Paul Smith's 'Y2K Stuff' for Indie Magazine

INDIE MAGAZINE
- 2000 ARCHIVE -

January 2000 - Room 101. Bozo customers.
February 2000 - Bozo Account Managers.
February 2000 (1st, unused version) - Nightclubbing.
March 2000 - Trade-marked for life.
April 2000 - W-W-Why?
May 2000 - How did I get here?
June 2000 - Being Big.
July 2000 - Lovely Charlies.
[ Comedy Interlude ]
August 2000 (1st version, rejected!) - Easy life.
August 2000 - Sony PrayStation.
September 2000 - Re-branding and e-Love.
October 2000 - Disappointment.
November 2000 - Faking it.
December 2000 - Christmas treats.

Visit the 1999 Indie archive page.
Visit the 2000 Indie archive page.
Visit the 2001 Indie archive page.
Visit the 2002 Indie archive page.

Back to the main Indie Index page.

Paul Smith's 2000 columns for Indie Magazine.

January 2000

There's a TV show called Room 101, which I love because I believe it's what we hate which truly defines us. To know a celebrity detests line dancing and poor lane discipline too makes me feel closer to them in some slightly sad way. Although I've watched religiously, I've yet to see a famous person smile at Paul Merton and say, "Bozo Customers". This is because very few have customers. Perhaps Anita Roddick gets dumb people asking her if it's ok to use lipstick on their pet rabbit, given that it's not been properly tested on animals. If so, get her on Room 101 so I can bounce up and down on my sofa shouting, "Me too!" You may assume from the above that someone has upset me this month, and you'd be right. But because it doesn't make great business sense to slag-off ones customers, no matter how inept or rude, all I'll say is 'you know who you are' and in 20 years from now I will loom out of the shadows and garrotte you with a printer cable.

Instead here's something to try at home. I'm trying to sell my dads old PC at the moment (486Dx2-50, 12Mb ram/540Mb HDD, 14"SVGA, £Offers!) which means temporarily I live in a two PC household. And to me 'one house, two PC's', means only one thing; DEATHMATCH-A-RAMA! A serial cable wasn't hard to come by and in no time at all I was hunting my old mucker Gavin around a Doom2 (ah, remember?) level of my own devising. A few years back, linked or network play was hailed as the Next Big Thing, but on-line gaming seems to have surpassed it. Perhaps I'm a little twisted but I much prefer to verbally abuse and goad an adversary in the same room and not pay a 'phone bill for the privilege. All the fun is in their reaction as I strafe their lifeless corpse sliding towards me on its belly… I digress. (A word only ever used by cardigan wearers.) Now early P1's have become as worthless as my dads 486, the future of thousands of dual computer households grows ever closer. Although I'm not quite sure where this may ultimately take us, there's got to be a moneymaking angle. I'm not suggesting you dust off your copies of Doom or stock up on x-over cables, but someone with a sharp idea will do something with this burgeoning market sector.

A wonderful idea currently going to waste, in my eyes at least, is e-mail. Here we have a flexible and powerful business tool and yet every morning when I check our mail all I get is three Spam's, a mixed quality selection of funnies and some porn [thanks Chris :o) ]. I'm begging you now, somebody, anybody, please 'mail me for a price list! Lets all work together to make this communications revolution (or be the first to use the word 'communolution') a rewarding experience rather than just another distraction. Because if there's one thing I really hate it's having my time wasted. Pointed look.

Dale, this hurt like buggery to cut to 513 words. It started at nearly 800 so please be kind to it. Paul.

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February 2000

It was Bozo Customers who came under attack from me last month. In the interest of journalistic balance, this month, Bozo Account Managers. I'll put my hand up. Occasionally I cock up. You may get USB instead of parallel port or two metres instead of three. I don't do it often and when I do I sort it out. Fairs fair. Sometimes it's even to my customers' benefit, like the time I quoted my cost price by accident and made £2 on the carriage of what should have been a £200 margin deal. Bah! Still, I shrug my shoulders and remind myself that some you win, some you lose.

However, that's little league compared to an old colleague we shall refer to as Mr. B*. Some years ago when he was young and reckless, through the medium of miss-typing, he pulled-off a remarkable deal. They had to book a 7½ ton truck to deliver the 73 monitors he'd sold. Dispatch had got as far as loading the lorry when a sharp-eyed someone said, "These monitors, should they really be £3 each?" To which the answer is 'no'. Three monitors at £73 a-piece were later sent out, while Mr. B was taken around the back of the building and playfully birched.

I ashamed to say I've had five minute pally conversations with someone I couldn't remember which ended with: "…and can I have that stuff for tomorrow?" "Ah, yes, sure…. One little question?…" It's embarrassing but it has to be done. The only other option is to take an educated guess at which customer you're talking to and hope for the best. I don't favour this route because I've seen too many past colleagues fluck up massively and send orders to the wrong account, thus compounding their mistake and ultimate discomfiture. That way not only does one customer have to wait for their goodies, another innocent bystander is drawn into the stew with a box of unwanted stuff that will have to be collected and redirected at our expense. Verdict: Not good.

