OMA to mp3 connect player and id3 tags

My external harddrive with my precious music collection decided to temporarily give up its service and I was stuck with a sunk feeling that I’ll never retrieve my music…

Well I remembered that I have my old sony NW-A3000 20GB music player, which I dug out and found that a chunkof my music was backed up there. As with all of these Sony devices, the music was transfered through the now decontiniued “Connect player” and all music was in a .oma format with no tags or anything. Frustrating but I could still hook it up to my stereo.

After some research, I found a software that is a simple java applet that can be installed on the player itself and lets you import/export files with id3tags and all as mp3!!!
The genious bit of really overdue programming is called JSymphonic, is freeware and can be downloaded under http://symphonic.sourceforge.net/page.php?4

Hope this helps a few frustrated Sony player users.

the beast reawakens

back again. Didnt think i would need this. i havent used it in the last half year but suddenly i amvery thankful i never deleted this blog.
i was just browsing some of my own old comments and stumbled accross one of the last ones i wrote.

I was saying not much willl change. weeeell i think i will have to correct myself here. just about everything has changed. iv’e completeley reinvented myself, without knowing it.
the road behind me has been interesting and the one infront becomes clearer by the day. (unlike the weather here in berlin, one day swallowed up by fog, it looked like the earth and the sky had melted into one mass of grey. the ground slowly dissolving into the air. the sound of my feet slushing through the melting snow gets swallowed before they even reach my ears. my mind is too ocupied with numbers and rationality to soak up the beauty that this surreal landscape holds for me. only now sitting in my dark room i realize what a mystic day it has been. thats probably why i startedup this blog again. seems like something inside wanted to get out again. there’s always a child in every man. mine just clawed its way through to the surface, struggling against the onstorm of rationality breaking into my mind.

i am amazed of the amount of things i have lost within the last 10 months. not phisically speaking (i always double check if i have my keys and wallet on me) but in a sense of were am i and how do i define myself.

this leads to an interesting question:

How dou you define yourself?

at some time it was the people i knew
at some time it seemed that music was true
then it was the thoughts i had,
that kept flittering around, scattered and alone in my head

at some time it was the love that burned within
but that flame has whisped out and grown so thin
recently it was the job i do
but that doesnt fill me or make you you

so here i stand thinking WHAT makes me me
and what does it take for me just to be me?
where the road goes i dont seem to know
will i find what it takes somewhere below?
will i turn out in the end then being me
or will i just sadly be?
-Jan 2009

(Not very complex poem or anything but keeping in the tradition with Dr. Suess, “Oh the places you’ll go”)

oh and also posted here

summer break

as u might have noticed, the amount of comments and rants have dwindled in the last few monthsand i cant see this trend changing any time soon, therefore i will officially pause this blog until further notice or i really find that i have to share something. but until then goodbye to blogging and hello summer, hello sun hello world!!

the present is the past of the future

i give up.
[...deleted on purpose...]

the big 25 is nocking at my door and i’ll give a quick resumee of the last year(s). for whom? me. anybody else can sod off.
I’ll start with 22, no 23 is better actually just before 23.
22 was a year for ending. my old band went 5 years went. shit happens.
23 was a year filled with fun and scars. not only was i scarred, i also handed out a few nice slashes and i am sorry for being a complete idiot for those whom it may concern (but believe me it wouldn’t have worked anyway!!) i did a great job of pulling myself together and planning and taking care of my future. song of the year Emil Bulls – Summer of Love/ Winter of Pain
24 was even better than 23. more fun less scars. actually no scars at all!! well..mostly… once again i have (and probably always will be) been a complete arse and i cant see this changing any time soon, sorry once more to whom it may concern. (this is starting to sound like a sabatical…) i’ve turned quite um “mellow” and have had a lot of fun and there are quite some stories that i’ll be able to tell my grandchildren once i’m old. no regrets but more the fun.

25 seems like a big step (i know not much will change but it’s still a quater of a century!!). i am looking at it with a smiling and a weeping eye. there are already plans that will change me (i hope and think) and many other currents churn the still calm ocean. at some point i figure the waves will hit the beach, once the storm has brewed up to full strength. hopefully there won’t be a tsunami…

right enough of this slushy crap. this post has probably been no more than a written excuse to myself to have a chance to look back on the last two quite exiting years and summarize them in a few cryptic lines that no one but me will understand in their completeness. one has to come to terms with himself and his past.

the present is the past of the future…
-Me, myself and i

The e-conomists view on googles developement

In response to the freeconomics article:

The freeconomics attitude is not specifically new, especially not with user software. Most software that is introduced to the market ends up being “shareware” to attract customers with low/no introductory costs, but due to update costs (addons/licenses) that’s where the real costs are generated.

In the case of google, one the first look a “all free” company, that offers most of its products (google search, google documents, etc) for free seems like a beneficiary project.
What google is actually trying to acquire is something that cant be calculated in monetary terms: customer trust.
Since it is clearly based in a system-structure it faces high  rates of moral hazard and a natural uncertainty on customer side of hidden intentions. (comp. Kleinaltenkamp et al.; B2B Marketing)
apart from being under the top ten ad-selling company’s on the web, they have huge expansionist/monopolistic plans, continuously growing in other media-related markets.
a few examples:
gOS: The first “opensource” desktop based on google aps, is already being sold in WalMart and will be the main operating system for the coming “cloudbook” the rival of asus eeepc.
according to wallstreet journal last month they showed the plans of google entering the mobile phone market (The possibilities that the mobile phone market offers for advertising is humongous and completely unexplored and unexploited! In the uk there are the first ad-subsidized rates, which give you free minutes if you accept up to 6 sms per day of advertising. Think where this can go, while your Nav-system is looking up the route you can watch commercials on the screen!!).
There is no functioning “free” social network that google hasn’t copied or actually owns. From wikipedia to facebook, either they are being rivaled by google or bought up. As stated above there is a strong monopolistic tendency.

