good stuff about 2003

1. nelsoncolne, josh for spending so much time finding things to put on it :-)
   
2. josh's webserver, /flashcom, webcams, text messages, blogging
   
3. flash / shockwave (and beta), simcity is abandonware,
   
4. those pictures by that guy : http://www.toothpastefordinner.com | rathergood.com | one word, 60 seconds
   
5. computers keep getting bigger (hard drives) faster and cheaper (special mention to toshiba (small hard drives (and even smaller next year)) epia / via (small motherboards)) and quieter and better at using less power.
   
6. processors get even more confusing: p4m? amd opteron/athlon 64? ibm g5/970? itanium? All have speeds ranging from 1ghz to just over 2 and perform very well.
   
7. anyone just using computers for interesting reasons

Exciting new stuff coming soon:

• that sony playstation that records to dvd is a good thing. and the other people that make a dvd recorder for quite cheap in a shops like wh smiths, or was it woolworths or superdrug. ok, so far I've found : Philips DVDR70 for under £250 Panasonic DMRE50 for about the same price
  
• 3d screens

not so good stuff that happened in 2003 in no particular order
1 microsoft are still one big company with too much power despite losing lots of court cases.
1.1 the virus that created tonnes of work for tech support people and alot of annoyance for average computer users.
1.5 lots of other court cases and patents that restrict the use of really obvious technology, like plugins and erm..
2. Tube crashes, tube strikes, royal mail strike, uk rail travel, power failures.
3. computers don't get any more reliable (your hard drive still dies) (although win xp does have some nice features) (but re-starting and recovering from an unbootable machine seems more difficult) : who are currently the hdd manufactures you rate most? samsung?
4. apple: mac os 10.3 (hello, now no one knows how to use your operating system) mac os X (10.2) (hello, you completely changed how everything works and we can't customise screen fonts or the apple menu) why is the Close button right next to the Maximize button / why is apple w (close window) next to apple q (quit), apple designed laptops (just plain do not last), apple lies (the fastest what for maybe a day, when for the last 2-3 years you've just been telling us that mhz don't matter)
5. mobile phones (inconsistent / illogical user interfaces, poor software, unreliable stuff 'given' to me, really poor support contracts)
5.5 what, it's over? my birthday was just the other day. scary.
just missed out: ebay (fees high, buyers/bidders poor, no customer support)