Save Money – Register for Etag
August 27, 2008 at 7:31 pm
Now before you think I actually support the money-grabbing b’stards that run our crappy ‘flooded when wet’ motorways, I’m don’t. I am only telling you this because it will save you some money. And if you’re going to the Electric Picnic this weekend, take double note because you could be liable for fines.
From this Saturday, August 30th we now have to pay more to get past the toll plazas. This is for all motorways that toll.
Register online now for a video account and you’ll be good to go this weekend. If you don’t register, and you pass the toll bridge, you’ll be charged €3 to cross.
But the real sting is that you only have a day to pay – if you don’t you are charged double – €6. What do they think we are? Made of money?
For anyone planning on going to the Electric Picnic this weekend – register now – as I’m sure the last thing you’ll want to be doing when you get home after the festival is remembering to pay your toll fine!
The punitive payment system goes on – if you don’t pay after 14 days, you’re fined €40. And after 56 days, €100 is the fine. Could make for a very expensive nip out to the shopping centre.
[Another stealth tax brought to you by our wonderful government, the same ones who brought you "HSE Nightmare Scare" parts I, II, and III...and of course the unforgettable "Online Voting Machines for the 21st century"]
There are a number of providers, I registered with Eflow – awfully annoying site that keeps updating while I was filling out the form… reminded me of an over earnest child swallowing mouthfuls of spit while relating a longwinded story. AA Roadwatch has a nice clear explanation as to what’s what and who’s who.
Tags: aa roadwatch, barrier free tolling, stealth tax
Google in Double Shocker
August 27, 2008 at 12:25 am
Just back from the 2nd Dublin Girl Geeks Dinner. Pics are here. A more serious affair than last time, but enjoyable nonetheless. 30 odd or so turned up at the lovely Herb Street Restaurant in South Docks. Herb Street is next door to the Ely and they looked after us very well.
We decided to have a topic to talk about this evening and the topic was “Furthering Your Career”. Everyone around the room introduced themselves and what they do and why they were here, and the overriding message was “I’m one woman on a team of 30 men” or 20, or 14, or whatever. Why is this the case? I really don’t understand it when there are so many varying roles available to women in technology.
Some mentioned how they earn less than their male counterparts. One take on this is that women are not as good at promoting themselves as men and asking what they want. Kevin Lyda from Google (yes! a man!) mentioned a book he came across called “What Colour is Your Parachute” which is all about how to negotiate yourself some good money when going for a job.
I was interested to know from Sigmar Recruitment who sponsored the wine (cheers!) if they could put some Irish slant on the earnings figures from the A List Apart survey on the internet (see recent blog). That sparked a comment from one of the Google people there that Yahoo! do a good salary survey that is broken down by country. You can check that here.
Update: here’s an interesting post on the questions asked by Google and Microsoft in interviews. If you know anyone working for these companies, they are very intelligent indeed!
And in a second Google shocker of the evening, I met someone else from Google who – wait for it – actually gave me her business card which contained phone number, email address, the works! I’ve never ever met anyone from Google who has done such a thing! She must be either very high up in Google or…. faking it! But the card seems real enough and if anyone wants the details I’ll be happy to pass on!
I enjoyed this evening, met some good people who I haven’t met before, and am glad I attended. Next one I’d like to have a more fun theme. And on to fun… do you all know there’s a Tweet Up happening at the Electric Picnic on Saturday at 12 noon. More details on @peterd’s blog here.
Night now.
Irish Web Awards Nominations – this Friday
August 25, 2008 at 11:42 pm
I’ve voted. You can too.
None of the ‘pay to enter bullsh’. No black tie affair that many cash strapped start ups can’t afford to attend. And it’s not a ‘how big is your email list’ type of awards do either.
Your website will be judged without you putting your hand in your pocket. A ticket for the night is also a magnitude less than other award functions but that’s no excuse. We think that 16 year old we keep mentioning should be able to afford 30 quid, sure they’d spend that on fags in a week.
The inaugural Irish Web Awards take place on 11 October.
You must get your nominations in before this Friday 29th August. If you’re going to the Electric Picnic, make it the last thing you do before you pack up and go!
What a stunning logo
Tags: Irish Web Awards
Girl Geek Dinner Dublin : 26 August
August 15, 2008 at 5:45 pm
Girl Geek Dinners are a chance for ladies in technology to get together, enjoy some nice food and drinks, and have fun meeting other women in their field.
Now it’s a fairly loose definition of technology here! Are you wondering if you qualify as a geek?
I’d say if you work on a computer or find yourself online for 50% of your waking hours, and you are an active reader/contributor to blogs, and perhaps you use some of the following tools to make your life easier:
- basecamp
- highrise
- delicio.us
- flickr/pix.ie
- wordpress
- gmail
- aib online banking
- this is a list of my most used tools folks!
Then you might well be a geek and not even know it. If that’s the case, you should definitely come along and meet others who share your interests and have an all round enjoyable night out in Dublin on 26 August.
Are you wondering if you qualify as a lady?
Hmm… you may well have a beard (because men are allowed to come). But you must be chaperoned by a real lady.
You could be a durty foul-mouthed ho, but that’s OK too because this is Ireland and there are varying perceptions of what is a lady.
So if you tick yes to box a and box b, then go on over to the Girl Geek Dinner Dublin site and register your interest. Do it quick because there’s a limit on places due to the intimate surroundings of Herbst restaurant.
Now to book that hair appointment….
How to get your name off phone directory lists
August 15, 2008 at 11:42 am
The company that looks after the eircom phone book and the yellow pages is called Truvo. Following Wednesday’s post and the interest it generated, I telephoned them and asked about getting my name removed from all future distributions and they put me through to their distribution company. I gave my details in there and that’s it! I’m off.
You can get your name removed too. Telephone 01 46 000 46 and give them your details.
You may also be interested to know that the eircom phone book includes phone numbers of all landlines (that are not ex directory). So even if you’re with Perlico, Digiweb, etc your name and number will still appear.
Now all I have to do is wait a year to see if this change takes effect, but you can rest assured that I will be keeping an eye out to make sure they do what they say they’re going to do!
Tags: golden pages, phone book, remove name, yellow pages
A List Apart Survey 2008
August 14, 2008 at 11:22 am
Calling all designers, developers, information architects, project managers, writers, editors, marketers, and everyone else who makes websites. It is time once again to pool our information so as to begin sketching a true picture of the way our profession is practiced worldwide.
Last year 33,000 people took the A List Apart Survey on working conditions of people who make websites. The web is such a new invention, I think it’s really important to start looking at the lives of those who make it happen. Interesting findings last year. What I noted:
- Massive gender imbalance (82.8% male). Why oh why? I believe that the web more than any other industry offers many types of roles that suit different types of brains – whether you’re a designer, a writer, a marketer, a linguist, a mathemetician, a programmer, a planner, a spatial designer, a project manager… there’s something for you. Add to that the fact that this is a young industry where a certain degree of democracy and flexibility exists, I really don’t understand why more women aren’t working in the web. The results of the 2007 survey shows that most people have come to the web having worked somewhere else. If you’re reading this and you’re thinking of making the leap over to the web side, come on over. It’s fun!
- Most respondents who were developers and designers are white, university educated, and located in the United States (48%). This is a pity because their wage data means nothing to me. I wish they broke the wage rates down by country!
- Heart warming stats – 97.1% of respondents are ‘excited by the field’. I wonder if that kind of statistic exists in any other industry? Of that, 35% are very frequently excited by it. This is evidenced by the fact that 72.5% of respondents have a personal blog. We tend to live what we talk.
There’s lots more interesting stuff in last year’s survey. Take a look – it’s easily scannable and digestible.
But the big news is that now is the time they’re calling for people to take part in this years survey. Go to it. Let’s get our voices heard and a bit of a EU (non UK) bias going on.
Thanks to Eric Nieudan for bringing this to my attention via Twitter.
Update: I took the survey and it took me 11 minutes
Tags: A List Apart Survey
Phone Book + Yellow Pages Opt Out
August 13, 2008 at 2:38 pm
Isn’t it about time we got the choice to opt out of receiving these hulks of paper to our doors?
Yesterday I received the eircom phone book and the yellow pages. The cost to the environment of delivering these to me is quite high, especially considering that:
- I will never use them, preferring to search the internet instead
- I am not listed in the phone book
- I am not an eircom customer
Actually I wonder if the phone book only lists eircom customers? I duly deposited them to the dusty shelf under the stairs and threw the old ones in the (green) bin.
Do you think it would be a good idea to give green consumers the chance to opt out of receiving the phone books?
Update on 15 August – it’s easy to remove your name from the distribution lists. Just dial 01 46 000 46.
Tags: Phone Book Opt Out
More Spam from the Irish?
August 12, 2008 at 2:12 pm
A previous post about the Golden Spiders being fined for spamming me generated a comment from John O’Neill, the owner of Backupanytime. Today he received an email from the owner of a new site, Mytown.ie, which he deems to be spam. He contacted the sender of the email and asked how he got his email address. The Mytown.ie guy had harvested the email off browseireland.com.
What Mytown.ie did is not illegal. They would only be in breach of the law if they ignored John’s request to remove his contact details from his database. Like what the mouldy spiders did to me. That shower kept emailing and telephoning even after I had asked to be removed from their lists. That is the real reason why they were fined for spamming.
I kind of feel sorry for Mytown.ie. It obviously took a lot of time and effort to do what they did, not to mention the monotony of harvesting all those email addresses. And I don’t think they’ll get that many responses. The email that I received was an elaborately written, too long, piece of marketing speak that went straight to the trash. They obviously just don’t know how to communicate online.
Here’s a link to a good post by Richard Hearne in which he meticulously breaks down what someone has done right in attracting his attention. Read the comments too for more info.
If you’re reading this Mr Mytown.ie – you can make a mistake once, just don’t do it twice. Oh, and good luck with your business.
Tags: spam
Want an iPhone but not with O2?
August 11, 2008 at 9:34 pm
All the cool kids are on iPhones and you’re stuck with your beaker of a non-O2 mobile in the playground. Well now you can upgrade really easily. Pat Phelan, Telecoms Disrupter and Power to the People has displayed how he has unlocked his 3G iPhone to work on Vodafone.
You can do it too.
He used an app that cost 20 quid from Simable and it works!
Down with monopolistic pricing models! Power to the people to choose their own phone provider!
Tags: iPhone
Is this a sign of the times?
August 8, 2008 at 4:41 pm
As an Economist, I’m not one to be jumping on the Recession Bandwagon, but I couldn’t help wondering today if this tale that follows is a sign of the times, and a worrying indication of things to come…
I’m all about pitching interesting ideas to clients. There’s a dull corporate way of doing things (white background, blue logo, samey navigation style) and then there’s The Other Way.
The Other Way involves coming up with ideas and a strategy that really grabs your audience by the cojones, excites and delights them, and leaves them wanting more. Kind of sexual I know, but sure we all know – sex sells things!
Brightspark has done very well as a business because we’re the ones you bring in when you want to do something to excite and delight. When dull and boring is not good enough. And in recent times, while the good times have been rolling, we’ve all been a little more confident. Decisions have been taken to do things a little more daring at times. And that is to be applauded.
But does the corrolary of that mean that now when the economy is slowing down, all the decision makers go back to the tried and tested, dull and boring? Are there to be no new edgy ideas then? Is it back to the “I better not in case I lose my job over it”?
I hope not.
Because I am not doing samey samey.
I just lost out on a job for something that could have been really cool. The CEO loved the ideas, got excited about them, and the team as a whole contributed to the conversation.
Then today, I got the call. They’re not going with our ideas pitched. Instead they’re going for a corporate brochure site. And they’re using a nice safe company. One of those ones who has done lots of graphic design, whose web design is merely an online representation of what they do for print.
Is it down to price I asked? No. Our pricing is similar. So it’s down to the safe bet in the slowing environment. I’m disappointed about this one. But also worried that this is a sign of things to come.
