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On Friday Triple J, the national youth radio network, played the Hottest 100 songs of 2006 as voted by listeners. The 100 songs can be seen here.

Each person is entitled to vote for their 10 favourite tracks for the year. For the record, here are the ten tracks I voted for, and the position they reached in the final list:

Augie March - One Crowded Hour - #1
Blue King Brown - Stand Up - #-
Darren Hanlon - Happiness Is A Chemical - #68
Faker - Love for Sale - #-
Grates - 19-20-20 - #10
Mach Pelican - Radio - #-
OK GO - Here It Goes Again - #14
Snow Patrol - You’re All I Have - #-
Wolf And Cub - This Mess - #-
Sekiden - Up In The Air - #-

I’m not surprised that Mach Pelican and Sekiden didn’t make it into the 100 - I love their songs, but they didn’t seem to gain much traction. I’m a little surprised that Wolf and Cub didn’t crack the 100. I’m very surprised that the Snow Patrol track I voted for didn’t make it, but the band was well represented by two other songs. Likewise, Blue King Brown just cracked the 100 (in position 100) with another of their tracks. I am flabbergasted that The Faker track didn’t rate highly - I guess it was a victim of a very early release in the year, and not in too many peoples minds by year end.

Big congratulations to Augie March for hitting the top spot - a very talented Australian band who have been doing the hard yards for years. Congratulations also to Brisbane band The Grates, and to Darren Hanlon, one of my favourite songwriters ever.

We’ve had an issue overnight with up a client who is transitioning from Microsoft Small Business Server to the ‘full’ versions of Micrsosoft Server and Exchange, using the Microsoft Transition Pack. Now, to put this into context, the client is correctly licensed, and the Transition pack has been purchased to legally give them the license for the ‘full’ products.

However, when we installed the Transition pack it came up with an product activation screen, with a blank installation ID in Step 3. As a result we cannot proceed and cannot log on to the server. Upon speaking to Microsoft Support, they want to charge us $400 to help resolve the issue.

Now, if we’ve done something wrong, we’re happy to pay up, although we believe we’ve followed the correct procedure. If we’ve done nothing wrong, and the client has been properly licensed, I don’t see why we should be made to pay to fix an issue that is a product fault.

So, I’m asking for help from anyone who reads this, with a particular shout-out to those who I know may have some idea how to resolve this: Michael, Frank, Ben, mssmallbiz.

[Update] If anyone can offer any advice, please either leave a comment, or shoot me an email at stephenh {at} centra {dot} com {dot} au. Thanks!

[Update #2] Matthew (my esteemed Technical Director) has managed to get hold of a helpful Microsoft Support person, and will be uninstalling SP1 from the Server component via the Transition Pack console. Hopefully this works fine; we’ve been assured that it will do the trick. However, any ideas or thoughts are still welcome. Thanks to those who have already emailed with suggestions.

Ockham’s Razor is the principle proposed by William of Ockham in the fourteenth century: “Pluralitas non est ponenda sine neccesitate”, which translates as “entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily”.

I have reason to apply this statement fairly often. Mostly because I tend to over-complicate things, but I’m certainly not alone in that respect.

The Savage Chickens put their own witty spin on it here.

Hugh’s thoughts on entrepreneurship. Hugh’s thoughts on blogging.

Spectators of different ethnic groups attacked each other at the Australian Open (Tennis) yesterday. Wow. I didn’t imagine this could happen at the tennis. I’ve written about this sort of behaviour before. I’m over writing about it, really. I guess it is a sign of the times, and a sign of the sick problems this society has to deal with.

Except I don’t think this society can deal with it. Sad.

One of my favourite basketball players, Chris Webber, has left Philadelphia and is joining his hometown team, the Detroit Pistons. I hope it goes well for the Pistons, and for Webber. If Houston (my favourite team) can’t win the championship this year, then I hope Detroit does.

I’ve just heard from my great mate, Wayne Burns, that his wife, Noriko, gave birth to a healthy baby boy called Joshua Masato. Yaaaay!!! Apparently Noriko is doing well, and Wayne is fully stoked. Congratulations to them both. Joshua was 3.27 kg at birth.

Now, I just wish they’d move back to Australia

PS - Wayne sent me a video of the baby, so if any of the ‘family’ want to see, just let me know and I’ll tell you how to get it.

Dikembe Mutombo, currently playing for my favourite NBA team, the Houston Rockets, has passed Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to move into second place on the All-Time Blocked Shot Leader List.

Dikembe has always been one of my favourite players, with his near-singular focus on defence. A graduate of Georgetown (Patrick Ewing, Alonzo Mourning), he has always held his own against other great centres in college in in the NBA.

Who is first on the list? Rockets great Hakeem Olajuwon - the player I emulated the most (or at least tried to) as a teenager. And before some smart alec (I’m thinking one of my younger brothers), I know that stats weren’t kept for blocked shots when Bill Russell was playing, and yes, he would probably be on the top of the list if there had been stats kept.

Yep, I taking off early for the weekend. I’m spending most of tomorrow and the weekend over at North Stradbroke Island again, this time for a bucks weekend. Should be good fun. Back at work on Monday.

Doc Searls has a great post on the ongoing spreading of Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt (FUD) regarding Net Neutrality. Check it out.