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Several of us have iPhones in the office, so one of the guys was asking this morning if we could get an iPhone wallpaper..

So now we have these:


We're still playing around with the positioning etc.,, so if you're an iPhone user please download them and let us know what you think.

Grey version of the wallpaper is below:

We've spoken about the Blacknight mugs a few times in the past and we've had a lot of people asking us about getting their hands on one.

So how can we make everyone happy?

We can't.

But what we have come up with is a silly idea to give away one of the mugs and we'll give away a couple of the Blacknight tshirts as runner up prizes.

So what do you have to do?

Simple really. Write a blog post explaining why we should give you a Blacknight mug

If you don't have a blog or for some reason you feel that your blog's readers won't "get" why you're writing about mugs, then simply post a comment here.

We'll run this until March 24th 2010.

Any questions?

Post a comment and let us know

Click to Play

We're delighted to finally be able to offer Awstats statistics for all our shared Linux based hosting accounts (it's also available for Windows).

If your site is hosted on any of our shared Linux hosting accounts you can now setup Awstats via your control panel

NB: Stats will not be viewable for 24 hours after setup, as the logs will need to be processed first.

We've also made available a screencast showing you how to set it all up in your control panel.

Since I'm a strong believer in making things as easy as possible where I can, you'll also find that our screencasts are available via iTunes as well.

If anyone has any feedback on the screencasts please do let us know.

Since I'm a bit of a coffee addict (as are a lot of our staff) I decided the time had come to upgrade our office coffee machine.

If you recall, we got ourselves quite a nice machine nearly two years ago.

Unfortunately that machine, while excellent in its own right, simply could not cope with our expanded numbers (our staff numbers have gone up quite a bit since we got it).

So I started shopping around for a new machine. Eventually we settled on the Jura Impressa X7. Like the other machine it's "bean to cup". The difference is that the Jura is a lot bigger and can be plumbed in. It also handles capuccino and latte directly ie. no more messing about with steamer nozzles etc.,

The only downside to the new machine is that our office milk consumption has sky rocketed!

Note the tube for the milk on the left of the machine (milk cooler has been ordered):
The coffee we're using at the moment came from Discount Coffee, who offer a good range of coffees at reasonable prices. As you can see in the photo above, the Jura has not one, but two spaces for beans, which means you don't have to refill it as often and you could even try mixing types of coffee if you were adventurous.

So what about mugs?

A few months ago we ordered a batch of mugs from Owen in Mug Revolution. We got mugs for all our own staff and for some clients / friends / partners etc.,

Like so many of these "silly" ideas the feedback has blown me away.

Yes, they are really nice mugs, but I wasn't honestly expecting so many people to be so passionate about them.

One person who got one sent me an email thanking us and, to be perfectly honest, it made it all worthwhile:

Thank You for the great coffee mug!!  It is twice the size of any of our mugs at home, which saves me the back and forth trip when I'm comfortable on the couch watching football. (Only a company run by guys could understand that benefit)

We have a couple of mugs left that we will probably give away in a competition at some point in the next couple of weeks,  but if you want to get your own mug you don't need to wait. Owen, who is a really cool guy, is now offering the Blacknight mug for sale on his site!

If you'd like to find out more about how the mugs are made, then have a look at some of Owen's videos on Youtube. Owen makes really nice mugs, but what's totally captivating from my point of view is his passion for his craft. If you exchange emails with him you'll be impressed with his attitude, but it's only when you actually see him talking about his work that you can get a real feel for it, so I'd recommend you take a minute or two to watch his videos. (And yes - I am a big fan of his work!)

As the ICANN meeting in Nairobi draws to a close several big questions still hang in the air.

While many ICANN insiders may be wondering about new TLDs the world's media is firmly focussed on one topic an one topic only - .xxx.

Tomorrow morning the ICANN board will officially decide what will happen with .xxx.

Will it move forward?

Will they find some way to not take a decision?

I for one will be getting up early tomorrow morning to find out!

In other news, the hosts of the next ICANN meeting, which is scheduled for Brussels, today presented a short video to those attending the current meeting.