On my return flight from the States last week, I flew on an A380 for the first time. That experience formed the basis of this week’s Road Worrier column for Lifehacker, though I didn’t mention my mild annoyance at the realisation that (1) no-one from business class was going to drop in and say “We hope you’re having a nice flight Mr Kidman” (2) being able to board via the business class gate doesn’t help so much when you still have to join the economy-class queue heading upstairs. I’m sure I’ll live. In other Lifehacker posts:

Friday’s Lifehacker posts were dominated by Google’s SearchWiki launch, which ended up with both an announcement post and a
first look. It’s rare for Google news to happen in a timeframe where I get to cover it before the US site already does the job. Other posts:

Yes, I’m back after two months and an A380 flight. The place is still here. My carry-on bag strap snapped walking through Sydney airport. Sped through customs. The usual stuff.

Being in transit didn’t visibly affect my productivity. At APC, there was a long analysis piece about how Windows 7 might be packaged, and a look at how iiNet is being sued by the movie industry. I wrote and researched the latter in the LAX lounge on Thursday evening, as it happens.

Meanwhile, at Lifehacker:

But that may not matter, ma’am, since you’re either a figment of someone else’s imagination or a brain-dead bimbo. Read my story for APC yesterday to work out what I’m talking about. Or stay professional and read a brief piece about Salesforce.com for APC Pro. Or get organised and jump straight to the Lifehacker posts:

My first story for iTWire in many moons looks at the role IT management plays in planning and building CityCenter, Vegas’ latest casino monolith. I walked past the construction site last night and there’ll be a lot to do if they’re going to be ready for a late 2009 launch. Meanwhile, the Lifehacker flow continued:

OK, not quite, but there is a bunch of Windows 7-ish reporting to note. Firstly, something from last week that I forgot to note at the time: a report for SearchSecurity on how BitLocker encryption will work on removable devices in Windows 7.

At APC, I had an article looking at the Blue Badge hack for accessing extra Windows 7 features. Elsewhere in the Microsoft camp, I looked at the weirdness that is email from Steve Ballmer. And finally, I chatted to Adobe about why there’s no Flash on the iPhone or BlackBerry. OK, that last one isn’t very Microsoft-related.

Meanwhile, at Lifehacker, the usual Monday Road Worrier column examined how to keep yourself amused at the airport without excessive baggae. Other posts:

Another busy week — I’ve shifted from San Fran to Vegas, done an aerial and ground tour of the Grand Canyon (including the infamous Skywalk), and seen Bette Midler. So far, so good, but it’s slowed down the posting.

At APC, the Windows 7 story flow continued, with reports on why Windows 7 won’t support USB 3.0 initially, how the new OS will help improve performance, and the role Device Stage might play in reducing crapware. (Astonishingly, that’s still not quite all the WinHEC stories in the kitty.)

Meanwhile, at Lifehacker:

Another Windows 7 story for APC, this time looking at how often installations fail on Vista. And the usual semi-quiet Monday at Lifehacker:

This trip to LA seems to have gone by in a blur — heading back to San Fran now. At least now I know the place is manageable without a car, contrary to popular belief, and despite the slightly insane Metro ticketing policy. There’ll doubtless be more WinHEC stories over the following week, but in the meantime there’s plenty to contemplate at Lifehacker:

So now I’m in LA, at Microsoft’s WinHEC event for hardware developers, which this year is all about Windows 7. The trip got off to a bad start when a defective train meant it took me nearly two hours to make a train journey that should take 20 minutes, but since then it’s all been good. Although it’s pretty much all been work.

Over at APC, there’s already two stories from the first day of the conference up: one looking at how Microsoft has begged hardware makers not to mess up drivers for Windows 7, the other at its resigned attitude. The former got linked to from Slashdot, which is always nice.

Probably the most noteworthy story at Lifehacker sprung from an unexpected source: me going to a Bananarama concert last week. The camera phone photos I took were shocking, but I managed to partially redeem them by shrinking them and making a montage wallpaper for my PC. This story also got picked up by the US Lifehacker parent edition, which even got around to mentioning me by name, though admittedly not in a very flattering context: “Angus Kidman, editor of our Aussie-focused cousin site, can admit both that he was near the front row of a Bananarama concert, and that the pictures he took from his cell phone camera were nothing great.” Oh well. Other Lifehacker posts: