Why do some people quote their phone numbers in funny ways on voice mails?

Most Australian phone numbers come in two varieties:

A local number, eg 7010 5105. (Let’s ignore the two digit area code for now; it’s not usually relevant in voice mails).

Or a mobile number, eg 0491 570 156.

How I’ve written them above is pretty much the standard, and that’s how I expect them to be quoted verbally. It’s no accident — with local numbers, the first four digits determines the phone exchange.

So I have enormous difficulties when someone decides to vary that, which often happens if they decide that part of the number repeats, so they should emphasise that, for instance 70 105 105. Or quoting a mobile number like a landline: 04 9157 0156. Something in my brain doesn’t scan the verbal input properly, and I have to hear it again to be sure I’ve written it down right.

It’s doubly difficult if in a voice mail they only say it once, and too quickly.

Please, stick to the formula.

I used to give either thumbs up or thumbs down. I’m switching to thumbs up, thumbs down, or neither.

Microserfs — This is the kind of book I should just lap up, isn’t it? A geek novel? But I didn’t. It dragged.

J-Pod — More enjoyable than Microserfs. Douglas Coupland’s self-referential bits were a bit hard to take, but overall I enjoyed it a lot more.

Torchwood series 2 — Less gratuitious L/S/V, it’s calmed down a bit. The insertion of Martha and more Who references (especially in the penultimate episode) made it all more enjoyable to watch, though I didn’t think there was a stand-out episode this year, not in the same way I enjoyed Random Shoes. The finale was a bit of a let-down, but came up with some surprises. I’m not a hard-core Buffy fan, and don’t know what those that are would have made of Captain Spike. The BBC actually put out a PG-rated version, but I think even that is pretty dark for kids to see. I’d watch it again one day — it wasn’t brilliant, but it had its moments.

Fistful of Quarters: The King of Kong — Great stuff. Not so much about classic video games as about the personalities involved in the world of classic video games — so non-gamers will enjoy this. The people involved are geeks, and know they’re geeks. The trust from the score referees in the messianic Billy Mitchell, and their mistrust to his challenger is particularly interesting. Not surprised Mitchell wasn’t happy with the way the film portrayed him. Definitely thumbs up. (Maybe I should start giving the double-thumbs up where appropriate?)

Next I need to see Chasing Ghosts.

Plenty has been written about this before, but I’ll put my oar in.

Facebook knows lots about you. Most users key in a bunch of stuff about their hobbies, favourite music, TV shows, all that kind of stuff. They know (roughly) where you live, how old you are, often your marital status, your interests.

So why are their adverts so hit-and-miss?

Sometimes they’re spot-on. I’ve seen Life On Mars t-shirts advertised, with pictures of Gene Hunt proclaiming some particularly amusing line from the show, such as “You’re surrounded by armed bastards!”. I’ve clicked through, and seriously considered ordering one. Well, until I saw the price.

But most of the adverts are useless. Hold ‘em poker — is there anything in my profile that suggests I’d be interested? Meet hot singles — Facebook knows I’ve been in a relationship for almost five years. Surely it isn’t predicting some kind of seven year itch coming up? Earn money from surveys — did I click on a “I need cash” option somewhere in my profile?

Snoring keeps her awake — uhh, no comment.

If computer systems are going to store a bunch of personal data about you, you’d think they’d at least make the effort to use it in a sensible way — not to mention if they get it right, they can make more money.

Or maybe I shouldn’t complain. At least the way things stand, I can happily ignore most of the ads that appear.

How’s this for a scheme?

1. Buy discounted Kit Kat Chunky chocolate bars for $1.29 at Safeway. (On special only until closing time tonight; normal price $1.88)

2. Eat bar.

3. Use code inside wrapper that gets me a $1.69 song from iTunes.

4. Profit!

I like chocolate, and I already have an iTunes account.

And in fact I’d been planning to buy a few songs, such as a couple of those David Bowie tunes used on Life On Mars (wasn’t the ending utterly brilliant!) including the title track, and Starman, also used to good effect on Torchwood. It’s cheaper to buy once-off songs for $1.69 than splash out and buy whole CDs full of other tracks I don’t really want. (How come the David Bowie best-of I already have didn’t include these two anyway?!) Even cheaper at minus 40 cents.

