Damien Mulley

Press release from eircom. 100 more exchanges to be enabled. Wimax in 5 urban areas to address line failures on existing exchanges and Setanta sports for all eircom broadband customers.

120k more people to get broadband through the upgrading of 100 exchanges and roll-out of WiMax. Free Setanta Sports via broadband for all eircom customers too.

An additional 100 telephone exchanges in communities across the country will be DSL enabled. The exchanges are located in all 26 counties and this further investment will be completed during 2007.

Furthermore, eircom is committing to take all broadband orders placed within the five urban centres of Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Waterford and Galway. In total, 120,000 extra telephone lines will now be able to support broadband due to these initiatives.

To help achieve this target, eircom will commence the rollout of WiMax technology during 2007 to overcome difficulties that arise when providing broadband over some telephone lines. WiMax will be used to supplement existing DSL service in these five major urban centres. The introduction of WiMax will ensure all potential customers will be able to receive broadband. Today’s announcement follows extensive WiMax trials that have been conducted by eircom in locations across Ireland during the past year.

I’m off to find out more information.

Update:
Wimax is only available after you place a “broadband” order with eircom. Rollout from Jan 2007. You can’t apply directly for this product. There will be an install fee. Prices will be same as DSL. Speeds not announced yet. Setanta is available to existing and new customers from Jan 2007.

List of Exchanges to be enabled in next year:
Cavan
Kilnaleck
Mullagh
Killeshandra

Clare
Clonlara
Tiermaclane
Milltown Abbey

Cork
Whitegate
Castlemartyr
Leap
Cloyne
Balineen
Ballyclough
Kildorrery
Ballygarvan
Timoleague
Ballinaclashet
Kilworth
Doneraile
Lombardstown

Donegal
Raphoe
Carrigart
Convoy
Mountcharles
Muff
Fahan
Greencastle
Quigleys Point
Kilmacrenan
Killygordon

Dublin
Garristown

Galway
Turloughmore
Dunmore
Rosscahill
Monivea
Kinvara

Kerry
Lixnau

Kildare
Carbury
Nurney

Kilkenny
Kilmacow
Knocktopher
Goresbridge
Mullinavat
Freshford

Letterkenny
Manorcunningham

Limerick
Rathkeale
Patrickswell
Pallaskenry
Cratloe
Cappamore
Glin

Laois
Rathdowney
Durrow
Ballylinan

Longford
Ballymahon

Mayo
Balla
Kilkelly
Louisburgh
Ballindine
Shrule
Newport
Charlestown

Meath
Summerhill
Wilkinstown
Julianstown
Nobber
Balrath

Monaghan
Inniskeen

Offaly
Rhode
Kilcormac

Portlaoise
Ballybrittas

Roscommon
Frenchpark

Sligo
Castlegarren
Cliffony

Tipperary
Kilsheelin
Borrisoleigh
Dundrum
Ardfinnan
Newcastle

Wicklow
Roundwood
Glendalough
Dunlavin

Wexford
Ferns
Ballynabola
Camolin
Killurin
Fethard
Castlebridge
Ballywilliam
Broadway
Killinick
Duncormick

Westmeath
Killucan
Castlepollard
Tyrrellspass

Waterford
Annestown
Ardmore
Aglish

This is the kind of bath mat I’d like.

Imagine sticking your elbow through a Picasso. A bumbling but very rich eejit did just that.

This is great. Via Steven – Baby Got Book. Warning. NSFA. Not safe for atheists.

Via Metafilter is Witness. Founded by Peter Gabriel, Witness is a human rights org that trains local groups to use video in their human rights advocacy campaigns. They then also help get the footage to media outlets and other groups. Their tagline is “See it, film it, change it.” Nice.

On the otherhand the Times says the EU wants to control and regulate video bloggers. Possibly even those that stick YouTube vids on their site. This “Television without Frontiers” idea seems to me to be a way of EU bods and regulators to get new business when their existing business of regulating traditional telco markets starts to dwindle. Still here in Ireland the telco landscape is so bad that there’s plenty of work left for the regulator.

Vids:
Oldie but a goodie. Aphex Twin – On. This was my first introduction to Aphex Twin. Long before he did Come to Daddy.

Now this is the very definition of fluffy. “Shoes” by Kelly. It has it all. Tacky, plasticy, expletives, catchy awful music, dudes in dresses doing bad impressions of women and shoes:

Continuing the daily posts this week about Sepultura is the first release from Roots is this song “Roots Bloody Roots”. This album had a lot of brazilian music on it and the video shows some traditional brazlian martial arts/dancing. This was also the last album with Max Cavelera. He went on to form Soulfly which wasn’t a bad band but no Sep.

Go here. Use this code: 44593

Free tickets for Dublin, Galway, Cork and Limerick.

This was an “acoustic” song from the album “Chaos AD”. The name comes from the name of the Kaiowas tribe, an Amazonian tribe that lived in the rainforest until the Brazilian government arrived and took their lands. They were pretty much put into internment camps and to protest many of them committeed suicide. From 1985 to 1999, over 300 of the tribe killed themselves. This song was Sepultura’s tribute to them. The song on the album was recorded live in Chepstow Castle inWales and you can hear the seagulls squawking in the background on the track on the album. This video was filmed at the Brazilian MTV Video Music Awards. Max Cavalera had left the band by then.

TCAL has a YouTube of kids covering Sepultura‘s Refuse Resist. That’s one of my favourite Sepultura songs. This is the video for the original Refuse Resist. I saw a quick clip for this on MTV years and years ago. It was around 4pm and there was an ad for the new album Chaos AD and the vid for Refuse Resist. I was hooked right then. I found the album later on in Comet records and really liked it. To me it was heavy metal without the macho bullshit, just hippy menality bullshit.

Good movie. Compared to the current offerings out there. Good acting, not great. Was kind of slow. I can’t see why Oscars should be dished out for this. Are things that bad? Some dialog was good. If you’ve not watched any movie from Japan or Korea in the past 15 years you might even find it refreshing. Tension, what tension? They could have done more with the girlfriend angle. Mark Wahlberg’s character was just useless. Full of twists and turns? Arse. There were more on my drive home from the cinema. I’ve seen far better “gangster” movies than this I must say. Scorsese has not regained his touch. I couldn’t figure out was DiCaprio troubled or constipated in the movie. I need to go watch Infernal Affairs which I hear is better, which is how these things usually go.

Believe it or not this bunch of miscreants are my favourite band. No superb lyrics, no fantastic music or haunting voices. Smokey guitars detuned and punched into cheap speakers is what some probably think of their music as. Back when I was a Guns N’ Roses fan I saw Axl Rose wear a cap with in the video for “The Garden” with Ministry on it. I think I was mistaken but I had heard of the name and damn I liked them. This track here has them sample a George Original Bush speech on the “New World Order” and the video has them use footage from the L.A. Riots. These boys were the original mashup artistes. Funny that these guys started off as a kind of early depeche mode. Synthtastic.

Here’s a brilliant mashup of the Hellsing Anime and the song “Just One Fix” from Ministry.

Here’s “The Garden” by Guns N’ Roses: