It was as inevitable as the tides really…

I had seen the babble, I had sat through the full Keynote address. I had sat there and wondered why it had taken until now for such a wondrous device to enter the market.

Yes. in summary, I bought an iPad.

Now, I am aware that depending upon how you view these sorts of things I am either a slave to the evil overlord known simply as, “Jobs” or I am a righteous carrier of the noble torch of Apple. Frankly, I’m not bothered what form your zealotry takes. The fact alone that this particular product inspires such feelings is testament to the level of importance that has been heaped upon it. The question is, how good is it?

The answer is very, provided you can do without certain features of a regular computer.

As a piece of technical wizardry that frankly would’ve got you burned as a witch as little as five years ago, it’s ridiculously clever. I’ve had enough time to play with the thing now to know that the email client is solid, the browser (albeit without Flash support following the lovers tiff between Apple and Adobe) is super tight and the general feel of the OS and what it could potentially do is very strong. With access to the app store and the treasure trove of possibilities that lie within it’s impossible to put the damn thing down at times and get on with your regular life.

The biggest surprise for me is the touch keyboard. I expected it to be a bit naff but you can absolutely fly along with the thing. I work with a computer most of every day so I can rattle along on a keyboard but this is something else. With not much practise at all you can easily surpass whatever your average typing speed is on a regular keyboard. I dont know how much of this is the fact you’re not actually pressing keys down mechanically or the in line spelling correction but whatever mix of the two it is it’s a triumph.

I’ve also had time to mix down a few tv shows and movies from other digital sources and I have to say that I am pretty impressed with the result. The h.264 support is a no brainer and the iPad will happily play back .mp4 and .m4v files with no complaints. I used handbrake on the iMac to mix down an episode of Lost from the original HD source and I am pleased to report that the result was fine for watching on a small screen. The iPad has a screen resolution of 1024 x 768, so if you want to maintain the aspect ration on, say a 720p video source, you’ll want to mix down to 1024 x 576. I modified the Apple TV preset to achieve this which seemed to be the easiest way to manage what I was after.

I would say that the boys at Apple haven’t been exaggerating on the battery life either. I’ve really been tanking the thing over the last few days and it’s not let me down yet. Admittedly I haven’t tried sitting around and watching movies for ten hours straight but I reckon that if you did, the battery would keep up with you.

So, you may be wondering where the faults are? What could possibly be wrong with such a magnificent machine?

Well, possibly the most obvious one would be multitasking. The iPad OS isn’t really built to do this effectively. I strongly suspect that there are more than enough horses under the bonnet to run multiple apps so this may be something that rolls around in the future. Certain combinations can be achieved, I am for example playing music whilst typing this but these combinations are chosen for you, rather than you choosing them. For those of you used to running several applications all at once and doing 12 things at once, this may initially mean that the iPad experience feels a little restrictive.

Secondly, there’s the fact that you know full well that in 18 months or so there will be an iPad “superdooper” that will have a camera, probably be 4g compatible, have a couple of other bits and leave you pining for a nice shiny new toy. That will be off-putting for some.

Thirdly, there are some really odd omissions, such as the lack of printer support and the frankly retarded file support system which is reliant on an iTunes back end that probably wasn’t written with anything like this in mind.

However, I would still punch anyone square in the face who can pick one of these up, spend 20 minutes or so tinkering and not want one. Why? Simple. We are in the presence of a seminal shift in how we interact with technology and the iPad is the first step on a road to an entirely new way of computing at home. Who wouldn’t want to be part of a group that took the first step?

I suspect that the branch of computing that we are about to unleash on the world will be limited only by our imagination and will draw a far more inclusive audience than ever before. The only thing that upsets me about this is that I’ve now got a lot less reasons to sit down in front of the iMac these days…

I know. . .  Compared to the impending General Election and the increasingly fraught end to the Premier League season, this is hardly in a similar league. However, I can honestly say with hindsight that I wish I’d have known more about this and had abetter understanding of relative risk as a younger man. Let this be a salutary lesson to you all. . .

For those of you who are sat there thinking, “What is this Income Protection thingy?”, I would say it’s probably better to go here first, then come back and carry on reading. For everyone else, let’s get started.

For lots of reasons I am a bit of an ‘emotional retard’. Having my father pass away when I was eleven effectively removed both the (relative) financial security of my family and my only male role model. Both were pretty tough to do without and this came back to bit me in the arse in my Twenties.

Effectively due to a series of events, much of which were within my control and I had chosen to ignore, I ended up in a rather invidious position at work. I shall spare you the precise details that had led to my predicament but, suffice to say, I was screwed.

In summary, I needed to work to keep the money coming in to keep my now deep depression away through a combination of commercialism and booze. However, just being at work was becoming a Herculean challenge. Something was always going to break. In the end, it was my head that broke first.

This, my friends, is where the bit about me loving Income Protection comes in. The sad thing is, I love it now knowing the value it could’ve had to me rather than the benefit it was as at this time I did not have a policy.

I was in some ways very, very lucky. I was working at the time for an employer with a very generous sickpay policy and I was entitled to six months full pay. The ugly truth was though that I was in a bad way. I was on a very high dose of a charming little drug known as Sertraline. If you would like to know more about these drugs and their recent record, I can highly recommend spending some time over on the Bad Science site as authored by Ben Goldacre. Surprisingly I wasn’t feeling much better (only funny if you’ve examined the earlier links) and I was rapidly approaching the end of my full sick pay. My debt pile meant going on half pay would spell my doom. My broken mind meant that going back to work would also spell my doom. I knew that I needed help and approached the NHS for additional services. This would eventually turn out to be one of the smartest things I have done to date as counselling would eventually be the answer. However, that was five months and a whole waiting list away yet.

So, what did I end up doing for the next five months? How did I get out of this predicament? The truth is, I didn’t. I took a demotion and went back to work in a diminished capacity but it wasn’t enough. The years of trying to spend myself happy had finally come home to roost and I ended up effectively ending my financial freedom by moving back home and entering into an Individual Voluntary Arrangement – something that I am tied to even now. In addition, being back at work was a really bad idea no matter how financially necessary it was. The drugs were messing me up. I slept for hours a day but rarely restfully. I had no desire or passion for human interaction. I became more withdrawn and if anything less human. Alright I was no longer in the depths of depression but this zombie like “inbetween” state was, if anything, worse. At least when you’re upset you feel something. I felt nothing. It was weird. My reputation and career path with my former employer was terminally damaged.

At this point you’re probably hoping that I plan on getting to the point some time this week. Fortunately, that point has been reached! With a suitable Income Protection policy I would’ve been infinitely better off both then and now. Let me explain why.

How does Income Protection fix this mess?

• It pays you money when you can’t work.

Apologies if this over-simplifies the matter but this is exactly what Income Protection is designed to do. In particular, plans with an “own occupation” definition mean that you only have to demonstrate that you are unable to fulfil the material duties of your own job in order to trigger a valid claim. I could’ve set up a plan to start paying out after six months to coincide with the end of my company sick pay. This would’ve given me the huge advantage of concentrating on getting better, rather than trying to juggle my health with the needs of my employer and my creditors. I simply cannot overstate how much of a difference this would’ve made.

• It doesn’t matter what’s keeping you off work.

Some of you may be sat there right now with a rather smug grin, stroking your ASU plan or your Critical Illness plan and thinking – “I’m alright jack.” I’m afraid not. The two most common claims made against Income Protection policies are for ‘Mental / Nervous Function Disorders’ or ‘Musculo-Skeletal’ problems. Neither of which are covered by either of the two aforementioned types of cover. Income Protection is unique and should not be confused with any other type of plan.

• If you try to do the right thing and it doesn’t work out – you’re still covered.

Many Income Protection plans come with very handy features like Relapse Benefit or Proportionate Benefit. When you are recovering from an illness like depression, one of the things you strive for is a return to normality. In fact, there are many positive health benefits of being able to resume a normal life. The renewal of your status as an employed person can do wonders for your self esteem. As a consequence, it’s not unusual for people to rush their return to work in a quest to reinstate normality. Sometimes, this works out fine. Other times, you end up worse as a consequence. What Relapse Benefit does is resume your payment straight away if you end up off work again with the same problem. This can be one of the areas in which you can find the real value of a policy. Some may only ‘link’ your time off work if you’re off again within six months. Others within a year. Some may restrict the number of successive claims you can make. Other policies will have no such restriction.

Equally in the quest to resume a normal life, many people will look to get back to work doing something. It may be that they phase their return over a period of time and build back up to full time hours. It may be that (like me) people go back to work in a diminished capacity and therefore with a reduced earnings capacity. Proportionate benefit makes a payment to you in these circumstances to effectively “top you up” to whatever the maximum you could claim for was, making sure that you are no worse off for going back to work.

• It buys you time to sort yourself out.

What this all boils down to is time and your own health. In the end, once I had the chance to attend counselling, some eleven months or so after I first had time off work with depression, I was really properly ready to return to work. Sadly I had been forced through my own circumstances to try and maintain gainful employment throughout this period and the end result was that I had to leave the company that I had worked for those last eight years. I was very lucky to find another good employer and I have since gone on to re-establish my career and more importantly my life on a much sounder footing. Many in my situation don’t get that lucky. With Income Protection, I would’ve had the piece of mind of knowing that, if necessary until my retirement age, that money would continue to come in and I could concentrate on nothing other than getting better.

This all sounds rather fabulous and necessary. Where do I get one of these?

Fortunately for you, Income Protection is widely available in the UK. However, like lots of things that are ‘widely available’ there are subtle differences between one product and another. With anything like this, I would always recommend seeking impartial Financial Advice. If you already have a relationship with a Financial Adviser, make contact with them and ask them about Income Protection. If not, don’t worry. There’s more of them around than you would think and it’s very easy to get hold of one. As a starter, you could head over here and see how many are operating in your area right now.

What I would urge you to do though is take action. Whilst my story is potentially avoidable, it may surprise you how many people are suffering right now. Mind estimate 1 in 10 adults will suffer with long term depression at some stage in their adult life. With the benefit of hindsight I can truly now say that I would much rather have had Income Protection and not needed it, than need it like I did and not have it.

“Just tried a mounted print out in a frame,really getting excited now! A1 prints look cool.”

has been the sort of unassuming Tweet I’ve been seeing from Jon Shackleton recently. Unassuming because what this chap has had the drive and determination to achieve recently has been nothing short of remarkable.

I’ve known Jon for a couple of years now and I’m sure that he would be the first to say that his love of photography has been a big part of his life. It has certainly got him very well acquainted with his adopted home of Manchester (his moniker of TdM being short for Tourista De Mancunia) and has opened doors for him that he probably wasn’t expecting!

Jon has developed an excellent eye for a genre of photography known as ‘Light Painting’. In essence, an atypical scene is lit with theatrical gels to form the basis of a moment in which Photography definitely swings towards the ‘Art’ end of it’s constant oscillation between ‘Art’ and ‘Science’. Expect to see industrial equipment, abandoned buildings and Communist Statue parks all given the light painting treatment as part of this exhibition.

I’ll be there for the opening night on Sunday 11th October (where another highly talented acquaintance in Air Adam will be massaging our ears with a DJ set) at Font Bar on New Wakefield street in Manchester. However, don’t despair if you can’t make the opening as the next three months give you ample opportunity to get along and move, “Into the Night”.

I’ve had a decent run on photography recently and have been helping the chaps over at the City Warehouse Apartment Hotel get the images on their website up to scratch.

With a brief of accuracy and honesty they let me loose on a few of the rooms to give them images to use to help prospective visitors get an insight into what they’ll find when they get there. I have to say that I did find the place to be very tastefully decorated and finished to a standard higher than you would expect.

Clearly I was here to work, rather than to stay so I’m not going to launch into raptures over the comfort, the space or the service as that simply wouldn’t be fair but as first impressions go – I’m quite impressed.

If you’re looking for somewhere to stay in the centre of Manchester, I think there is a new destination you can add to your list. Visit the chaps over at http://www.citywarehouseapartments.com and have a look for yourself.

ED

I have to say that my time with the Festival was a full blown, seat of the pants, thrill ride from start to finish. To say that I loved it is just too much of an understatement for words!

I have occasionally got involved in charity fundraising projects in the past but I have to say that I may have had some pre – conceived ideas about what a volunteer workforce would be like that I am now rather ashamed of. The ambition of the Festival demanded a small army of 300 or so volunteers in order to make it happen and I can honestly say that I would be honoured to have this quality of workforce in any FTSE 100 listed company. Stuff just got done. It’s that simple!

As a photographer for the Festival my interactions with a lot of the volunteers were sadly quite minimal but the number of times in conversation I would hear visitors commenting on and praising the staff for their professionalism was simply too often to be coincidental.

Personally I was exposed to opportunities that I doubt I’d have got anywhere near otherwise and I’d like to think that in the main, I was able to deliver what I set out to achieve. have a flick through the photos and see what you think. They are held in the Gallery section of the main Festival site.

Missing It Already . . .

Well this is all very exciting!

Much to my delight I was recently accepted to be a photographer for the upcoming Manchester International Festival. This was a huge opportunity for me and , even though I do say so myself, a little unexpected. After all, little old me working on a project like this? Heady times indeed.

Still, what it did demonstrate is that sometimes even a mug with a portfolio gets lucky!

Even better than finding out this news however was finding out that I get another look at the Great Hall in Manchester Town hall tomorrow. MIF are hosting a volunteer event there for a couple of hours in the evening in a ‘meet and greet’ sense.Not only will the opportunity to meet all the wonderful people who are volunteering be great but the setting is truly magnificent.

The Great Hall does have to be seen to be believed. It’s a tremendous example of Neo – Gothic architecture (as is all of Manchester Town Hall) and the Ford Madox Brown Murals tell a magnificent story of the origins of Manchester. So, if you are a MIF volunteer I’ll see you there!

ED