My thoughts on the Nexus 7

I’ve been meaning to write a review on the Nexus 7 - 32GB, wifi only - for a few months now, but haven’t gotten round to it until now for two main reasons:

1. I’ve been busy writing.
2. I dropped the first Nexus 7 I bought, broke it and had to wait a few weeks to get a new one.

So firstly, the Nexus 7 isn’t the most durable piece of hardware out there. When I dropped my original device, it was from waist height, and in a protective case. The screen didn’t smash, nor did the body chip, but the battery must have become dislodged, as it had severe power issues afterwards.

That to one side, I’ll keep this fairly short:

Durability

We’ll get this one out of the way first. The Nexus 7 is a VERY delicate piece of hardware. As mentioned above, after a week of owning it I accidentally dropped it on my study floor. It turned off immediately and when it finally powered on, the slightest tap or jolt would power it down instantly. I took it back to the store and got a new device a week later.

Durability is important for most of my devices, as I intend to use them for a long time. But it’s not a major issue here as I only use the Nexus 7 at home or work (as it is wifi only), and don’t intend to carry it around much.

Apart from its lack of shock-proofing, it is a well built and solid feeling device.

Rating – 5/10

Applications

I’ve been careful not to flood the Nexus with useless applications, and have found myself downloading some really cool and frequently used apps as a result.

The Nexus has been criticised by some for merely using apps designed for smartphones and simply up-scaling them to fit the tablet’s screen. I haven’t experienced any issue here and use the same apps on my Sony Xperia S as I do on my Nexus 7.

Here are some essential Nexus 7 apps that I use:

• ·         Evernote

• ·         Widgetsoid

• ·         MX Player (seems to be able to play HD video files that VLC Player can’t)

• ·         OfficeSuite Pro (great for reading and editing text)

• ·         Nova Launcher

• ·         Outlook.com (great email client)

• ·         WordWeb (good dictionary app)

I’m sure I’ll be downloading many more apps in the near future, but so far I’m very happy with what I’ve got.

Rating – 9/10

Audio & Visual

I really like the Nexus 7’s screen. There are rumors of a 1080p Nexus 7 coming soon, but until then, this screen is enough for me. The iPad mini’s screen is apparently sharper, but I’ve not had any issues with glare, lack of colour or quality with the Nexus 7. Colours are vibrant and bright, and when watching high def movies, the detail is still crisp.

The speakers are based at the back of the unit as a single strip, and are fine if you are in a normal indoor environment. The quality is high, but the volume isn’t always loud enough (depending on the output level of the media being played). When I'm watching quiet Youtube videos or movies etc I have a small portable speaker that I plug into the Nexus 7 if the audio being played is too weak, which has happened a few times.

The bonus is that I’ve never experienced audio clipping, the downside is that not all media played through the 7 is loud enough.

Rating – 8/10

Usability

The Nexus 7 is extremely easy to use. As with most Android products, you have the option to keep things as simple as you want, or you can make the device extremely customised.

I’m somewhere in between. I have used the apps Nova Launcher and Widgetsoid to keep everything I need (so far) on one page. All my main apps, twitter, facebook, Youtube, Blogger etc and Dolphin Browser HD are found in the Widgetsoid pull down menu at the top left, and my settings are in the pull down menu in the top right.

My main page holds all my widgets, like weather, google+, feedly, evernote and BBC News headlines. The launcher holds all my other useful apps in folders such as, media, finances, news etc.

Picking this device up and using it from the get-go was no trouble at all.

Rating – 9/10

Conclusion, if you havn't alerady got a tablet, buy a Nexus 7, especially if you have other Android devices which can sync with it. 

GRADE - AWESOME
 

Is Charles Ramsey a hero?

By now we should all know who Charles Ramsey is. He shot to instant fame when he gave an honest and very animated account of his rescue of Amanda Berry; one of four females held captive in the house of Ariel Castro.

Ramsey kicked Castro’s front door in when he heard and saw Amanda Berry trying to escape, after approximately ten years of torturous captivity. It goes without saying that Ramsey’s deeds were nothing short of heroic. His selflessness ended years of rape, forced-imprisonment, physical and mental abuse, and a plethora of horrors we are yet to hear about, and others which we won’t.

The twist came a few days after Ramsey’s live news interview, that he had a criminal past. Ramsey was previously convicted of three separate accounts of domestic abuse against his ex-wife, which resulted in him going to prison, and rightly so.

What I personally find interesting is that up to the few seconds before Ramsey heard Amanda Berry’s cries for help, he was NOT a hero. He was a convicted felon and a former wife beater. But in the moment he put his foot through Ariel Castro’s door, he rose out of that mire and became something more.

What he did was heroic, but I would not call Charles Ramsey a hero. 

Heroes are pure, and good, and constant in their ideals – hence why they are so rare and mainly exist on the screen or in written fiction. Search long and hard enough and you will find stains on almost anything - or anyone.

Charles Ramsey is an anti-hero, and that is by no means a derogatory term. Anti-heroes are flawed, they are broken, they are human, and they are real. 

His past is blemished and his moral principals are likely conflicted. But even though he was once a villain, it should not be forgotten that he did something spectacular this week, something extremely benevolent.

He deserves all of the praise he gets.

Updates and some extra thoughts on writing

First blog post in what seems to be a while, but it’s simply because I’ve been busy with holidays, work and life in general.

The short story originally prepared for April will most likely come out later in the year (or maybe never at all), it just didn't feel ready. The good news is that April’s new short story (although late) will be part one of a three part series, based on an idea I jotted down over 3 years ago.

