Back in 1982 I arrived in Porthcurno, Cornwall, fresh out of college and wet behind the ears. The attraction of Porthcurno? Apart from the fantastic beach, gorgeous blue water and weather, it was a remote Cable & Wireless out-station were people from all around the world came to learn about all sorts of communication equipment.

Well Porthcurno has just been awarded a great accolade – it’s one of Britain’s top ten beaches. But there’s more to Porthcurno than that.

Cliff-side theatre

Aside from the fantastic beach, there is the intriguing Minack Theatre which was built in to the cliffs by Rowena Cade in the 1930s. Whilst not being a mainstream theatre-goer, I recommend everyone attends at least one play there for the atmosphere. There’s nothing like watching HMS Pinafore with the wind in your hair and the Atlantic Ocean for a backdrop – no other theatre comes close.

Communications galore

The Cable & Wireless training college is now long gone, but before it was established as a place of learning it was one of the most important places in the world – so important that it was heavily defended during World War II.

Porthcurno, or PK as it was more commonly known in the communications world, was were many of Britain’s communications cables slipped down the beach, in to the ocean, and off to all corners of the world. Porthcurno was the centre of the Victorian Internet.

The sands shift nightly on the beach and often reveal their secret, armour plated submarine cables that will, at one time, have linked Britain with every continent on the planet. But it doesn’t stop there, about a quarter of a mile north of the beach is the Porthcurno Telegraph museum.

The museum traces the history of communications in this remote part of the United Kingdom and is a fascinating visit for the whole family.

Porthcurno – one of my top locations in England

Cornwall holds a special place in my memories. It is a special place and I suggest you book your trip now.

I went out to day to spend about £300 on a new bridge camera that could shoot HD movies as well as take really decent photographs. I’d researched my market, got prices from Internet retailers, so went armed with all the facts. However, I was prepared to pay a little bit extra on the basis that I’d be able to try out the camera in the shop before I bought it. I think this fair doos, they’re charging more than the Internet retailers so they’ve got to put a little effort in to the sale.

So, first stop, Comet in Aintree. I spotted my preferred camera and very nicely asked if I could have a cloer look at the camera and see it in action. I could see it, I was told, it’s there on the shelf – but I couldn’t see it in action because Comet has a policy of not keeping batteries charged. The staff are not allowed to demonstrate cameras I was later told by the manager when I complained. So why did they want to charge me an extra £50 over the Internet retailer? They wouldn’t budge on the price, even given that they were not going to do anything for the extra £50 they wanted to charge me, so I just walked out – they didn’t deserve my business. I certainly wans’t going to blow £300 on a product I was not abosultely sure was going to do everything I wanted.

We, as a nation, in our quest for ever cheaper goods have supported businesses like this at the expense of the good old family run local business who would have thought nothing about spending half an hour with me to make sure that I walked out the door with the right product. And would I have paid an extra £50 for this service, you bet.

Anyway, second stop, that good old family run local business that is PC World in Aintree. No, I’ve not gone off my rocker. I was treated today the way I used to be treated in the good old days, I met someone (the digital SLR camera specialist) who had good personal skills and great values – it was a pleasure to do business with him. Unfortunately I don’t have his name, but he knows who he is.

I spotted my same target bridge camera and was about to ask for help when I spotted some ex-demo SLR cameras. Now they might not have been able to shoot HD video, but an SLR would benefit me hugely over a bridge as the quality of the still images they produce is, in general, much better.Factor in the flexibility of additional lenses and flash guns and the benefits are huge. I’ve always fancied an SLR but they really were out of my budget.

Enter my helpful sales person. He spent over half an hour with me extolling the virtues of the various models on special offer, getting a battery out and showing me a camera working (something no shop did according to the manager at Comet), and putting up with me whilst I oo’ed and are’d over which one to pick. I think I made the right choice. I spent within my budget, but I came away with a different, better, camera than the one I wanted. I was treated like I was the most important person in that shop.

Well done Mr Digital SLR Specialist at PC World in Aintree – your store, ney your company, ought to be proud of you and train all their other young oiks to emulate you. That sale could have been yours Comet in Aintree, but you couldn’t be bothered – your loss.

When I was a kid in the late sixties, the articles on the 6 O’clock news may have been days old – it took that long for film footage to get from the far flung corners of the globe to the BBC News studio. Now, I can be filming the news and transmitting it around the world with just a three second delay (providing I can get a phone signal, or course).

Qik is an online communications device that takes live feeds from mobile phones and makes them visible to the world. The application downloaded to my Nokia E71 phone in minutes, installed in a snap and was ready for streaming in no time – the most drawn out part of the process was waiting for the validation email.

Video quality can vary between low, medium and high (varying the images size between 128×96, 176×144 and 320×240 pixels respectively). The video can also be optimised for minimum dealy in the streaming and maximum quality, but this latter setting can result in viewers having the video pause every minute, or so, as the stream is buffered.

The E71 hasn’t got the greatest camera on a phone, quite poor to be honest, but I have to say that I was quite impressed with the result. I’ve only messed around with it at the moment, but I will be doing some more meaningful tests with it over the coming weeks.

The videos that are producted can be named, described and saved for viewers to watch ‘after the event’. This is great as it enables you to build up your own personal video archive. I’m not sure how much space you’re allocated for you archive storage, but will no doubt discover this soon. There’s also a facility to advertise forthcoming events that you plan to stream and to transmit your location with the stream so viewers can see where you are. If that’s not enough, you can post your streaming to your friends live using Twitter, facebook and a host of other social applications.

This is an application I can make use of and hope to do so during the summer. In the mean time, you can view my videos at http://ww.qik.com/g7lfc.