The reasons for mistakes are as varied as the bozo account managers who make them. Pressure has to be my main one. I only get fluffy when urgency is the word and I'm running around like a headless chicken. Other peoples may include:
A) Alcopops, i.e. "It got cocked-up because I'm pished."
B) Idleness, i.e. "It got cocked-up because I just couldn't be arsed."
C) Traditional incompetence, i.e. "It got cocked-up because I'm stupid"
All of these are bad but someone I once worked with (I guess he's stacking shelves at Tesco now) would send out random shipments at the end of the month to hit target, a routine which won him few friends.

This months plea. Forgive we sales people our mistakes, for we are only human. However, if it happens a lot it might be because we're drunk, lazy, dumb or scamming. Telling the difference isn't always easy but it is important to try.

*Although his real name is Chris Bottomley.

504 words Dale, I hope it's ok.

Paul.

P.S. Chris ok'd me to use his name in connection with his true story.

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February 2000 (Version 1, unused!)

I love clubbing. I think it's the way the seal cubs look up as you advance towards them, as if to say, "Great! Can I pitch?" However, on this occasion, the 19th of January, I was going to HOME, the super-club in Leicester Square. On the train down to London with Andy, my boss, I practised my best clubbing banter. "Innit, sorted, respect due", I intoned. "No need", I tried in my best Mark & Lard voice. I was indeed 'Mad for it'. We'd been privileged enough to be invited to the Bleeding Edge Publishing (owners of CTW and your very own Indie Magazine) Millennium Party by top-editing-dude Dale Bradford. It was to be my first full-on trade bash and my first proper club experience too. I'd been to clubs before, you understand. It's just 'The White Stiletto', my local meat market, with its one asthmatic smoke machine and single glitter-ball, is to clubs what the Reliant Kitten is to Formula 1.

The place was filling up nicely by 7.20, when we arrived. The base thumped, the lights flashed and I'm happy to report the dress code ('sexy', the invitations had requested) was being observed. I can't say I was bumping into familiar faces all night long, with the exception of Lee Schofield from CTW/Indie, as BEP do a lot of music and video trade mags too. So, never shy, I decided to make some new friends, like the very lovely Shelley and the equally delightful Poula pictured below. They collared me and accused me of photographic voyeurism as I snapped bad behaviour with a disposable camera. I explained I was taking shots for the Indie Magazine, so they said shouldn't I have a camera with a great big lens, and I said I found a small one was just as good… and so on. You get the picture.

As the night wore on the dancing got madder, the drinking less selective, and the snogging more public. I won't mention the gropeidge. That's other people's bopping, boozing and tongue wrestling, not mine. I have the natural grace and rhythm of a Rhino in a spin dryer on the dance-floor so I declined to groove. I'm t-total so didn't make much of a dent at the free bar either, but had enough coke to keep me going all night. Coca-Cola! Coca-Cola! Let's scotch those rumours right now! And as for mouth-pressing, Judith, my other half, had given me clear instructions and a picture of a severed ear as a warning-cum-reminder.

I'd like to say I'm making the next bit up, but it is, sadly, all too true. Except the bit about the stick. By one o'clock I was Larry Lightweight so we left, ears still ringing. The tube had stopped running so we walked up Tottenham Court Road to Euston. Which was also closed. We'd missed the last train back to my car, parked at Berkhamsted station. So, at 2 a.m. and five below zero, we're caught in London with no trains for four hours and nothing to do except watch a loudly arguing couple publicly air their sex lives. Which was nice. A Taxi seemed our only option and we found a helpful soul in a B reg. Mercedes. In broken English he explained he had no idea a world beyond the North Circular existed, but we negotiated a price of £40 anyway. Within moments our possibly Armenian minicab driver, who merely muttered as a Gatso camera flashed him, was speeding us at 70mph through central London. I checked my seatbelt one more time, just to be sure. With Andy directing him we found the M1 and headed out of town, the car steadily developing a worrying ticking noise. Before we reached the relative safety of Watford, something functionally vital to the engine went horribly Pete Tong and we ground to a halt on the hard shoulder. It was about now I started looking around for hidden cameras. We were left standing behind the crash barriers, freezing our buns off, as our remarkably calm driver tried to repair a seized straight-six by checked the oil and saying 'gearbox' over and over again. Then he reverted to a technique that worked with his previous form of transport, back home in Armenia. He started hitting the car with a stout stick and shouting at it. When that didn't work he 'phoned his brother on his mobile and using the international language of sign we convinced him that this was the northbound carriageway of the M1. Frankly it could have been the Newbury by-pass for all he knew. He promised help would soon be with us, to take us the rest of the way. Our doubts developed as we waited, so after giving him half the money for half a job, we struck out on foot up the M1 to warm up. Keeping well up the embankment and behind the barriers we were in no real danger but as the hours passed I began to wander which god I had upset. About three miles, two frozen feet and a cut across country later we came to a petrol station on the outskirts of Watford and called Emma, Andy's girlfriend, to rescue us. The Orange Message Service wasn't able to help but an understanding lorry driver turned up, and after listening to our sad story, took us out of his way to Berko. As a crowning turd to our journey home, the railway station car-parks barriers were all down…

The moral of this story is that the Muller Rice commercials are right. We'd had a great time and had to pay the price, and in future NCP and not the public transport system shall be receiving my patronage.