good literature for further reading (incomplete Bibliography):

• Levit&Dubner: Freakonomics
• Harford: The Undercover economist
• Anderson/ Narus: Business Market Management
• Kleinaltenkamp: Einführung in das Business-to-Business-Marketing

the drill (or death by shopping)

“pass me another… no make it a double.” espresso that is. the days drone on, much the same these days (with the few exceptions of life thrown in between). i found my digital camera and realized that i still had my memory card from last summer in there. the camera decided to die on me. it just quit. stopped. wouldn’t even retract the lens any more. since then i have been too busted to get a new one. they wanted to charge me 59 € just for having a look at it. thats going to be the price that i will charge from now on to look at anything, especially when i’m on a shopping tour with a lady.
she: “hey how do you think this looks? does it make me look fat?”
me: “pay first and then I’ll tell ya!”

good way to make fast money ey? isnt it interesting how the opinion of men and women differ once its all about clothes and shopping? my typical answer for any question concerning the look of any garment covering a lady is, “ok”.  that is the highest degree of praise one can expect from me for a piece of skimpy cloth covering just the minimum amount of skin, so they wont stick you in jail for public disturbance. somehow this never pleases the woman who i am accompanying on their delightful afternoon of watching me slowly turn insane. the “ok” is never enough. it always leads to another eye-rolling moment and a disgusted grunt for my lack of understanding the importance of the situation. but who would believe me if i’d jump up suddenly and shout: “that’s it!! it’s the piece of cloth that your skin has wanted to come in contact with your entire life!! it makes you so handsome i could claw out my eyes!!”  not very convincing is it?

better yet, i love the question “does it make me look fat?” what, that piece of cloth thats so thin i wouldn’t even consider using it as a handkerchief? fact is, its not the piece of cloth that would make you fat (even if she was, which by all given standards she isnt) its the food you put into you that does.

its just like putting race stripes on a mini cooper wont make it go any faster, but injecting it with a decent amount of NOS would. do i sound frustrated? nooo way…

oh my personal tip of the day: whatever you do never, i repeat NEVER EVER EVER go shoe shopping with a woman. you’ve served your time in iraq? well thats nothing compared to the torment you will have to suffer…

laterz

long lost love

i found my guitar again. this is a reeeally old picture. i must have been around 16 or 17?

when i started i used to play for hours on it. i sort of left of the last couple of years. probably because i switched to base in my present band. sort of hemmed me in, in developing new songs and actually expressing myself through my guitar.

the feel of the strings under my fingers, the melodies flowing from the synapses in my brain straight into the strings. i am one with it. the emotions, those small electrical discharges turn into a melody; my feelings form as notes. i stroke my guitar with the passion i would invest on the soft body of a woman. the sweet feminine curves vibrate with the harmonies, sending a reprecussion through my bones, making me one with the melody. i am swallowed by the sensation of sound.

she is my therapy. i noticed i need her. she drains all excess energy from me and soothes me.
why did i find her again? i watched the animie series Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad. reminded me of my own musical development and the struggle that i faced with my band. what is it all about? if you know “Beck” you might understand the last post i wrote.
i will go stroke a few tunes out of my baby now. just to help me find some sleep…

goodnight…

music can change the world

do you believe in music? i do. music has the power to change. it is a medium that in this modern time is stronger than ever. let us forget for a moment the continious battle of the industry against the rising importance of music. the developement of music distribution and the chanells that make it possible help serve the rising demand. in a time of globalisation music travels faster and further than ever before. it reaches more people and thus spreads its message.

music is a form of emotional expression. not only does it live from the feelings that the musician puts into it but also supports so many other people in their emotions. we are all human beings we all feel. one of the chanells that enables us to express our emotions is art. art in any form. be it poetry, painted, recorded, filmed and yes and especially so: sung, played and performed.
i believe that music has the power to change and if not change at least help. here’s my favourite quote:
“music is the noise that thinks…” 

so put your favourite record on, lean back an become one with the sound. let the music fill you and highten your emotions whatever they may be.

“If music be the food of love, play on,
Give me excess of it; that surfeiting,
The appetite may sicken, and so die.” 

-Shakespeare (Twelfth Nigh, Act 1)

 

roll the dice

…and see which number comes up. where do we go? what is the path we should tread on? it might be 2008 but has anything really changed? my resolution was to say “no” more often. sort of a scream for independence or whtvr. the 25. Jan is known as the worst day of the year. why? its still winter, we realize we cant keep our resolutions and we havent gotten back into the daily rythm. this is the time of the year with the highest suicide rate, depending on where you live and if you are a case of S.A.D. (might want to check that on wikipedia). In scotland (gorr those strange northern folk) celebrate “burns” day and dive into a festive indulgent feast of whiskey and haggis. well every country has its customs which it goes by.

as i sit and watch the clouds obscure the moon i feel an urge to change, to leave behind the past that seems to have a constant grip on the present. i always seem to get intangled in the past while trying o cope with the present. where cani put my foot without treading into the has been? looking ahead seems more complicated the further one progresses throughout life…

good night.

pimp my toilet pt.2

i didnt think someone would turn the bog into such an event but here you have it!

an american drainage company had a contest for the king of crappers. this toilet had everything from an ipod docking station, an xbox and an hdtv plus various other stuff. the most usefull feature must be the emergency button incase you get stuck or whatever.

i dont know, i think i dont fancy spending that much time in the bathroom. max time in the bathroom (including shower, shave and the complete body grooming process) is half an hour…

the article

well for those who enjoy this sort of thing, here the pic: