you want to be the song that you hear in your head

hello there

wow, or if you like, phew. i am going to do one of them 'mega' posts here, look you see, instead of splitting it up over two or three of them. why? well, why not? variety, you never know, may or may not make it all somewhat more interesting for you.

quite a bit of it - the spine, if you like - relates and indeed pertains to the challenge of getting an Apple product to simply do what you bought it to do, so if you are one of the Apple disciples or apologists you may want to consider opting out round about now for the sake of your blood pressure.

and on that note, that seemingly dangerous thing that happens when you want some different vibes to listen to on your ipod thing. this means plugging it into a proper, non-iOS or OS computer to add the tunes from. this, as has been seen time and again on this blog, angers Apple somewhat, and they on a whim just blank all the vibes off of your ipod for you to show their displeasure.

oh hell yes, i do indeed use an old Windows XP machine to update the ipod with. there is no way, no way at all, i am letting iTunes unleash its misery on my regular, Windows 7 computer, thank you.  going on how iTunes cripples any machine it comes into contact with, i am not knacking a computer i care about with it.

if i feel this way, should you be a new reader, then why on earth do i use any Apple products? because the ipod is the best available portable, personal music player on the go, and there's nothing that comes even close to it. i really wish there was. i think something called a Go Gear off of Philips is supposed to be good; as and when the pods die perhaps that is what i will move to.

going on the enthusiasm with which Apple like blanking my ipods, i thought i would take a photo of what was on it before i started adding some new tracks. just, you know, to remember.

you have, i suspect, reached a point at which you are rather tired of Apple grumbles for the moment, so let us all take a nice pause and watch some video of the cows conspiring and planning their revolutionary liberation.

oh yes, i have still with some interest been monitoring the evolution of the cows and their plans, i just have not had the margin or inclination to update here with it all. i don't mind giving updates as and when, you know, and i do appreciate one or two of you visit here purely to see what the cows are doing. it's just that, the way i see it, one day - possibly soon, possibly many decades from now - the cows will take over and you will know all about it before you read it here.

so, then, back to Apple, and this very funny request.

i did actually laugh out loud when i saw this, and then got very, very cross when i saw there was no "go f*** yourself" button to press as a means of a response. of course i selected no thanks, and was indeed furious that the word 'thanks' was included.

that Apple for some reason want people who give them lots of coins of money to buy products to believe that they have any interest at all in what they might want is an exciting one. it is patently not true, of course. i am assuming they are making this token gesture as a means of working out ways to extract more coins of money from the people, not to give them anything in particular for the coins of money already extracted.

a photo of the cows engaged in conspiracy? sure, why not. it allows you, after all, to see what an early Spring morning, say around 7:10am, looks at the moment.

that fence / hedge thing is not going to hold them back, at all. if the cows do make a break for it, if they act of their clear intentions of world domination, a simple charge at that hedge / fence, or if you like fedge i suppose, will see them break through and towards me. the only thing that could save me is a passing truck or tractor knocking them down as they make their way over the road. assuming, of course, that the cows do not look left and right when crossing.
 
back to Apple moans and groans? sure, if that's what you want.

that is indeed one of them iPod touch things, the ones that i am not at all impressed with. i got it for a rather good price, however, and my (considerably) better half likes it. she can do all them touchscreen things that i have no interest in.

updating the ipod used mostly by (considerably) better half first seemed like a wise way to gauge the mood of Apple. if they opted to go on a "we are blanking your device" mission, her 8GB model (of which you can use nearly half of the memory; the other half of course reserved for their ridiculous software) was pretty easy to reconstruct.

here we go, then, the 'sync in progress' screen. it likes to make you think it's doing what you want it to, but doesn't reveal if it has worked until you've ejected it and checked.

just what Apple's problem is with 'drag and drop' would be beyond me. it's pretty basic and user friendly, and oh yeah, it's that latter point that they will have a problem with.

i don't get why you have to 'drag and drop' the vibes into the ipod via iTunes, and then after you have dragged and dropped, and only then, does it 'sync'. no, it does not make it better, it's a pain and a waste of time. yeah, very first world, that problem.

what's the one thing that would improve Apple products and cut out most of my complaints? buttons. a power off button, ideally, not this 'sleep' or 'standby' rubbish. and buttons to use to navigate and select things with. all this touchscreen rubbish is annoying and intended for children's toys. buttons are the hallmark of a proper, real, grown up device. access to the battery would be nice too, so you could replace it, but of course that would go somewhat against the business model of Apple; "oh your battery is not working so here buy a whole new device".