954 words Dale, pictures to follow ASAP.

Paul.

P.S. If it's too long, lose the bit about the stick!

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March 2000

My customers make me laugh. Usually it's with, but occasionally it's at, but at least I get a chuckle once in a while. For example, the other day I was chatting on the phone to a customer about his two loveable scamps, or as he put it, children…

"Well, Paul wasn't looking too happy in the pictures", said Ed.
I gave my cheesy grin. "That's so cute! You named him after me?"
"Actually I named them both after you."
"Really? What's the other one called?"
"Twat."*

I think the true measure of how good or bad your relationship with a customer or supplier is isn't if you play golf together or not. It's how rude and abusive you can be (in a playful way, naturally) without overstepping the mark. Although, sadly, it's not always easy to judge where that illusive mark lies. I remember years ago I dealt with a big account who would always call up and ask for 'the wanker', and say "Hello Paul, you bastard". I assumed at the time it was his comedy way and joined in, but it turned out that he just hated my guts. Some you win…

Giving me less smiles has been the legal profession, as this month I've been in trouble over this very column. In the December issue of the Indie magazine I foolishly used the word 'biro' to refer to ballpoint pens generally. What I should have written is 'Biro™' or alternatively 'ballpoint pen', as Pettman Smith Solicitors were kind enough to point out to me. Consequently, through this column, I'd like to offer my most sincere and humble apologies to the upstanding firm that is Biro Bic Limited for any reduction in the perceived value of their Mark. I won't do it again.

Trademark infringement is a funny old area though, isn't it? If I mention I use a Dyson™ (one of the finest vacs in the land. Please don't sue my ass, as he has no money of his own) to do the hoovering, will Solicitors for Hoover™ send me a snotty letter to demand I should have written I use a Dyson™ to do my vacuum cleaning? Now this has been printed, we'll all just have to wait and see! I'll keep you updated on any developments. But more seriously, folks, I'm sure you've got trademarked names all over your price-lists, brochures, shop signs and/or press advertising. Let my recent experience guide you. I quietly suggest you put at the bottom of the page something like 'All trademarks are the property of their respective owners and are acknowledged'. That's if you don't want to help a Solicitor justify his or her sad 'n' sorry parasitic existence.

Paul's Thought for the month: Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines.

(Weasels™ is a registered mark of the Huge-Bastard Corporation of America ® and is so acknowledged it hurts.)

*I can't make stuff this good up! By the way, why am I lopsidedly squinting in every picture of me in existence?

I appear to have entered my sweary period! 506 words. I hope this is ok Dale, and it won't get us in trouble, will it? Ultimately who would be pursued through the courts for damages? Me for writing it or you, as editor, for including it? :o)

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April 2000

Question 1) The World Wide Web.

An invaluable business tool, reflecting the communolution* which is reaching into all our lives at the beginning of the third Millennium. Or just a great way to see Porn?

Discuss.

Much is being made of the internet-based global market place these days. I accept it's splendid to have an on-line 'shop window', which lets people from undiscovered South American tribes deep in the rainforests of Equador swoon at your range of PC options. But will they really be typing in their Amex Gold Card numbers next to your shopping trolley icon? Most of the Indies readers, like that unique retailing couple in Royston Vasey, have a local shop, for local people. One big advantage you have over the 'net is that in your shop, visitors can handle the precious things. As Jeramy Clarkson once commented about the WWW, who would buy a car without driving it first?

Hence the Internet is great for certain types of trade, for example, anyone who's selling a commodity item as cheaply as possible with the tiniest of overheads. Or a unique, totally niche product, like Furby Hookers (www.fishdot.org/furby). In the big e-book of winners and losers, I assume mail order firms are going to be the real sufferers when every home and business is hooked to the 'net. The cost of production and distribution of a big fat catalogue puts them at a big fat disadvantage to the fast adapting net species. What can they offer that e-tailers can't? Not much. How can they survive? By evolving faster than their peers. What can you offer the discerning shopper that on-line boutiques can't? A friendly face, advice, technical backup, personal service and a cup of tea, for a start. How can you survive? By doing what you've always done, just better. I might buy a CD or Game by phone or phone-line, but I've big reservations about buying a complex PC system that way. It's not all doom and gloom for the console boys and girls either. Shopping in a hobby for millions. They call it Retail Therapy. The immediacy of a spontaneous purchase is something no web-site can offer. In a shop you see a thing, you like the thing, you buy the thing, you take the thing home, rip off the cellophane and use it. On-line, you see a grainy picture of a thing, you wonder if its exactly as described, you take a chance and buy the thing, you wait two to three days to receive the thing… I don't know about you, but to suffer all that uncertainty, the thing would have to be a whole lot cheaper than I could find it locally.

If, after all my reassuring, you're still worried about the effect of the Internet on your business, try charging shoppers in your store a-penny-a-minute while they browse and see how much they warm to you.

*From Communications revolution. Some day the OED people are going to accept one of my new words, and when that happens, you saw that word here first folks.

I appear to have left my sweary period! 512 words. I hope this is ok Dale and that you don't mind me pinching all your ideas from the 'welcome to the February issue of Indie' box. Ta.

Paul

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May 2000

The stories I hear about how people got into this crazy industry often amaze me. I have a customer who became interested in computer retailing after stealing the wrong boxes from a Dix*ns warehouse. Had things gone to plan, by now he could have been the guv' of a string of TV, video and hi-fi shops instead. At this years CTS I met a Scot who had recently retired from a hard life on the oilrigs, out in the cruel North Sea, to become an Indie. I asked him if he missed the isolation, the constant threat of danger and the long unforgiving hours. "Miss it?" he replied, "I'm just getting used to it." As Basil Brush would say, "Aha-aha-aha… Boom-boom."

My own story is one of sexual politics. I was happy as a motorcycle courier but my girlfriend at that time (Ah! The raven-haired Catherine. Where art thy now?) thought I was capable of much more. Or perhaps she had become bored with my oily, leather-clad look and wanted to see me in a smart business suit? Anyway, I was bullied and generally 'blackmailed' into applying for a job as the grand sounding 'Business Machines Sales Consultant' for a local stationer (now closed.) The day after I accepted the position, she dumped me. Oh the irony of it. In an unsuccessful effort to win her back, I vowed to become the best BMSC the world had ever seen. To this day I can still recall the features and benefits of all the calculators.

Although I had fun selling PCs and occasionally, when they worked, 'Mac's too, sadly the job involved hard work so I resigned to work for ZCL as the assistant Manager of a branch of their retail chain, Calculus (now closed.) Here I learnt to tow the High Street Multiple line, to abandon my individuality and sacrifice my soul to the corporate gods. When they went bust, I worked for five months selling mobile phones. I left shortly before the branch was closed to be the Manager for a local Indie PC store…

Predictably, within six months that shop had also closed, and I was once more destitute at Christmas. It was about now that I began my downward spiral into alcohol, drugs, prostitution and finally, most tragically of all, PC cable distribution. It's not something I'm proud of. I was young and needed the money. Call me foolish, but I couldn't resist the draw of black rubber Power-leads… Mmmm!

That company lasted almost two years as my employer before it too became infected with whatever dark financial beast of the Id I carry within me, and closed down. Are you beginning to see a pattern emerge? The next Distie I became a symbiotic parasite of, seemed (for now at least), to break my trail of destruction. Feeling as if I'd lost my mystical powers of chaos, I resigned*.

Which brings me to the great firm I now work for. It's nice to be surrounded by so many happy, guileless, smiling faces…

505 words. I can write these faster than you can bring out Indies! I can see a backlog forming, piles of unused 'Paul Smith Writes…' turning into an EEC bollocks mountain! The good new is that we're making a healthy profit at the moment and is still growing at 40% p.a…. so fingers crossed there then!

Paul

* This firm, RK Distribution, has since closed. ;-)

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June 2000

SCoRE. What is there to say about this great show which hasn't already been said? Nothing. So instead I'll tell you the future lies in being BIG.

Barclays Bank know it, Gangland Misters know it, Sumo Wrestlers know it and now you know it. Grow or stagnate. Expand or die(t). Evolve or Dissolve. "But how?" you're probably shouting. To save you from the acute embarrassment of yelling a rhetorical question at a magazine in public, I'm going to tell you.

You'll love this!… The secret is to sell more stuff.

You're not impressed? Ok, here's a bit more information.

There is any number of ways to increase your turnover. Some will kill your margin, but today I'd like to concentrate on broadening your range of products and services and remarkably, for once, I'm not just suggesting branching out into something we distribute.

I wanted to write myself a cool website. (You'll find the results at: http://paulmadbobsmith.tripod.com) Before I could prod the workings of HTML in an anxious way I needed a book. I visited every computer shop in my town but drew a -----. Ultimately I was forced to visit, of all things, a bookshop. I resisted the urge of every fibre of my being to look at the Black Lace erotic fiction section as I searched for a suitable tome. I found what I was looking for in the chunky orange shape of The Idiots Guide to Writing WebPages. It's great and, had it been in a computer shop and not a bookstore, I may have picked up a copy of FrontPage or some clipart at the same time. You follow my reasoning. So:

o If you don't already, why not sell computer books?
o Then display software nearby which relates to the titles you sell.
o Learn HTML (believe me, it isn't very hard) and offer to write peoples sites for them.