The words are flowing as well as I could hope, and I’m enjoying writing it. I’ll probably spend the weekend finishing it off and polishing it, so it will be slightly later than expected. But “better late than never” I guess.

Lastly, some profound musings: There are times when I don’t feel like writing, and would much rather do something else – like watch TV, play with my computers, have a few drinks after work, go to the gym etc. But whenever I’m torn between writing, and procrastinating/doing something else, I always regret doing something else, and feel as if I could have been more productive.

But I have not yet once regretted sitting down and writing, even when I didn’t feel like it.

Apart from spending time with my family and girlfriend, there really isn’t anything else that I prioritise as much at this stage when it comes to utilising my free time. And I’m happy that things have turned out that way; as it means I’m taking this seriously.

April's short story will be up soon. Stay tuned.

REPOST: My views on self-publishing (from May 2011)

This is a repost from May 2011. Although we are nearly two years on, I still strongly believe in what I've written here. I hope you find my insight useful:

--------------------------------

I'm still learning about the "phenomenon" of self-publishing, but wanted to say a few things about it regardless.

I was just reading Nathan Bransford's blog post regarding self-published millionaire author Amanda Hocking (who is now published via a traditional house). I'd never heard of her until ten minutes ago, but clearly a lot of people have, most likely tweens; as her books seem to be based on teen romance/fantasy.

Anyway, Amanda has obviously done very well for herself through the self-publishing of her first nine novels, as she has made over $2million from ebook sales alone.

As will be argued, this kind of success is most likely to be the exception and not the rule. I am sure there are many self-published authors out there who have also priced their books at 99c and are making zilch.

But here is the interesting part: people clearly like Amanda's writing, her words strike a chord within them; even though Amanda's words were not what the many agents and publishers she approached (before she began to do it herself) wanted or deemed fit to publish.

Just 5-10 years ago, someone in Amanda's position would have had very few options after the usual rejections from agents and publishers:

1) brush yourself off and start/continue with your next novel in the hope it may be "the one".
2) become dissuaded and abandon all hope of success/publication.

But times have changed, and there is another option available for the unpublished writer: self-publish your work online.

Now, in 2011 we see that in the UK alone annual ebook sales have reached £180m, a 20% rise from the previous year. Despite libraries and bookstores closing down at frightening rates, people are still reading, and they are reading a lot. But the standard medium for the delivery of the words they read is changing; adapting with the ever advancing technology at our disposal.

I have highlighted words for the simple reason that I believe that words are the only thing which matter in all of this. I do believe ebooks will eventually outsell (not eradicate however) the traditional paperback and hardback. Just as online news has decimated the printed-press industry, the same will happen within the next 5-10 years to paper books. The e-media age is upon us.

Similarly, one could look at the demise of the vinyl record caused by the arrival of the now virtually extinct compact disc. And the same about the dominance of mp3s over the CD. The e-media age prevailed yet again, and both vinyl and CD's (along with minidiscs and tape cassettes) are virtually dinosaurs; extinct, rare or dying out.

It seems as if humans are evolving into a species that no longer want to hold physical things. We want the intangible and we want it readily accessible and as cheap as possible. Information (be it audio, text or video) will soon all exist online, held by servers and carried through fibre-optic cables, as opposed to being confined by physical discs or paper.

But as a writer/aspiring author, I am not afraid. For as long as I keep producing words there will always be something to be read. Words are meant to be read, regardless of the format they arrive in, and although I will try the typical agent-->publisher-->physical book route first; my ultimate goal will be to have the words I have spent hundreds of hours writing, read by as many people who deem them readable.


I am a romantic in the sense that I do prefer to read a nice paperback, hopefully untouched by anyone else before me and slightly worn by my own use over time. I also like the feel of books, their weight and texture. I don't make a conscious thought about it whilst I read, but I know I like to actually hold a book.

There is a certain mystic charm within a good printed book that will never be replaced by a Kindle or iPad.

But the following will remain constant regardless of the novel's new format:

The covers will contain pages, the pages will contain paragraphs, the paragraphs will contain sentences, the sentences will contain words and the words (hopefully) will contain enough magic to take you away from wherever you are and straight into the world the author has created.


No matter where we end up, it shouldn’t be forgotten that words are all that matter.

tl;dr :p

March’s Short Story is up!

The short story for March is now live on the website. This one is a bit different from the fairytale vibe of the first two, as is titled Necroleptic.

Like most of my ideas, this one was borne of the simple concept of “what if”? In this instance, what if instead of a person being narcoleptic [i.e. falling asleep and regaining consciousness randomly] they were necroleptic instead [i.e. they died and regained consciousness randomly]?

The story is brief, but could easily be a something I could revisit and explore at length in future (and who knows, maybe I will). It also shares some concepts with the Spirit Broker, in that the place we go to when we die may well be the very place we were before we were conceived.

The next blog post will be my review of the Nexus 7 tablet. I’ve been using it a lot since buying it a few weeks ago and will write up a breakdown of my thoughts so far.

M

February's short story: Lady of the Snow

This shortstory is a tale loosely based on the Japanese legend of Yuki-Onna. I borrowed the name of the story from a Symphony X song (Symphony X are a bad-ass progressive metal band from New Jersey. Check them out…if you like progressive metal).

This is another story based in the realm of New Eden, and after reading through it again I realised that New Eden probably isn’t a great place to live if you’re a guy.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy the story. Feel free to comment on my facebook page or on Twitter.

M