I must admit I like the idea of this white ZX Spectrum based on the rubber key variety. It’s been fully updated with HDMI and modern inputs including USB-A ports. £129. I’d also like to own the Amiga A1200 (£169) as there was no possible way of owning one back when I was a kid – it was far too expensive (as was the BBC Micro which had the best keyboard of any of the 8-bit computers).

However, even if I had the budget for them, I don’t have the space as it is. I’ve also feel that I’ve moved on quite a bit from the 8-bit retro gaming scene (though I occasionally yearn for a quick go at Chuckie Egg). Things got really interesting when I moved up to an Amstrad PC3086. It didn’t have a hard drive, but it did have two types of floppy drive and you could easily play decent games thanks to its VGA graphics (which was fancy at the time – especially at that price point) even if you had to keep swapping disks out every so often.

But it’s great that there are companies out there that cater to those who are nostalgic for the good old days of gaming and programming. It makes us appreciate what we had before all the nonsense that we have now (Windows 11, I’m looking at you).

I’m concerned that, in several years, either WB or Paramount (or the combined entity) will eventually succumb, leading to IP asset stripping and being sold to the vultures that I’m sure are circling the properties of both companies as I type this. It wouldn’t surprise me that a company like Netflix couldn’t then just swoop in and bag those properties for themselves at a price substantially cheaper than what it would have cost them to have bought Warner Bros. in the first place.

We’ve seen in recent days that you can’t take anything for granted. Epic Games, makers of Fortnite and a former potential employer from last year when I applied for a data wrangling job within their Metahuman division, announced on Tuesday that they are laying off 1,000 employees because people weren’t engaging enough with Fortnite. What hasn’t helped is Epic fighting (and subsequently spending a shit load of money on) Apple and Google over third-party payments and stores in Apple’s and Google’s ecosystems.

A week earlier, Sony Pictures announced the imminent closure of Pixomondo, the visual effects company responsible for film and television visual effects on major series, including virtual production on recent Star Trek series such as Discovery, Strange New Worlds, and Starfleet Academy (which in itself has just been cancelled by Paramount within the past week). Some of the company will be absorbed into Sony Pictures Imageworks – but I’d certainly expect to see a substantial number of layoffs as a result.

Creative Corporate America seems to be suffering from Shit Hitting The Fan syndrome at the moment. Spending more money than is being earned (“Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income, twenty pounds, annual expenditure, twenty pounds nought and six, result misery.” – The Micawber Principle) and subsequently flailing (and failing) to find the right investors who will bring them back on track, even after restructuring.

And all of this is not helped by a certain useful idiot causing worldwide economic chaos because nobody will tell him “no”.

Still lots to learn, but I have spent a good chunk of the past two weeks on induction courses and getting set up. This is the largest organisation I’ve worked for so far, so things can take a little while to get used to organisational processes, etc.

It’s quite strange in many ways. I’ve been used to being on-site all the time at Supermassive Games, but here it’s hybrid (50% in the office, 50% at home). And many of my colleagues work almost entirely from home or have very limited time in the office. There are advantages to doing so (no commuting!), and I was hybrid working at Memset and KPS for a long while. But that also comes with a few challenges.

Working as a team feels entirely different when everybody works in different places than when you’re working together on-site. Then there is the equipment. Where I work is now 100% hot desking, organised vaguely by department. You need to book your desk in advance (though I’ve encountered people at the desk I’ve booked on several occasions, which subsequently leads to awkward conversations). The downside to this is that even if you’re in the office, you’re not always going to be seated near your colleagues.

The monitor(s) at the desks are only HD-capable and much smaller than I expected. Whereas at home, I have a 27″ monitor that’s capable of a 144Hz refresh rate and gives me decent screen real estate with the M4 Pro MacBook Pro that I’ve been given. This is essential for working with the support ticket system, which is rather.. limited.. in how it handles its overviews and dashboards. The higher the resolution and the bigger the monitor, the better the experience is.

There are some other things that just come with working with a much larger, older and well-established institution than I’ve been used to working for so far, but these are just part and parcel, and you’ll get used to them quickly. Patience is a virtue, as they say.

However, the benefits far outweigh any small issues, and one has access to the entire Adobe Creative Suite for personal use at home (at least a £65/month benefit in its own right), Apple Store educational discounts, and up to £2,000 in salary-sacrifice vouchers for lots of things. And that’s really only the start. Working in education has substantial perks versus many other places I’ve worked for, that’s for sure.

During the first week, I decided to treat myself to an overnight stay at The Hub by Premier Inn in Farringdon (Old Bailey) as it was cheap(ish). This particular branch gives you a digital key via Apple’s Wallet so that you can check in via the Premier Inn app, and once your room is available, it pops up on the Apple Wallet, and you can use your iPhone or Apple Watch as your room key. The bar is decent, and the breakfast (at a reasonable £8) is good and filling. Would recommend to those who are looking for a decent, but basic, stay in London.

As for London itself, having worked in Wardour Street for MPC between 2002 and 2008, things have certainly changed. I’ve yet to tell for the better or worse, but what I will say is the number of maniac cyclists shooting up and down High Holborn and going through red lights is excruciating to watch. But there are plenty of places to get a bite to eat at lunchtime. And places to go too. I had considered joining the London Library as that’s not far away, and would be a brilliant place to hang out, but I can’t justify its monthly fee given the number of books I currently read (and I tend to pick up e-books that interest me on Amazon for 99p when they go on sale). Then there’s the mortgage, which is due to go up by close to £200/month in June because of the UK economy and Trump being an arsehole with his wars.

Overall, I’m starting to get on with the job. Slowly, but surely. It’s nice to feel wanted again, and it’s allowed me to find my passion for WordPress and CMSes again. Hence, you’ll find a lot of older articles gone as I’ve moved away from WordPress.com and back onto my own server, where I’m managing the hosting stack myself again. I’ve spent most of last weekend getting re-acquainted with RHEL and specifically Apache again (whereas for the past 3 years it’s effectively been nginx and Ubuntu).

Martyn’s Movie Watch…
Les Visiteurs * Les Visiteurs II

Finally, a couple of films I’ve been watching during my downtime. I’ve seen Les Visiteurs many moons ago, but I don’t believe I ever saw its sequel. Rewatching the first film reaffirmed why I liked it the first time around – it’s stone cold bonkers. Christian Clavier, who co-wrote the film, is clearly having the time of his life playing the serf to Jean Reno’s medieval knight who has to travel through time to stop himself killing his father-in-law, whom he thought was a bear – all because he captured a witch who poisons his water when he’s not looking. Alas, the wizard he uses to fix the problem sends him and his serf 1,000 years into the future… and hilarity begins.

It’s a genuinely funny film and still holds up 30 years later. Its sequel, Les Visiteurs II, is more of the same, though I’d say it’s even more chaotic and maybe even funnier. There’s a whole sequence when Clavier’s serf blows up a television, causing the entire front room to explode. Subsequently, there’s an entire sequence featuring firemen putting out the fire, which is – somehow – even MORE chaotic, and I haven’t laughed that hard for some time.

I love both these films. They’re proper farces, and everybody involved with them looks as if they’re having the time of their lives. Combine it with a great soundtrack, and you’ve got a couple of great films that – if you’re willing to put up with subtitles – are well worth your time.

I’ve still yet to see the third (and possibly final) film – Bastille Day, but that’s for this weekend.