rwillett

I just heard Angry on Planet Rock and thought that it sounded like the Stones and lo and behold it was. I liked it, I liked it enough to think about buying it. I still might. I'm firmly in the camp of carryin on as long as you want and if there are people who want to listen to you, fair game. Doesn't John Paul Jones play in his local pub on a Sunday afternoon and invite people to play with him? Good for him. If people don;t like them, fine, they are playing because they like it, none of the remaining members of the Stones need the money, I suspect The Glimmer Twins are richer than some countries, but as far as I can work out, they've earnt it. I thought they did pause when Charlie went, at least for a few days? I have to say I actually shed a tear as I liked Charlies playing, and he appeared to be a class act. Anyway, if you don;t like them, ignore them, I have managed to ignore BTS for all their performing life, I suspect other people can manage to ignore the Stones. RIP Charlie Rob

Baba O'Riley/The Who/Planet Rock

So that lovely looking base actually cost 2 x £879. I’m assuming you treated your lovely wife to a spa experience costing the same? 😉 Good strategy though. My last purchase involves taking a cheap guitar in an Ibanez bag in the car and somehow , no idea how, it transformed into a Fender Mustang by the time it came back on Sunday. The colours of each guitar were very similar so I know that it was the original guitar, just mysteriously upgraded. I’m a simple man at heart so am assuming a religious conversion. I’ve never heard of Reverend Guitars but I’m about three hours from Glasgow (and two from Leeds) so may pop up there to check it out. I wonder if lightning strikes twice? Perhaps it was the cheap Ibanez bag, I should test this theory out. Anyway lovely looking guitar. Rob

Phew, I'm glad you got those ads as well, I thought my secret was out <phew>

Mmmm…..

I think it's a stunning guitar. I think having high standards is great, and it's a credit to you that you want to work to those levels. However don't pull yourself down on that work of art though. I have no idea what the costs of the parts are, but stribgly suspect that the hours you have put into it easily exceed those costs. I'd put it up for sale and see if you can get more for the guitar than the cost of parts. If you have a figure in mind PM me (I make no promises). I can't play a five string, never tried, can't really play a four string either, if I'm being honest but it would such a shame for something like that to get broken up for basically scrap value. All the best Rob

It certainly beats the naff letter rack I made in wood working class for my mum's birthday when I was about 12. Only four bits of wood and none of them lined up or were jointed properly. She still keeps the bloody thing. I look at people who can work wood like this with awe and insane jealously. I was quite competent as a C developer, yet nothing I do, no matter how clever or elegant the code is, no matter what brilliant tricks I perform with pointers, no matter the really nifty way I handle interrupts on a disk driver in the kernel, will ever look as nice as that woodwork. It's simply not fair 😢 Rob

Nah. The head is still in the right place. It has an appropriate number of strings that are also in the right place. It doesn’t look like it’s been used as a hammer or that a hacksaw has been used to ‘improve’ it. There are no random holes to indicate the number of attempts to drill something. Now of course, this could the sacrificial guitar, the ‘before’ before the after.

I wonder if this is based on your IP address? Thats the normal way to *try* and work where people are. This fails miserably for stuff like AOL who are all out of Virginia. If you go to this website https://nordvpn.com/what-is-my-ip/ it displays where it thinks you are. This is where it thinks I am. Its out by around 30 miles but at least it's in the right country. Since your IP address is sent out with every http request, its not sensitive information and will be in the logs anyway. Might be worth checking, There are lots of websites that do this sort of stuff. Rob

Andoid phone now posted off.

John, I have replied and will keep looking. Thanks rob

First of all thank you for the comprehensive update. Thats very helpful. I think what you are doing is the right approach as well. I wasn't aware of this test, not sure I should be at all to be honest, but it appears other people have been scared by it. I like the idea of advertising for lurkers, I also like the idea of paying supporters not having some of the ads. I recognise the challenges that you face financially, its a tough environment. Thats why I became a paid supporter. It would be good to know which cookiers are needed and which are not. Most people (including myself) have no issues with necessary cookies, but I am wary of the trackers that accompany Google and Facebook. Facebook has too much information about people already. My personal view is that the more comms the better. However other people might have other views. I am more reassured now and will follow this with interest, Rob

