Technology

Sexy Einstein. via Andrea Harner: One day, I'd like to think I could look as good as this.

My latest mashup on Google Maps is a straight job of plugging an RSS feed from the national website FixMyStreet into a map.

For those who are not aware of it, FixMyStreet is an open source project which allows members of the public to report problems where they live such as graffiti, dog dirt, poor road conditions.

What's good is that you can use the site to drill down to where you live to find out what problems are there, and report them.

Each report is then passed on to the relevant local authority to tackle.

Flash problems: resolved.

I remember some advice that if you can't work out a problem by thinking and thinking about, try sleeping on it. And it's worked - in a way.

I posted yesterday my frustration about some actionscript that I wanted to use in developing an interactive map, although the code kept returning errors.

Answer: a quick post to Actionscript.org allowed me to explain my problem.

I've now spent two months trying to get a feel for how to write a blog - but think I've got a long way to go yet.

The accepted wisdom is that you should stick to things you know about, and take a brickbat to everything else - in fact the same advice which Keith Waterhouse once gave to Tony Parsons.

If you dig through the links on my FriendFeed trail, you will find countless tips from blogging luminaries such as Seth Godin.

The challenges facing the newspaper industry is as well documented as they are worrying for journalists working in them.

I’ve worked in the industry for a decade during which time a job in the media was widely seen as safe in the same way that booze and guns are defensive havens for investors - to buy stocks in, that is - during tough times.

How times change. In the past two or three years, there has been an increasing sense of panic about how newspapers and media groups are going to embrace the internet.

Zombies have become the monster of choice for any self-respecting horror film maker after Danny Boyle's genre-busting gore flick 28 Days Later.

The simple evolutionary ability of allowing the undead to run rather than shuffle - used to brilliant effect in the opening scenes of sequel 28 Weeks Later - has done more to resurrect the zombie genre, particularly given fears about scientific research and possible threat of viruses, than the original Dawn of the Dead.

So it's finally happened. A married couple are to divorce over virtual infidelity in the virtual world of Second Life. According to The Sun today, David Pollard's affair with a woman in the U.S., a person he has never met but has apparently had virtual sex with, has led to the irreconcible breakdown of his marriage to Amy - a woman who he also met through a Yahoo chatroom.

The newspaper reports how his wife was devastated as her husband spent increasingly more time - up to 16 hours a day - online and away from her.

Finally, after a week of trawling forums, running traces and generally stumbling around in the dark, I've finally got my code for a working custom video player. For anyone who is interested, here it is. Next to get the scrubber bar to scrub...

stop();

var videoInterval = setInterval(videoStatus, 100);
var amoundLoaded:Number;
var duration:Number

var playTime:Number

//if someone clicks back to home button, do just that.
mainBtn.addEventListener (MouseEvent.CLICK, returnHome);
function returnHome (e:MouseEvent)
{
ns.pause();
gotoAndStop("main");
}