Big idea two. We've recently started distributing second user hardware. The response has been very surprising. It seems a lot of you get asked for this type of stuff all the time and haven't yet dabbled because you are wary of getting stitched up on some crappy old stock like a Kipper in casualty. The good news is if you use a supplier you can trust, as we do, the rewards can be very pleasant. We can supply dealers a Compaq P133, 12" TFT laptop for as little as £280, to happily retail at £499 inc. VAT. That's almost 35% margin on a system, and if that doesn't engage your interest, you're obviously making far too much money already.

Last and least, if you're a reader of Top Gear Magazine, you'll spot on pages 147 and 204 of the June edition e-mails from one Paul Smith. Ah! Fame at last! Chuffed that they chose to print my first ever letters to them, out of the literally hundreds that they receive each month? Lets just say my head is quite... What's the word?

497 words, Dale. Hope it's ok. I'll fax over the info from the DICE final this week too. Paul.

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July 2000

Lovely Charlies.

Gay Search may have the funniest name of any gardening television personality, just beating Charlie Dimock, (who wouldn't pay good money to see that?) but it hasn't stopped her becoming the darling of the people who flock to garden centres every Sunday. Similarly, if you like cars, there is no escaping from Jeramy Clarkson. You get Patrick Moore for the heavens, Fred Dibnah for industrial heritage and Dave Attenborough for anything furry with teeth. So far so good, but where is the popular media's face of computers and consoles? No, you can't count Dominic Diamond, for all of the obvious reasons. Philippa Forrester may battle it out with Carol Vauderman to be our technical totty, but would I trust them to give me their view on the Playstation2's DVD decoding abilities? Nope. It's not because they're women, far from it. It's just because they don't carry the believable authority on the subject that, say, Jez Paxman does on politics. I.T. has become such a large mainstream issue, as shown by the prominence of stories in the press and on the telly about virus attacks, that an individual is now required to be the accepted source of wisdom. The big question is where do you apply?

Oh no, my double entendre is showing.

A customer of mine who must remain nameless (you like these ones, don't you?) recently split with his wife over a woman he met whilst surfing the 'net. I'm not 100% sure he ever actually [word removed on legal advise] the woman because I'm not privy to the full details, but the whole concept of on-line romance, leading to single-handed typing is a fascinating subject and not just because I'm a pervert. Is cyber-sex a form of adultery? I think we can agree it's some sort of a betrayal of trust, but without penetration (unwise due to the danger of electrocution) is it infidelity? How long is it going to be (no pun intended) before sex toy manufacturers make something you can plug into your serial port (ditto) to be even ruder on-line? People have been saying for years that IT has reached into every part of our lives, but is this one part too far? They even have a name for this technology; Dildonics. No. Really. I fear it may spell the end of the human race, for the following badly thought out reason: Sex without the risk of disease, unwanted pregnancy, or in my case, apologetic embarrassment, has its attractions. Which leads me smoothly onto:

It's the end of the world, as we know I.T.

Does anyone but me see a world, a thousand years from now, where the machines have taken over and Mankind is a fading memory in some database? When computers with true AI are finally created, and I don't believe we're going to have to wait 30 years, they will be set to work designing more computers with better AI… Humanity could fast become as obsolete at a VIC20. Congratulations. You work in the industry that may eventually make the human biological organism a larval stage to a civilization based on machine intelligence. I hope you're happy with yourself.

527 angry words. I hope this isn't too deep and/or too sexual for your discerning readership. Paul.

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Just to prove you really should believe it when magazines say 'All correspondence is assumed to be for publication...!'

My editor, Dale, puts the boot in!

August 2000. Version One...rejected on the grounds of self-obsession. Which was fair enough!

Easy-peasy. A walk in the park. Falling off a lo-aaaagh!

This isn't as easy at it looks you know. To the uneducated eye it may appear that my column is hastily thrown together at the last minute each month. It's simply not the case, or at least, it isn't usually. Normally I have weeks to beg, borrow or steal inspiration, carefully research my subject, hone my word-play skills and generally pull something vaguely coherent together. (All that effort wasted! Ed.) However…

This month my deadline has snuck up on me out of the blue, due to my busy jetset lifestyle as an international playboy and raconteur. Which brings me to this looking-at-the-screen moment. I have written for Indie since distant 1997 when, as Tammy (my weekend name) I began putting finger to keyboard. And this is the first time that an idea, of whatever dubious quality, has failed to arrive upon demand. My Muse, it seems, has taken that two week Cuban holiday. My creative spark has been bound, gagged and bundled into the boot of a fast car. Like I say, it's not all beer and skittles.

Editor Dale tells me a fellow columnist is about to bow out of the spot-light of fame which the Indie magazine affords us. The stress, it would appear, has burnt him out too. The brighter side of this news is that now there's a gap in the journalist market for someone else to fill. Who is going to step up to the microphone? My advice, for all it's worth, is that to write for a magazine one must have a good-sized ego. Every month I have to believe (often without the aid of drugs) that what I am about to commit will be of interest to thousands of people. It's quite a responsibility. This half-a-page would be worth what, five hundred quid in advertising revenue?..

