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  • Dolby to Turn Volume Down on Loud Commercials – Neowin.net

    What isn’t quite stated here that I believe this should get rid of the need to turn your telly down massively when adverts come on. I was listening to someone talk about this the other day, and apparently the volume isn’t turned up by the tv company, the sound is recorded at a higher level of compression. Anyway, if this deals with it I want it built into my telly, and yesterday.

    Dolby. That’s all I have to say and you think of “audio” and “surround sound”. What’s that company up to recently? Dolby Volume: a technology that equalizes the volume across all audio coming out of your TV. The system aims to deliver consistent volume for TV channels, programs, and commercials.

    Dolby Volume models how “humans perceive audio” to eliminate variable loudness in the audio stream, automatically. Dolby claims user intervention completely is unnecessary (aside from the initial setup). The system handles up to a 30dB in reduction or amplification. Ars Technica mentions that Dolby did not address what Dolby Volume does when explosions or other sudden noises are meant to happen.

    News source: Ars Technica

    Read full story…

  • WordPress 2.1 Ella – WordPress Development Blog

    WordPress have announced version 2.1. It sounds like there are some interesting new features to try here, such as spellchecking, autosaving and more AJAX-based features. So I will have to try it out soon, probably on another blog first as a test.

  • Lumines Live! Packs Hit Soon (And Cheap!) – Kotaku

    Basic news is that the addon packs for Lumines on the 360 will be cheap for a limited period, starting sometime this week. I’ll be checking to see when they go up myself.

  • Not smoked since last night

    Haven’t killed anyone yet either.

  • Bit of a catch up

    Well it has been a while since I’ve written about myself, what with being away in London learning Java for a week, and posting lots of news stories instead. I’m about caught up now, so I hopefully will try and settle into a pattern with a little more balance. BTW, be aware that the comments on the news stories for the moment link to the actual story, rather than to my comments section. Should hopefully get chance to fix that soon.

    I’m a bit full tonight, having cooked Nigel Slater’s perfect coq au vin. It is a great recipe, and with a few shortcuts I made it relatively quickly. I also cooked the full version (justabout) over New Year, and it is marvellous.

    Being the New Year now, I have to put some of my resolutions into action. So this weekend I’m giving up smoking, and I’m also going to try and watch my weight a bit, so that it doesn’t add any more, particularly as I’d like to lose a little too. So I may make mention of what (if any) I lose. I am going to keep track of it, so I get an idea of what I’m doing that is right or wrong.

    We’ve also decided on our holiday for this year, we’re off to New York in October hopefully! I’m bricking it about the flight, but seeing as I managed a couple of hours each way to France last year, I think I can about cope with it as long as I keep me head stuck in a book all the way. Will be well worth it once we get there though, can’t wait.

    This has also partly been the motivation to get a new camera, a proper digital SLR. I’m hoping to buy it in the next month, and start taking some high-quality pics to put on flickr and for my own general amusement. And to occupy me whilst I am giving up smoking. Hope I can pull that off.

  • Go heading to Live Arcade? (Xbox 360) – Eurogamer

    I hope this is coming to Live Arcade, the more board games on there the merrier I reckon.

  • Cap’n Crunch – The Twilight Years

    This is a great new story about Cap’n Crunch, one of the original hackers in a way, as he was into phone phreaking in the 1970s. His friends and him created many of the methodologies of hacking as it is still practised today, and it is fascinating to see what has become of him since, as I’d only ever read about the actual phone exploits he had done.

  • Refinery29 Shops – Cool Hunting

    Refinery 29 started out as a guide to the coolest and greatest in New York shopping. Now they have an online shop bringing together the best items from the best shops. Well worth a look, read more on the cool hunting site that links to it.

  • Upload and convert videos to any format with Hey!Watch

    May be worth a go, an online app that converts youtube videos and the like to any format you like. You can only do 10 a month before you have to subscribe, but for the odd must have video it could be worth it.

  • Haw gets Last Laugh – Londonist

    hawhaw.jpg

    This is great. Brian Haw's protest has been transformed into art and that art itself forms a fresh protest.

    Just have a lot of respect for the protester Brian Haw, and it is great to see his protest living on like this.