So what’s the catch here?

• According to the terms and conditions, you can only do this up to 5 times per iTunes account. Damn.
• They’re Nestle bars. I’ve long boycotted Nestle. But the costs of the discount and the promotion are likely to be borne by the manufacturer, which hopefully means they’re earning nothing at all, or even losing money on the deal.
• I have to eat the chocolate. Bummer. (I’ll pace myself.)

Life On Mars trivia: Sam Tyler was named after Rose Tyler from Doctor Who.

One night last week I was flicking between the six o’clock news services and I came across a Channel 9 story about someone’s wedding dress being delivered late for the wedding.

WTF? Look, I feel sorry for them, but THIS IS NOT NEWS.

You don’t want your journos to be aloof and distant from the people, and reporting only on stories that don’t affect anybody. But to run a fully-fledged two minute news story based around something this trivial is really pushing it.

I’m betting it would be enough to make many people switch over and never come back.

(There was a cranky letter in the Green Guide about it, too.)

It was like stepping back in time.

Down the stairs we went, into the darkness. Electronic beeps and bloops could be heard from all directions. Flickering lights.

Most of the classics were there. Centipede. Galaga. Ms Pacman. Asteroids. Space Invaders. Donkey Kong. And more. A handful in cocktail tabletop cabinets, but most the way God intended, in proper stand-up cabinets.

It took me back to the arcade amusements section of Luna Park circa 1985.

Except Luna Park never had MAME hooked up to a big projector screen. Back then if people wanted to observe your prowess, they had to huddle around.

ACMI’s Game On exhibit had all this and lots more. Apart from the section devoted to arcade games, they had areas showing off home computers of the 80s and 90s, consoles from the 80s to present, handheld games (Donkey Kong Game+Watch!) — and almost all of it playable.

I’m not sure the kids fully appreciated the plodding reality of the original IBM PC (sadly it wasn’t wired-up). Also in static displays were a Sinclair ZX-81 and an Apple II.

The kids and I went berzerk playing everything we could lay our hands on. We’d planned our trip to arrive right on opening time, and it paid off, as later things got reasonably busy, but we had a go on most things. I got high score on Pacman clone Puckman, as well as Ms Pacman. Some people had put very high scores on Donkey Kong already, so no go there, but I did get third on Galaga, despite the not-quite-reliable fire button. The Donkey Kong G+W left me trying to remember which of my friends had it. (I remember owning Donkey Kong Jr, and Donkey Kong II in this medium.) The sit-in Star Wars game was terrific, and Asteroids with proper vector graphics was great.

Of the newer games, R-Type on the PS1 (?) was fun, and I couldn’t quite get the controls on Golden Eye, but had a merry old time blasting away. Isaac and I spent some time beating each other to a pulp in Way of the Exploding Fist on a Commodore 64 (yes, I was wearing my Zzap!64 t-shirt). I couldn’t quite figure out Jeff Minter’s Tempest, which was running on an Atari Jaguar. Didn’t get a chance to play Wii, though they had a few PS3 and XBox 360 games on display, some quite spectacular.

Highly recommended, particularly if you grew up pumping 20 cent coins into machines. Oh, and love the giant Mario out the front in Flinders Street — one side a Donkey Kong pixellated original, the other in high-res.

(I’d post a pic of the giant Mario, but alas my five-year-old Canon A70 camera appears to have just died.)

Very clever trailer here.

Maybe things haven’t changed all that much in the last 119 years.

And in place of lowing cattle, I can hear the fiendish rattle
Of the tramways and the buses making hurry down the street,
And the language uninviting of the gutter children fighting,
Comes fitfully and faintly through the ceaseless tramp of feet.

– from Clancy of the Overflow — Banjo Patterson, 1889

OMG.

Why did nobody tell me about this before? The King of Kong.

I know, I know… I didn’t actually list the original Donkey Kong in my top ten games… I don’t know what I was thinking of — it’s definitely one of my favourites. My own high score is around the 31,000 mark.

It’s in the cinemas locally now, but can already be ordered from Amazon.com on DVD. Very tempting, but I think I want to see it on the big screen first.

• The Age — feature article on the movie
• Age Review
• A related movie: Chasing Ghosts