twitter is convincing me to get a HTC Desire over the Wildfire, no one has mentioned any Nokia device, opensource or no.

Nokia - You are in deep, rancid shit.