Lying, as I explained to the Pope just the other day, is a vital skill too. Flattery has helped smooth my path and having an opinion on everything has been a helpful aid. These are the tools one needs to burgle the fortress men call Indie. If you are so equipped, why not drop nice Mr. Bradford a line? No, that's not another drug reference. But I give you fair warning; this life can be a cruel mistress. For example, before starting on this journey, I had a full head of luxury hair. Conversely, the rewards can be huge too; only yesterday I was approached by Shaven Ravers(tm) magazine to be their I.T. correspondent. I think I'll pass-up the offer because I'm holding out to be a staff writer for Top Gear magazine.

Hey! An idea! Wow! Harry Potter, the books that have taken the whole world by storm it would seem, must be the perfect licence at the moment. A Hollywood film is in pre-production and just imagine the PC/Console possibilities! Quidditch Manager 2000! Virtual Hogwarts! Hippogriff flight sims! And if none of that means anything to you, you must be a Muggle. Damn, I'm just warming to my subject and I've run out of ti-

Hi Dale! 510 words. Ooops! I hope this isn't too self-indulgent. If it is I do have a couple of better ideas about the use of the word 'clit' in popular journalism. Your call, Mr Bradford, your call.

Paul

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August 2000 Version Two, as used

Sony rarely get it wrong. You can't argue the Walkman revolutionised music-on-the-move, in a kind of 'best thing since the whole concept of bread, let alone slicing' way. Playstation showed games consoles weren't just for agoraphobic kids who couldn't get to the local arcade. If there was a hiccup, it was Betamax 20 years back. And you know I'm the kind of guy to point out that Betamax was the technically superior format, don't you? Higher definition, for starters… Which is Image quality, which in-turn is something Sony have never got wrong. The quality of their corporate image (i.e. they're the Mercedes of consumer electronics) has never been better. The gamble that produced the PSX has proven to be one of the best moves the business ever made, with sales now generating a third of Sony's income…

So why do I think they may be about to get it horridly wrong, from your point of view?

Playstation 2 is destined to be the biggest product launch since the solar system condensed, in just the same way that 'Star Wars Episode One: The Phantom menace' had all the ingredients to be the biggest movie of all time. And we all know what happened there, don't we? I'm not suggesting all your pre-orders are going to get cancelled (unless Curxions get all the stock. It may be worth praying to the god of your choice about allocation for the weeks running up to the launch) but in the current atmosphere of 'Rip-off Britain' punters are going to be looking for the better deal, the lower price. And many will be prepared to wait for that deal to show. None of which looks good for indies. And it gets worse. Lots of the others, I assume, are going to visit the on-line Sony store, as they did for the Japanese launch, and see what's looking good there.

The traditional distribution tree (manufacturing being the trunk, distribution being the branches, retail being the twigs and the end users being the leafs) is under serious threat, and the PS2 launch could be our clearest view of this yet. That tree exists because Sony have a million units to shift and a million lounges have a space a PS2 would fit just right in. Under normal conditions Sony would need retailers to promote their products and distributors to supply those shops, while they look after the simple task of supplying a few disties. However a product that needs no salesman to read aloud from the card which lists features and benefits, coupled to the wide open doors of the internet, means you don't get a tree, you get something which looks suspiciously like Cress. And why not? Manufacturers can cut out two lots of middlemen for the price of some huge servers and a call centre.

Much as I hate being a harbinger of doom, I believe Sony are in business to make money and their plans may not involve you forever. I know. I hope I'm wrong too.

Dale, 503 words on evil Japanese Capitalists. Chairman Mao would have been proud of me! I'm hoping this cuts the mustard. And now, to sleep… zzzzzzzzzzz

Paul

Don't read it, download it!

September 2000

Paul Smith writes… Of re-branding and e-Love.

The ECTS has the wrong name. Let's break it down. Ok, sure, it's always held in England, which is technically a European country. That's in the same way that the Isle of Man in technically in the UK, if you know what I mean. What I am saying is it's not very central, is it? And there are Computers there, mostly running the light shows and lasers. You may know I have long had a problem with the Trade part of the name, given that I sometimes can't see the tottie for prepubescent Shop Managers and toddling Systems Analysts. Leaving us 'Show', which is the 25% of 'ECTS' that I don't have an intrinsic problem with. Hence I propose, Prince-like, that it's simply renamed 'The Show'. Or, if that is just a bit too vague, I quite like: The Top-Left-hand-bit of Europe Software, Console and Peripheral Extravaganza. Or TLESCPE for short. If we are really to have a change of venue to somewhere a bit cooler than the tropical hothouse at Kew gardens, then should we not have a full re-branding exercise? TeLESCoPE, where the industry looks ahead. Hey, that's not bad…. "Miller Freeman? Hi, my name's Paul Smith and I've had this gre- Hello? Hello?"

