Thursday, April 05, 2007

Watching Cheese and Coffee


It’s always interesting to read about a friend in the newspaper and in the Guardian 03/04/07 there was a piece about “cult banality on the net”, referring to the website that shows a large piece of cheese as it (very slowly) matures, and it's getting thousands of hits per day.

In a review of internet history they mentioned the now cult and classic ‘The Trojan Room Coffee Pot’ which is thought to be the world’s first webcam. In the days before the world wide web, a friend of mine Quentin Stafford-Fraser (picture left) had the idea of training a camera on the university departments coffee machine to help prevent people from making pointless trips to the coffee machine before it was ready. It later became so famous that the coffee pot was auctioned on-line for £3,350.

Although I can see the use of having a live picture of a coffee machine, I’m not going to be tuning into the maturing cheese.

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

The coffee pot was a brilliant idea

Anonymous said...

I know Quentin too, what a small world. I was really impressed by a fabulous framed "pic" he had on his office wall of stunning digital images which kept changing. He is a very clever man.

James Higham said...

I quite like the 'cheese blog'. I posted on that when it came out but confess I haven't been back again. Has anything matured any yet?

Dr Michelle Tempest said...

Thanks Ellee - he is a very clever man. James, I think it's a slow mature. Michelle

Jeremy Jacobs said...

Yes but if you were a cheese I'd think you'd be smooth and sophisticated like a Roquefort.

(I feel a meme coming on!)

simon said...

"Tuning in to the maturing cheese"

I read as "TURNING into the maturing cheese!"

Geez Michelle! I laughed so hard I nearly choked on my coffee....

jmb said...

Last year we all tuned into the bald eagle's nest with eggs, waiting for them to hatch. Sadly they never did. I don't know what you expect of a cheese.
Just goes to show that you can get internet junkies follow any kind of lead.

jmb said...

Well, of course, I actually went over to look, (an internet junky too)and I've decided that it's a very clever piece of advertising. I wonder how many cheeses they've sold.
jmb

jumpinginpuddles said...

lol now personally we wouldnt mind watching people trying to find truffels lol because it hink thats hysterical, the river cottage guy used his pig to find some once.
Lol in fact there are a few things we wouldnt mind watching maturing but cheese so isnt one of them

Maalie said...

Well doctor, you caused another one here to go and look at the cheese! I wonder how it gets so many hits? I guess people email the URL to mates around the world and it just mushrooms (so to speak...).

Dr Michelle Tempest said...

Thanks Jeremy -Although not sure I would want to turen into a cheese.
Simon - glad you laughed, although I am sure I do make such typos!
Jmb, Simon - glad you saw the cheese getting older.
Jumping In Puddles - I think that's a good way of putting it, watching some things mature would be good... but cheese may not be the thing I would choose either! I'm grateful smell is not put through the www.

Thanks to you all. Michelle