I don't get any popup ads on either Firefox on Mac or Safari on iPhone. I have all sorts of extensions to block stuff though as I detest all the trackers and cookies. Stringly suggest adding in various things like Privacy Badger, Ghostery, AdBlock and going through your privacy settings to kill any leaks of information you can. I stopped using Chrome a few years ago, Firefox works very well except for development and a few websites. Safari is pretty good but not as good yet. Apple does appear to block a lot of stuff in Safari anyway. YMMV Rob

My warnings in English I’m also not getting it each time I use Basschat. Given I support Basschat as a subscriber I don’t like that. I would have hoped my payment would have avoided this sort of tracking for us all. Dead easy for next year, I won’t support the site financially. Actions have consequences. Rob

These are the trackers that Safari on an iPhone is blocking for basschat. c

It appears that you no longer have the right to opt out of cookies under UK law. This changed last year 2022 as part of the Government drive to liberalise the internet. This liberalisation appears to only benefit people who collect data on you. It doesn’t help you. The exception to this is when websites collect information from children. I cannot recall what information is requested on signing up. However since the ICO does absolutely nothing to enforce cookie compliance under UK law, the law is mostly disregarded. It appears that in the UK the inability to opt out is legal. However in the EU, users must explicitly opt in to cookies. The exact opposite of the UK. This means the cookie is illegal for EU users as it gives no ability to use this site without denying non essential cookies. The EU and local states do take personal information and cookies seriously so any complaint might be looked at. I might try and look at the site from a European based VPN and see what it looks like. I’ll also look at what extensions are available to clear and kill cookies. Poisoning the well is the other option. think of it as yet another Brexit dividend. Rob

No longer for sale. Not sure if it’s sold or withdrawn

This is an old Android phone, a Nexus 5 LG-821 in black. It was the flagship Google phone (at the time) Specs are here https://www.lg.com/uk/mobile-phones/smartphones/lgd821/ It was actually a nice phone when it came out with a reasonable camera. I used it for Android development but it only supports up to Android 6 which is quite old. However it is a servicable phone, just don't expect it to run your latest VR games. As a burner phone, or one you can take abroad and don't mind it getting nicked, or a free one for the kids who keep dropping theirs, its great. It's in realy good condition, no scratches and has been in a case from new. The case is included but it's getting on a bit (somewhat like me). It's free and I'll even post it for free. I'll reset it to factory settings before you get it. After than it's up to you Thanks Rob

It’s always good to check out as many basses as you can. It’s a sign of an organised and inquisitive mind. Even though you might have a small number of basses (perhaps less than 25), one more might just provide that extra oomph or subtle tone that you’ve been looking for. At least that’s my rationale and I only have four. I have to say the Mustang might be good enough for anything I might ever do, but that doesn’t stop me looking and testing and checking the credit card “just-in-case”. I’m lucky that I live an hour each way from my local music shops Promenade Music in Morecombe. If I still lived in London, I’d probably be bankrupt. I can’t even play that well but you know how it is…. Rob

Wow. What a wonderful guitar.

Has anybody managed to get their mod_dwarf providing digital input into something like GarageBand on an iPad. Looked at this page https://wiki.mod.audio/wiki/Audio_Through_USB#Using_USB_Audio_Gadget and added the appropriate files via ssh. I resisted the temptation to wander up and down the file system seeing what was there Rebooted etc. I used the same USB cable (USB-B in the Mod Dwarf to USB-A on the iPad via a USB Apple Camera Adaptor that I used for the ssh connection, so I know that the cable works) to connect the MD to the iPad. Can't see any connection there, if I replace the USB connection with an iRIG, Garageband notes that it is there. I can feed the Mod_Dwarf output into the iRig and feed that into the iPad and that works, but that adds yet another D->A and then A->D conversion. I've done the update on the mod_dwarf twice just to check and got the same result each time. If anybody has done this, be grateful to know. Thanks Rob

I'm not sure what I can say about Mick that hasn't been said before. Just brought a Ritter Gig Bag off him. Slightly annoyed with him as I think he undersold it and he should have charged me more Great bloke to work with, no issues whatsover. Looking forward to sharing a coffee with him Rob