I’m finally able to do something to assuage my blog guilt, after a week of some great meetings and working hard on a lot of cool stuff which unfortunately I can’t share just quite yet…

But I can share a very nice testimonial from Julian Thorne, Managing Director of Dovetail after they kindly let me present at their client conference recently…

‘Dan is incredibly knowledgeable about the social networks in all their myriad guises. He also has that rare ability to enthusiastically inform the uninitiated without ever being patronising’

You might not have heard, but my blogging absence coincided with some small computer and phone company launching some kind of computing device. Hence a post about what it could mean on the One Golden Square blog. Which led to the pleasure of writing a bit of a follow up on the Music Week site. And I’m also flattered by the fact Michael Leis credited me with inspiring his latest post on the iPad. (Incidentally, Michael has been on a bit of a roll with his blog posts recently – some great writing about the usage of APIs for example. Well worth reading/subscribing to).

On balance all that good stuff, this was the week when my Xbox decided to encounter the dreaded ‘Error 74’ – which basically means it has self-destructed just out of the warranty Microsoft specifically extended to three years to counter the fault. That means a £68 repair bill or buying a new Xbox in the post-Christmas month notorious for sending people into debt anyway.

What’s been interesting is that I don’t actually miss playing video games during my enforced break (I have to admit to also owning a PS2, PS, Dreamcast, N64, Sega Saturn, SNES, NES, Megadrive, Master System and various other consoles and computers if needed – reverting to the geek stereotype).

But I really miss the social side of online gaming. Particularly as a core group of friends who I rarely see in real life have all been online every time I’ve logged onto Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. It’s the fact I’m now barred from this interaction which is the stressful part, and the reason that I’m rebalancing the family budget to accommodate a solution asap.

It makes me wonder about the effect of a more complete disconnection – I’m still online and keeping up with my social life on Twitter, Facebook, forums etc – it’s purely the team-based adrenalin of online warfare I’m missing… But between work, commuting, writing for my personal projects and family life, it’s the one vicarious bit of entertainment in my life at the moment.

Still, it’s spurred me into arranging a couple of drinks with some friends, so I guess it’s not all bad…