Over the past week a large amount of websites have been banned at work. First, IT in their wisdom banned all stock image and media websites. The reason being that all had imagery tagged with 'nude', 'flesh' or 'naked' suggesting pornography (you can still access The Sun, The Star, FHM and many other sites that could contain similar material...not that I do you see...just went on for research...)! As you can imagine this went down like a sack of cack with all the designers who use these websites to buy/share/sell imagery for work (and outside work for that matter). I managed to get them quickly unblocked and received an apology from those concerned in the IT crowd, but it highlighted an increased level of censorship/paranoia amongst the corporate world. I understand risk and security in the modern age, but moderation, investigation and individual merit of usage must be observed...otherwise we may as well be seen as sheep...baa!
Social networking sites have been banned for a while, mainly because people were spending too much time chatting to mates etc. I can sort of understand that, but YouTube's blocking was a bit puzzling. I even explained to the Firewall managers how it is an effective marketing, research and resource tool. The response was that so many people were looking at videos during their lunch hour, that the company's bandwidth limits were being breached...erm...a multi-national with a huge LAN config. can't cope with what can't be that many daily video downloads?! I suspect they just feared people were spending too much time on it and not enough working. As What really got my goat was loosing access to Flickr and Twitter. I wondered how long the later would last as it has little work relevance (and I can still post by phone), but Flickr (loves you)?! Promptly threw my rattle out of my proverbial pram and got access back sharpish.
So, aside from that work has been pretty much all consuming and will continue to be for the next few weeks. I seem to have my fingers in so many pies in this job that I barely have time to take a nibble, let alone a bite. I have some major projects on the go at the moment, as well as juggling the daily design work and branding help desk type stuff. The bureaucracy and politics seems to make my job 10 times harder - on paper a project is simple if executed efficiently and communicated well, but inherent issues such as pricing wars, difficult personalities and lack of value for creative solutions create mountains out of mole hills. I'm sure it's the same in many other companies, but it doesn't make it any less frustrating. Shouldn't grumble though, it the current economic climate I am grateful to have the job I do.
The weekend was fun. We went to stay with Chris and Jen in Littleworth, Oxfordshire again on Saturday. Top night with BBQ, wine, banter and making a fuss of their cute dogs. We bought Chris an huge Cuban Cohiba cigar for his b'day which he loved (he's a member of the exclusive Cigar Club, so it's not quite such a weird pressie) and proceeded to share one from his personal collection. I really enjoyed it, though can't see myself becoming a cigar smoker since I'm barely a smoker of any kind anymore. After cruising back down the A4 we spent Sunday afternoon on Kings Road looking for some bargains (wrong street me thinks), then a chilled Sunday night in as it poured down outside...there had better not be hose-pipe ban this year! At least my window boxes are doing well - the Rocket is rocketing up!
Oh...and we finally got our wedding album after 6 months - we love it and it beings back lots of amazing memories. Not much else - got a new free upgrade K850i phone after threatening to leave my supplier if they didn't give me one (they wouldn't stretch to an N95 - bugger)! In the absence of a radio reception on the tube I have been mostly listening to The Mighty Boosh podcasts - very funny they are too. A great new (to me) book on the go - easy read, so review to come soon. Just got to get through the next few weeks - it's going to be painful, but challenging and hopefully worth a pat on the back at the end (that's the best bonus I can expect in the city at the moment)!
See you later then dear visitor...come back again soon. I'll have some chocolate digestives next time!
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