Matthew Lang avatar

Matthew Lang

Family guy and web developer

First paragraph: Troy

Troy. The most marvellous kingdom in all the world. The Jewel of the Aegean. Glittering Ilium, the city that rose and fell not once but twice. Gatekeeper of traffic in and out of the barbarous east. Kingdom of gold and horses. Fierce nurse of prophets, princes, heroes, warriors and poets. Under the protection of ARES, ARTERMIS, APOLLO and APHRODITE she stood for years as the paragon of all that can be achieved in the arts of war and peace, trade and treaty, love and art, statecraft, piety and civil harmony. When she fell, a hole opened in the human world that may neve be filled, save in memory. Poets must sing the story over and over again, passing it from generation to generation, lest in losing Troy we lost a part of ourselves.

— Troy by Stephen Fry

Can SAAS build a better vaccination system?

Deloitte's system to manage the management of vaccination has come under fire for being unusable and in some cases, even abandoned for paper-based solutions.
Clinic workers in Connecticut, Virginia, and other states say the system is notorious for randomly canceled appointments, unreliable registration, and problems that lock staff out of the dashboard they’re supposed to use to log records. The CDC acknowledges there are multiple flaws it’s working to fix, although it attributes some of the problems to user error.

— What went wrong with America’s $44 million vaccine data system?
This isn't great for any system that is rolled out for the public to use. But the staggering thing for me is that they were awarded the contract on a no-bid basis as they were the only responsible source to build the system. Also, $44 million should get you a website that doesn't get trumped by a paper-based solution.

Imagine for a second if GitHub had the resources to build this, or even Basecamp or Shopify. Not only do they have the experience of websites that are heavily used every day by millions of users, but they also have the knowledge of building for the public. Their websites are used by millions of people every day, and they have to ensure that design changes need to be clear to the people using it.

Could these companies build a better vaccination system?

The open web we let slip through our fingers

With the internet shifting into huge companies’ hands, we’re losing the fight against the open web. Heather Burns reminds us of those times and why it’s down to Generation X to fight for that free open internet once more.

Today’s young tech policy professionals are are, quite rightfully, responding to the only internet in the only world they have ever known. The awful one. The one where the internet was and is a handful of billion-pound companies. The one where the internet has only ever been petrol on a fire. The one where the internet has been essential infrastructure like water and heat, not a thing you had to request and master. The closed internet made for them. Not the open internet I got to make.

— Why Generation X will save the web

Tweetbot 6 is here

Tweetbot 6 is here with support for cards and polls, and a new subscription model of $0.99 per month or $5.99 per year. You don't need to take out the subscription model, but it does limit what you can do. 

The trade-off here is that you can take the subscription out for the app and get a chronological timeline with a few added features or use Twitter's own app, which brings with it its own benefits and drawbacks.

After spending more time than I care to admit on Twitter's own client, I've plumped for the annual subscription for Tweetbot 6. Over time I hope that we'll get to see more features added to Tweetbot. 

NFL Championship heartbreak once again for the Packers

Not the results I wanted last night in each of the Championship games.

Heartbreak for the Packers once again. Starting to wonder if there's ever been a better quarterback than Aaron Rodgers with only a single championship title. Anyway, last night's game seems to be a recurring theme with the Packers when it comes to the big game. It was definitely a game of two halves with the Buccaneers being on top in the first half and the Packers rallying in the second half. However, the Packers offence in the second half couldn't capitalise on those turnovers, and the Buccaneer defence was first class.

In the other game, the Chiefs came out on top over my AFC favourites, the Bills. The Bills have been great to watch this season, and the Allen & Diggs combo is one that I hope provides plenty of playoff opportunities for the Bills over the next few years.
I managed my first walk/run of the year this morning. I ended up splitting the two roughly 50/50. Not bad for a first attempt at running. I'm aiming to run the full distance by the end of February.