The Richness of Life - Stephen Jay Gould

Advantages: Wide range of topics covered, largely accessible and entertaining
Disadvantages: Occasionally overly academic

...The Richness of Life - Stephen Jay Gould Steven Jay Gould was one of America's most prominent experts on palaeontology and evolutionary biology. A prolific writer he produced many books, papers and articles from the 1960's up to his death in 2002. A teacher at Harvard University he published several academic books but also worked prodigiously to popularise science through a number of more accessible works and the impressive achievement of delivering 300 unbroken articles for the magazine Natural History. In some ways considered to be America's answer to Richard Dawkins, the pair shared a passion for Darwin and evolutionary theory but famously came to academic blows over a number of issues where their theories came into conflict. Through the 80's and 90's they traded blows through articles and reviews of each others work but...

brereton66 11.11.2008 · Read review
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Review of The Richness of Life - Stephen Jay Gould

FREE DVDs

Advantages: Free trial, large choice, post included,new realeases
Disadvantages: see review

...I like movies and I like freebies, so when you get offered both in one swoop you?re bound to accept! I used my two week free trial with this company and remained with them for a couple of monthsbefore moving on to try many other companies free trials (and winning a new DVD player on Tesco DVD rental site on their free trial offer). I then had an email from DVDs 365 asking me to go back, and offering me a free DVD if I did so. I had just left Tesco (with my new DVD player) so I chose to go back with them. ∆◊◊ THE SERVICE THEY OFFER ∆◊◊ Basically it?s like going to a video shop and hiring films on DVD, except you don?t pay for each film you chose ? rather a monthly fee for which you can watch as many movies as you can fit in, for us this is usually around 8 a month (2 a week usually weekends...

dabmim 15.11.2004 · Read review
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Review of dvds365.com

Excellent Elliott, O how we miss you

Advantages: A genre straddling pop album that has a great lifespan
Disadvantages: will not interest the fickle listener who's into 3 minute pop-tarts

...Being a cult hero is a two-edged sword. On the one hand you're appreciated for being individual, brilliant and anonymous to the mainstream. On the other, you suffer the fate of being liked just because it's "cool" to and never really properly understood. Elliott Smith died in 2003 and took his place alongside cult figures, Buckley, Cobain, Drake and so on.. (not necessarily alphabetically, but you get the picture). Behind him he left a body of work that has the potential to be celebrated for longer than the 34 short years of his own life. But let's not get sentimental about this particular album XO which I'm reviewing and fall into the trap of immortalising something on cult grounds alone. If you had no background knowledge of Elliott Smith and took this album on face value, there are certainly grounds for celebrating the discovery...

mattyexpress 16.08.2006 · Read review
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Review of XO - Elliott Smith

Surprising Picture Quality - Panasonic DVD-S54

Advantages: Incredible picture quality when compared to my old non-upscaling player with a scart lead
Disadvantages: Sometimes disc drive can be really noisy when DVD's initially load.

...At first I wasn't convinced by up-scaling DVD player technology but was persuaded after reading an article in "What Hi-Fi? Sound and Vision" magazine. Unable to afford a Blu-Ray player my sister and I bought the Panasonic DVD-S54 to match our parents brand new Panasonic TX-32LZD80 LCD television as their Christmas 2008 present. Admittedly it was a slightly selfish purchase as we both live at home and wanted to watch DVDs on the big new TV ourselves! We bought the player from the electrical retailer Comet for about £100 just before Christmas so there were no discounts applied. On Christmas day when opened we found a relatively small box tightly packed with the player in polystyrene packaging. All the components such as cables, remote and manuals were well presented in their own protective plastic bags, to keep them protected. The player...

bobbacon985 12.02.2009 · Read review
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Review of Panasonic DVD-S54

Under Construction - Missy Elliott

Advantages: See opinion
Disadvantages: See opinion

...Hmmm... can this go here? Worth a try anyway!! Review of "Under Construction" by "Missy Elliott" ~The Artist~ Melissa Elliott, better known as Missy "Misdemeanour" Elliott bust onto the Hip Hop scene in 1997 with her debut "Supa Dupa Fly" which brought us the hits "Sock It 2 Me", "The Rain" and "Beep Me 911" - the later being her first major UK hit. But this wasn't the first time the world had met Missy. She began her career as part of a female singing group "Sista". When Sista stalled, Elliott began to concentrate on making guest appearances on other artists' releases, in addition to producing a plethora of high quality Hip Hop and RnB tracks with her childhood friend and collaborator Tim Mosley AKA Timbaland. Most notable of which was their co-production of Aaliyah's 1996 sophomore album "One In A Million". Since "Supa...