I have to admit I met my new girlfriend via the Internet. I know it sounds as tacky as the blue stuff you put posters up with, but I promise it wasn't due to some sordid chat-room cyber encounter. She responded to a piece of fiction (Oh yes. Didn't you know? I 'write') I'd had posted up on a site and the modern wonder of e-mail took it from there. This has made me think about how society has been changed, in a very real way, by the communolution I have previously mentioned in these sacred pages. I know more about a Scottish girl called Jill who's bored and in Zimbabwe than I do about my next-door neighbors, I've kind of gone off television and I can't remember what the inside of my bank looks like. It is becoming, in the words of Vladimir Lenin, a Funny Old World. Or a Brave New One. Your call. On a lighter note I have discovered a Yorkshireman invented the Internet. Just look at the evidence: E-mail. E-commerce. E-tailing. Ee, lad, come down off t' roof, ya daft ha'path. See? And don't forget what all flat cap wearers drink, "Ey, Tea"

Quick half-hearted rant time! 15" monitor, 14" viewable screen. 14" monitor, 13" viewable screen. Now that's not so hard is it? I'm tutting as I type this.

And finally, in this season of anticipation, let us spend a moment looking back on the world as it once was. It was 20 years ago that the Sinclair ZX80 was launched. While you may be feeling side-lined in an increasingly 'big-boys' cooperate world, just be thankful you aren't encumbered by a whole 1k of Ram and a keyboard that feels as responsive as the lid of a Tupperware bowl.

502 words and some iffy spelling, Dale. I hope this is both thought provoking and entertaining. Ok… if that's too much to hope for, then I'll just hope it's not utter crap. I missed my Homer Simpson confession in this month's addition. Does this mean I have escaped the indignity? By the way I loved your new column. I smiled knowingly as I read it! But what the hell were you doing in PC Word in the fist place? Turncoat, lol!

That's all my waffle for now. Stay Welsh,

Paul Smith (28)

Don't read it, download it!

October 2000

Paul Smith writes… of disappointment and bad behavior

I wanted to write about the ECTS, but having tried several different approaches I've decided that whatever I chose to say about it would be as irrelevant as the show itself. So there.

Just about the only worthwhile thing I learnt was that Playstation2 is not a Holy Grail in slinky black plastic. I was expecting a quantum leap in performance of SNES/N64 proportions. What I saw was no paradigm shift. It was a Playstation1.5 at best. Far more impressive was the Nintendo Game Boy Advance, which my carefully honed gaming skills tell me is going to sell like thoroughly heated cakes. Even the Dreamcast looked good on the Gem stand, where a bundled deal with a DVD deck was catching folk's attention. Don't write this system off just yet, boys and girls, because if you've all out of Playstation2's by November the 30th this could easily be your bread and butter for Christmas. Just stick the demo of Half Life on in the window and see those noses pressed to the cold fern frosted glass on Christmas Eve!

Quick half-hearted rant time! 15" monitor, 14" viewable screen. 14" monitor, 13" viewable screen. Now that's not so hard is it? I'm tutting as I type this….

Mad, bad and dangerous to know?

You may recall last month I told the world that I'd met my new girlfriend via the Internet in a totally non-sordid way. Many said a relationship based on such 'flimsy' as a joint interest in the television work of David Renwick was doomed to fail. They were right. Ho hum. However I have been talking to another girl via the 'net (I am at my most attractive when typing) for a while and the other day I chatted to her on the 'phone too. Yes, you're right, this is going to get sordid! Thinking I had nothing to loose I suggested we meet up sometime for coffee, as you do, and to my surprise she accepted. The next day I drove to meet her in my best shirt. When I got out of my car at her local McDonalds (classy) I realised with a sinking heart, that I had no idea of what this girl looked like, as the only picture I'd seen of her was of her arse! So short of wandering around asking people to stand up, how the hell was I going to recognize her? Fortunately I'd not been so shy about showing my face in the picture I'd sent her, and she spotted me as I looked around the car park with a worried expression. A stunningly attractive blonde in her 20's waved me over to an outside table... We walked her dog (not a euphemism) and had a pub lunch. My observation? That the Internet isn't a just about porn, e-commerce and Dot-Com millionaires, it's also about beautiful bored women with an interest in S&M.

483 words Dale. Not sure about this one…the ebb and flow of it doesn't seem quite right to me. Does Feng Shui (my spell checker has, Elvis-like, left the building) work on written documents? Do I have this problem because my bed now faces the door? Am I North/South when I should be East/West? Let me know if I need to do a re-write.

Paul Smith

P.S. A small invoice will be wandering your way again soon. Sorry.

Don't read it, download it!

November 2000

Paul Smith writes… About personal development and faking it.

