by on 30 Nov 2010 56 Comments

The infamous YouTube spinner

Rejoice!

Yesterday, Mauritius Telecom announced that my Internet speed will be doubled from 512kbit/s to 1Mbit/s without an increase in subscription fee by tomorrow, 1 December 2010, exactly 20 months after another similar doubling in speed.

Naturally, I am happy. And getting 1Mbit/s is definitely going to be an important milestone for me and, I guess, a lot of Mauritian friends. We’ll leave the world of the kilobit to join the one of the megabit per second!

Or, will we?

I have some doubts.

You see, I like YouTube. I watch videos on my MacBook, on my Nexus One and on my LCD TV using my PlayStation 3. And videos are sometimes slow to stream and sometimes do not even start. Google has setup some YouTube mirrors locally but I understand that those servers contain a subset of the most popular videos… (I guess mostly Lady Gaga clips and porn…) So bad luck for those with a less predictable taste.

I have also noticed that I regularly get the infamous YouTube spinner after dinner and during the week-end. I suppose that a lot of us like to watch videos at the same time. And I understand that the slowdown happens throughout the island.

The technical explanation for this slowdown is simple: Internet bandwidth from Mauritius to elsewhere (more specifically the USA) is not large enough for all of us to watch different YouTube videos at the same time.

And we need to watch different YouTube videos. Or, else, how are young people going to be inspired to change their world? This is the only way to become part of history.

I sincerely hope that Mauritius Telecom is going to increase the international bandwidth tomorrow. But, to be frank, I have some doubts.

Filed Under: Mauritius, News, Technology, Web
by on 29 Nov 2010 2 Comments

Announcing Infos.mu

www.infos.mu

Christina and the kids like to ask me the following during the week-end: “What are we going to do today?” Sometimes, the answer is obvious but, to be frank, sometimes I am not inspired at all and I find it tough to come up with something worthwhile.

In fact, I’ve slowly realised over the years that a lot of Mauritians (and, by extension, foreigners living in Mauritius) do not really know what’s happening in the country and, consequently, waste their free time indulging on the self-contemplation of their navels…

That’s why I got the idea of creating a website, www.infos.mu, to inform people about events happening on the island as well as provide practical information not readily available elsewhere. I really want (us) to discover Mauritius differently.  The site aims to become a comprehensive directory of information for Mauritians and foreigners.

Here are cool things you can do on www.infos.mu right now:

Sure, the website is still a work in progress. And I really need to enhance the navigation (any idea of what I could do?)

One key idea of www.infos.mu is that it is a contributory website with user-generated content: anyone can become a contributor and add events which he/she feel are worthwhile. You have an event happening in your region? Do not hesitate to share the event with us.

I would like to thank Ishtiba Meeajane, Liliane Chan as well as Christina who have done a formidable job to help me set up www.infos.mu.

www.infos.mu is a free service provided by Knowledge Seven, my own company which provides consultancy, support and training for opensource software. By the way, I’ve a blog on Knowledge Seven’s website too…

(A precision: the Google ads on the website are, eventually, for covering hosting costs.)

Filed Under: Knowledge7, Mauritius, Movies, Music, News, Technology, Web
by on 21 Nov 2010 9 Comments

Quick polls result on dpreview

Photo from Flickr

Just came across results following quite a few polls on dpreview, one of the most popular photography website.

Some of the results are worth commenting.

For “What shooting mode do you most often use?”, half answered Aperture Priority. In general, I am more of a Program guy (during the day) and Manual guy (at night.) But I have also noticed that I tend to use Aperture Priority more now because I have just bought a Canon EF 50mm f/1.8. During the day, you can’t really let the camera choose the aperture as, most of the time, it will tend to choose f/1.8 and this will give you a too shallow depth of field. So, what I do, is that I just AP and select f/8 which gives me admirable results.

For “To what extent do you post-process your images?”, most answered “Most shots get a little brightness/contrast and/or sharpening.” This is exactly what I do: some cropping (I love cropping my photos!) and lighting and that’s it. Direct to Flickr if it’s good enough!

To “What single thing contributed most to learning your photographic skills?”, half answered “Practice – I’m 100% self taught.” A quarter answered “Books / magazines / online articles.” This means that 3/4 of photographers out there learnt their art by themselves.

And, finally, “How often do you shoot raw?”, half answered “I only ever shoot raw.” Personally, I am more in favour of getting it right the first time…

Filed Under: Education, News, Photography, Technology