darkchild_ie 17.01.2003 (20.08.2006) · Read review
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Review of Under Construction [PA] - Missy Elliott

Mindgame Jon Elliott Wheels

Advantages: Provide A Smooth Roll
Disadvantages: Little too small

...These are pretty small at 54mm and soft at 88a, but they are excellent wheels. I was cursed with the early Razor Cream wheels, which have all nearly all split at the cores, so I badly needed some new wheels. The Elliotts have a really nice feel to them. I tried them out in park first with a flat four setup, and for wheels that small they performed really well, good when you bear in mind the fact that they are quite soft, and soft wheels usually tend to be slower (is that right?). On street you notice the size difference, 54mm is pretty small, and I can't help thinking that 55-56mm might have been smoother, but then you rarely get perfectly smooth street anyway. On street gaps they felt pretty good, Mindgame have obviously put work into building good cores and the shock absorption when combined with that of my Razor Creams is pretty...

matthawkes 12.03.2001 (30.03.2001) · Read review
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Review of Mindgame Jon Elliott Wheels

Gould strikes gold

Advantages: A radical and thoughtful re-imaging of the 40s detective
Disadvantages: A flim that demands attention in order to be enjoyed

..."The Long Goodbye" was directed by Robert Altman who also made M*A*S*H, The Player and Short Cuts amongst other films. Altman is not an action director, preferring verbal sparring to physical jousting and I'd recommend that anyone sitting down to watch this film be in the mood to pay attention and listen carefully - it's not popcorn entertainment and that isn't a criticism. The Long Goodbye is based on a Raymond Chandler book of the same name and stars Chandler's most famous creation, Philip Marlowe. Marlowe has been played by various screen legends such as Humphrey Bogart, Robert Mitchum, James Garner and Dick Powell all of whom projected variations on the same theme of a smart, tough and handsome 1940s detective but no one comes close to portraying the character the way that Elliott Gould does. Marlowe has undergone a radical re...

pedroj 21.10.2005 · Read review
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Review of The Long Goodbye (DVD)

Missy Elliott in another film?

Advantages: Shows the truth of friends and family
Disadvantages: Soundtrack and film!

...tell you whether he is a good director or not as I wouldn't really know. Honey Daniels is played by Jessica Alba. She is a really great actress in my opinion, however I do think that this film wasn't good, and that surprised me by her acting skills considering the fact that she is a brilliant actress, this film is supposed to be just as good, but I don't think it really shows her acting abilities and just shows how a film can put over that the star is a rubbish actor/actress. The rest of the actors/actresses are not so famous, however you get to see one famous singer who calls herself Missy Elliott. Anyway I have changed my actors/actresses profiles a bit, I don't know whether you noticed, but do you prefer them this way? Or do you want me to put them back the way I had them before? Honey is a dancer, a choreographer and is working...

Jonni_boi 05.02.2009 · Read review
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Review of Honey (DVD)

Sweet Adeline, My Clementine

Advantages: Excellent vocals, calm, reflective tracks, Something different to the majority of singer songwriters
Disadvantages: He died shortly before his 7th album

...It would seem that 2005 is going to be the year of the singer songwriter. With the likes of David Gray and Tom McRae leading the way in the last few years a number of other artists have sprung from nowhere. One artist who is now missing out on a movement I've no doubt he would have been at the forefront of, is Elliott Smith. Elliott committed suicide back in October 2003 at just 34 years of age and left behind a wealth of fantastic music. My first introduction to Smith was on the Good Will Hunting soundtrack, where he featured a couple of times and it really stuck in my mind to find out who he was. After a few searches I came across a few more samples of his work and bought this album from Amazon to see just how good he actually was. Despite still having a lot of reservations when the album arrived I put it on and was instantly...

Andy.mack 24.06.2005 · Read review
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Review of XO - Elliott Smith

YAMAHA DVD-S 557 this is THE DVD player of all time.

Advantages: Brilliant DVD player, perfect quality
Disadvantages: cant think of any

......

plainpaul 22.02.2009 · Read review
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Review of Yamaha DVD-S 557