Category: General

To most people, IT is like what is portrayed in The IT Crowd. Having an office in the bowels of your company's building doesn't do much to help shatter stereotypes. In my career to date, the team that I have worked in that has had the best relationship with the people it served was the … Continue reading Things I'm glad to see the back of: basement living

If you have never been to the Imagination offices, try to find the opportunity. Converted from two old school buildings (so I have been told) back in the late 80s, the Store Street offices sit around a huge, five-storey atrium. Because it is also part of Imagination's product portfolio as a space available for hire, … Continue reading Things I am going to miss: 25 Store Street

Through almost all of my career I have worked in mixed Microsoft/Apple environments. It has become a challenge for me in the past three years like never before. I'll try and deconstruct why: Consumerized (not commoditized) My time at Imagination has coincided with the blossoming of Apple as a fully fledged consumer product manufacturer (rather … Continue reading Things I'm glad to see the back of: supporting Apple

In conversation with a few people in the past couple of weeks, I have joked that my biggest fear about my new job is having to go back to using Microsoft Office. The thing is, I'm not even only half joking. The experiences of the past 18 months have given me a view of not … Continue reading Things I am going to miss: Google Apps

Project achievements this week included: - CS5 business migration planning began - lots of printing on the new Canon printers... - ...and scanning too - met with two recruiters to start to help to find my replacement - AD deployed out to the first 100 people - yellow card system pushed into development - UC … Continue reading Weeknote 42 – life, the universe, and job handover

We live in an app world. The innovation of Apple and others have meant that expectation about what a software application should cost has fallen to cents, a few dollars or, at best, free (hey, iPhone users... did you not know that Angry Birds is free on Android?). In this world of low price points … Continue reading Things I'm glad to see the back of: creative software pricing models

From about as soon as I first understood how to use a computer back in the 1980s, I have been trying to use them to create if not "art", then at least "stuff". On the BBC Micro it was trying to squeeze music out of three channels of bleeping and one of white noise, and … Continue reading Things I am going to miss: creative software tools

Yesterday I eulogized about the majestic splendour of Bloomsbury. It's eastern border, sadly, is blighted by a series of overpriced consumer electronics stores that have no place in the 21st Century. I've never quite understood the effect that happens in cities where retailers of a particular type of product congregate in a particular area. In … Continue reading Things I'm glad to see the back of: TCR electronics shops

As a way of mentally preparing myself for the new job, I'm going to alternate articles of things that I'm going to miss about my current job, and things that I will be glad to see the back of. First up is Bloomsbury. I adore Bloomsbury. Lying to the east of Tottenham Court Road, Bloomsbury … Continue reading Things I am going to miss: Bloomsbury

I have written before about the psychological analysis of the incorporated company as psychopath in the book and film The Corporation. In conversation at the weekend another similar parallel can be drawn between loyal customers and the psychological phenomenon known as Stockholm Syndrome, which is the well documented state where people held captive in, for … Continue reading Captivated by Apple