One For The Search Engines – 1st Credit.

February 16, 2008

I had a rather nasty phone call from a debit chasing company the other day, who go by the name of 1st Credit (now for the search engine bit – 08701642049 – 08701 642049).

Turns out I owed some money to a company I purchased a domain name through.

The company had renewed the domain name without telling me and had never bothered to invoice me or ask for any payment at all.

How can you pay for something you didn’t know you owed any money for?

I purchased the domain name from a company called Domainnames GB some years ago, and had no end of hassle with them whenever I wanted to do something with the domain.

Domainnames GB eventually ended up been part of a company called Legend Communications plc who in turn ended up been part of a company called THUS plc.

Are you still following….good…then we’ll continue…

Between all three of these companies I have found it to be more grief than I could ever imagine to get the said domain renewed and eventually transferred with clarification that any requests pertaining to the domain had been completed.

Finally this morning having had the run in with the debt company, I have cleared the debt I didn’t even know I had and finally severed all ties to these domain sellers….I hope!

So back to our friends 1st Credit – It turns out they are a company who buy debts off other companies, and then start DEMANDING payment of those debts via rather nasty phone calls and threatening letters.

Should you ever have to deal with this company, here’s some advice -

When they call you, they will begin asking for private information and they will ask you to go through a security check -

DO NOT give them any information at all, and insist they tell YOU what the call is about.

If they ask you again to go through the security check – Hang up.

You should find a letter will then drop through your door from 1st Credit, which should give a little clarity as to what they are after.

If you have a debt, I would suggest you pay the company you owe and then insist on 1st Credit been informed the debt is clear, and that you then require written confirmation from both parties the debt has been settled.

Be very careful what you tell 1st Credit, as there is a name for companies like them – SCUM!

More Info -

The phone number mentioned at the top of the Blog is the number 1st Credit called me on 08701642049 – 08701 642049 should you serch for it in Google.

A forum discussion at the Money Saving Expert Website regarding 1st Credit.

The moral of the story is -

I have no problem at all paying for something I should pay for as long as I actually know I owe money for it.

All the companies I have mentioned in this post I would NOT recommend.


Full Screen H.264 Flash Video Sample.

February 7, 2008

Fabio Sonnati, the Italian Flash Video specialist has posted a sample of video encoded at just 500kb/sec.

What’s so good about that you may be wondering, well it shows the capabilities of what can be achieved by the H.264 Codec at such a low encoding rate.

I think you can safely say the results are very impressive, it also plays in full screen just by double clicking on the video.

Fabio has also just published the Flash Video Factory Blog, unfortunately it’s written in his native Italian, so unless you can speak and read Italian, you’ll need to find a translator before you take a look!

Full Screen H.264 Flash Video Sample.


Mike Peters / The Alarm Gathering – 2008.

February 7, 2008

On a cold and windy weekend in January, I attended my ninth Mike Peters annual Gathering in Llandudno, North Wales.

To the un-initiated Mike Peters is the front man of the band The Alarm.

The Alarm were my boyhood heroes during my teenage years, and they produced some great music including classics such as -

Where Were You Hiding When The Storm Broke?
68 Guns.
Blaze Of Glory.

The Gathering is split into two performances over two nights and sells out every year, with people attending from all over the globe.

On the Friday night, Mike does a solo acoustic performance on a stage set in the middle of the arena, and on the Saturday night it is a full on band performance on the main stage.

Where else for about £30.00 are you going to get over five hours of great live music for that sort of money?

Detailed below are the set lists performed at the two gigs, played over the weekend.

THE GATHERING 2008 25/26th JANUARY 2008,
The Arena, Venue Cymru, Llandudno, N Wales

The Ultimate Alarm Weekend

Seventy Two songs of Love Hope and Strength

FRI ACOUSTIC SET [MIKE PETERS]

LOVE HOPE & STRENGTH
UNSAFE BUILDING
SHOUT TO THE DEVIL
REASON 41
FOR FREEDOM
ACROSS THE BORDER
TELL ME
WHAT KIND OF HELL
SECOND GENERATION
DAWN CHORUS
ONLY THE THUNDER
WALK FOREVER BY MY SIDE
MAJORITY
HALLOWED GROUND
SHELTER
PERMANENCE IN CHANGE
PRESENCE OF LOVE
EYE OF THE HURRICANE
THE ROCK
LOVE DON’T COME EASY
CHANGE II
NO FRONTIERS B HARP
HOW THE MIGHTY FALL
CORRIDORS OF POWER
A NEW SOUTH WALES
THE WIND BLOWS AWAY MY WORDS
MOMENTS IN TIME
MARCHING ON
WHERE WERE YOU HIDING?
SIXTY EIGHT GUNS
ABSOLUTE REALITY
BLAZE OF GLORY
MOMENTS IN TIME[REPRISE]

Set Length 2:15 [33 SONGS]

SAT ELECTRIC SET [THE ALARM MMVIII]

THE OPENING
THREE SEVENS CLASH
WHERE WERE YOU HIDING WHEN THE STORM BROKE?
MY TOWN
FIGHTBACK
ABSOLUTE REALITY
THE ALARM CALLING
THE DECEIVER
WAR SONG
I NEVER LEFT I ONLY WENT AWAY
CEASE AND DESIST
HIGHER CALL
BLAZE OF GLORY
ACOUSTIC STAGE[In the middle of the venue!!!]
BREATHE
RIGHT BACK WHERE I STARTED FROM
CLOSE
21ST CENTURY
ELECTRIC STAGE
ONE STEP CLOSER TO HOME
KNIFE EDGE
SOLD ME DOWN THE RIVER
DRUNK AND DISORDERLY
TRAFFICKING
SUPERCHANNEL
STRENGTH
RAIN IN THE SUMMERTIME
WITHOUT A FIGHT
RESCUE ME
SIXTY EIGHT GUNS

ENCORE 1
DEESIDE
THE STAND[INC.THE CHANT HAS JUST BEGUN]
MARCHING ON

ENCORE 2
45 RPM
NEW ROSE
BOREDOM
GOD SAVE THE QUEEN
SHEENA IS A PUNK ROCKER
45 RPM [REPRISE]
SPIRIT OF ‘76
LOVE HOPE STRENGTH

Set length: 3 Hours [39 SONGS]

Mike Peters / The Alarm Gathering - 2008 Ticket Stub.


Apple Mac Pro Rig.

February 3, 2008

Here is a picture of the rig I have recently put together to take my learning and work upto the next level.

I ditched Windows and moved to Mac in order to be able to work on more video based projects.

The rig consists of the following -

1 x Mac Pro with following spec -

750GB Serial ATA 3GB/s Drive @ 7200.

350GB Serial ATA 3GB/s Drive @ 7200.

2 x 3.0 Ghz Quad Core Intel Xeon Processors.

2 x 16x SuperDrive DL (DVD+R / DL / DVDRW / CD-RW)

ATI Radion x1900 XT 512MB SDRAM.

6GB Ram.

2 x Dell Ultrasharp 2407WFP-HC 24″ Widescreen LCD Monitors.

1 x Harman Kardon Soundsticks II Speakers.

Mac Pro Set Up.