I will never take an F1 car around Stowe corner and I'll never fly a Boeing 737 into JFK in thick fog. I don't expect I'll ever race the Mille Miglia against Stirling Moss or go 3 rounds with Prince Naseem. These things bother me. Was it De Carté who said, "I am my experiences, and without knowing what it's like to do all these things, I am half a man"?* Thank you simulations I say, because they let me faux-experience these situations. But just how accurate are they? Would my Soul know the difference?

Last month I was in the relatively unique position to compare a simulation with the real thing. No, BA had not taken leave of their senses and handed me a snazzy peaked hat and the controls of a large passenger aircraft. Nor had Naz thrown me a pair of gloves and promised to go easy for the first few rounds. I am talking of driving a Ferrari 355. As something of a wheel nut, and a devout follower of Clarkson (may the Lord have mercy upon his hair), I have long held the 355 in high esteem. It's been my idea of motoring nirvana. On the 19th of October I drove one around Thruxton Racetrack, and the day after I bought a copy of Ferrari 355 for my Dreamcast. The comparison? Well, given that a 355 costs about £100k, and even a few laps in one costs £50, you'd expect it to be more fun than the software, and you'd be right. However, to its advantage the 0's and 1's version is happy without a climate controlled garage. One area the game falls down badly on is smell. The leather interior. The slight whiff of burning rubber when you overcook the tyres. The hint of urine when you find yourself unexpectedly in the kitty litter, going sideways at 110mph. I guess this could be addressed with a scratch-and-sniff page in the handbook? I imagine a sachet of something which sets your nerves on edge and makes your stomach flip could be included in future versions, but there is no simple way to pull lateral G (Ali's not-so-hip brother) in your lounge so it can be forgiven that failing. You need to sit close to the screen to fool your peripheral vision, and putting a pair of surround-sound speakers behind you is a must too. Get a mate sitting next to you to say, in a too-calm voice, "You braked a bit too late there, didn't you? And you're still turning in too sharply" and you're nearly there.

To sum up, the Ferrari 355 is a fine automobile, but not raw enough for me to think of it as a sports car (I like to feel that the car is in a conspiracy with my right foot to kill me) and the game is ok, if a little formulaic.

One last thought; Am I the only person wishing Microsoft could simulate a decent operating system?

*No it wasn't.
[NOTE FOR DALE: Can you print this upside-down like the answer to a quiz question?]

502 words Dale… if it's crap it may be too late for me to do something else, but let me know.

Paul

Don't read it, download it!

December 2000

Paul Smith writes… About Christmas treats

As a person under the age of 30 with testicles, it's quite natural for me to be a gadget freak. Women are, on the whole, too damn sensible to care that DVD has superior image definition to VHS, and I don't know anyone in their 40's you could call an Early Adopter. As this is the time of year for such things, tiny pieces of consumer electronics have been inexorably drawing my attention.

I've procured a new digital camera to replace my ancient Minolta 0.3 Megapixel job. I sprung £269 for a Canon [NB. Ooops, it's a Casio!] which, while it boasts 'only' 1.3Mp output, comes fully loaded with 8x optical zoom plus 4x digital zoom and a whole host of other groovy features like time-laps, avi movie output and a manual I've been using as a coffee table. If I were looking to start a business in this crazy industry right now, I'd plump for selling digital cameras. They've a nice balance of coolness, pocket-money-to-silly-money price tags and the big boys aren't making impossible to make a profit on them yet. Add to this their very smallness, making working out of a shopette possible. Consider; 40 cameras equate to a single 17" monitor by volume. Rapid development means a strong second hand market (I got £100 back for my Dimâge V) and a constant demand for more memory cards, battery packs, readers, tripods… Damn it, I'd even sell printers along side them, plus ink cartridges and paper of course! No harm in being a 'one-stop-shop for all your creative digital photography needs'. Nice ring to that…

I'd get into this market now, because in 10 years only pros are going to be paying for film and developing, everyone else having sussed getting four or five nice pictures from a roll of 24 just isn't cost effective. Oh, and when was the last time you saw a camera shop go bust?

The other fab thing I've stumbled across is the MP3 file format. Yep, it seems I'm behind the times, but since I began Napstering last month I've been gathering obscure 'n' funky stuff. Morally I would feel iffy downloading commercially available tracks, but I don't think anyone was ever going to make money out of the Nena (remember her?) spoof '99 Dead Baboons'. Now, predictably enough, I'm looking for a MP3 player to take jogging. (Canned laughter). I'd be handy to have one that uses Compact Flash cards so I could share them with my camera. I could have been smart and bought a combined camera/MP3 player, like the Fuji 40i, but I wasn't, so there. I've let it be known within the family that a Creative D.A.P Jukebox would be well received on Christmas morning. For just £350 retail, I'd be getting a portable unit with 6Gb of storage. That's over four days of playback. Let me just add 'Battery Factory' to my list for Santa. The cruel reality is it'll be another Terry's Chocolate Orange, but a boy can dream, can't he?

Paul Smith, of Aylesbury, is currently seeking gainful employment.

Exactly 500 seasonal words, Dale, old mate, old pal, old chum. I hope you like.

Paul

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