i believe if you make a quality product, and market it well, people will throw money at you. that Apple constantly seek to find ways to milk money off of people and consider the quality of a product to be negligible and unimportant says it all.

have i done anything even more ambitious than try to update an ipod recently? why yes, indeed i have. in something of a reckless, hopeful and sentimental mood, i have opted to try and trust the South African Post Office to deliver mail and, if at all possible, deliver mail in a reasonable amount of time.

by "reasonable" i mean in 6 to 8 weeks or so, or if you like 2 months. i really, really like posting things to people, in particular cards and that for easter, birthdays and whatever else they sell cards for. i suppose at some point someone will think of sending cards at christmas, but we will see.

will the above arrive in time? well, i can but hope. the last i heard was that the SA Post Office was in such a bloody mess that no international mail was going in or coming out of the country. bonus, then, if it turns up at all. 

so, did the ipod with the touchscreen all update ok with no fuss and no theatrics? why yes, actually it did, as you can see here.

yeah, that's U2 on the display right there. a band somewhat synonymous with Apple. although, as i recall, there was not really all that much fuss the first time Apple gave away a U2 album with their products - i think it was How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb that came loaded on the ipod. and i do quite like how that's an image of Bono singing to represent songs as an icon.

that Apple really, really likes U2 is one of the few redeeming features of the company, in retrospect. although i still don't get all the fuss from last year with Songs Of Innocence. outside of it being a very, very good album, why did U2 get blamed for all of that? to recap, U2 made an album with the intention of releasing it so people like me could buy it and get on with enjoying it. Apple comes along and says "hello, can we give you (guessed at) $100million in return for giving your album away for free please?". Bono and the lads decide that this would be most agreeable. Apple set it all up with their impossible to navigate software so that it automatically downloads to the Apple devices of many people who lack the interest in U2 that they might have. and somehow U2 are to blame?

another break? surely. here's an image that amused Spiros somewhat, and a few others too.

it's off one of them shows which that Harry Enfield fella did, you know, him that did all that Loadsamoney and stuff. not sure if he is still on the go, probably is.

i am getting pretty bored with this now, so presumably you are too. anyway, let's make this as painless and quick as we can to end, here's a picture showing that, at this stage, Apple are happy and content to leave my vibes on the device.

will it stay like that? well, we will see, but the lack of swearing should be something of a clue that this all ends reasonably well. for a change.

wither sentinel, or if you like lone wolf? that renegade cow that seems to be leading the evolutionary revolution? why, right here, alone, looking all leader-like, broody and deep in thought.

i at least think that's sentinel. i am pretty sure it is, although they all look the same to me. are you allowed to say that about cows? i mean, if you say that they all look the same do you now get knacked by some sort of lobby group for prejudice? i will find out if you do, i suppose, because i just did say that.

you want for a video of my ipod classic, also known as a proper ipod, updating? not sure why you would want for such a thing, but sure, that's doable.

if you can hear some sort of music on the go there (sorry, i never check the sound. i very rarely put the sound on the pc at all, unless someone insists). it's U2, possibly Discotheque, an underrated and very, very clever single from the band. 

and there would be U2 again, on the ipod, all nicely updated and working fine with the vibes that i wanted on it, thank you very much indeed.

quite phenomenal. the challenge of adding new vibes to not one, not three, but two Apple products went, by and large, fine and without a hitch.

i was so excited that i very nearly wrote them a letter, telling them how i was able - twice - to update a product of theirs the way i wanted to, and was able to do something with the product that i actually wished to; something that it was bought to do. and sign it off with a suggestion that they stop being twats, of course.

i did not write any such letter, of course. sure, they would ignore the part about asking them not to be twats, which would be disappointing and somewhat understandable. no, what held me back was the thought of them knowing that someone was able to do what they wanted to do with their product, not what Apple insisted on. that would just lead to yet another bloody iOS update being unleashed, bringing a swift and decisive end to such freedoms for your coins of money.

what new vibes is it that i shall be listening to on the ipod, or ipods? well, as the pictures have pretty much suggested here, Prince. i have that best of Prince DVD on the go at the moment, and am very much reminded of how awesome his love of bass is. i may well, when not reading, listen to a bit of Prince on the bus as i go upon my travels.

how many items of mail am i presently throwing into the system in the hope that the South African Post Office kind of does its job? three so far, and a fourth will be added tomorrow, or maybe Monday.

it would be really, really nice if they all arrived, you know. i can only do what i have done to try and bring this about, we shall see.

i can't think what exactly it might be, but if something in the above has been of interest or entertainment, well then so much the better. i shall attempt to refrain from further updates until i have something of actual interest to post, methinks.

until such a time, then, dear reader,




be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!