Monthly Archives: March 2006

I’ve just discovered this blog, called mediawatchwatch. It’s quite good, and I intend to follow it for a bit. Going through the archives I found this post. Norwich vicar defends SpringerThe Rev Peter Nokes of St Peter Mancroft Church in Norwich has been standing up for Jerry Springer: The Opera. He told the Norwich Evening […]

I searched for Leigh Simpson on MSN Search, and look what I found. I’m not convinced that the search was working properly. If you want to create a similar search which doesn’t seem to work properly, go to http://www.msnsearchspoof.com/.

I’ve ranted before about the proliferation of image verification systems. In my case, I was ranting about the fact that Yahoo! was making me fill in a box when I sent an email. Luckily that’s declined, I get a verification box about every hundred messages or so, which seems fair enough. The new problem is […]

An argument in pictures…From NHS Blog Doctor

Something Awful presents some of the best internet hate mail I’ve seen in a long time. Cant do it? Oh, im not surprised, seeing as you are a zero-talent neanderthal who posesses the brains of a smashed eggshell dipped in acid resin. So next time you go to insult someone directly because they like a […]

What is Web 2.0? I’ve discussed a lot without much idea of what’s going on. This site may help. It’s the Web 2.0 Awards, featuring lots of great sites. All the top names are in there, including flickr, facebook, myspace, del.icio.us, youtube, and many more.

Facebook is an online community-building website similar to MySpace. Both of these websites collect personal information. For me, my most jealously-guarded secret tends to be my email address. Thanks to a little bit of care (and another email address I use to sign up to crap) I’ve kept my spam down to an acceptable level. […]

…doesn’t seem to have hit Blogger yet. As a test, this post is going out at 22:39 here in Cambridge. I’ll be intrigued to see what the timestamp says.

Or not, actually. It’s Ken, again. The mayor of London criticised Robert Tuttle while bemoaning the US embassy’s insistence that its diplomatic staff should not pay the congestion charge because they view it as a tax. Embassies are exempt from all local tax under the 1961 Vienna convention. Mr Livingstone told ITV’s London Today: “It […]

… this makes quite a lot of sense. Wherever people live in fear, with no prospect of advance, we should be on their side; in solidarity with them, whether in Sudan, Zimbabwe, Burma, North Korea; and where countries, and there are many in the Middle East today, are in the process of democratic development, we […]

This chap works for Microsoft. He works on the networking team. This picture may give a sense of how complicated Vista is going to be: Every single little square is a new feature for the networking stack. And people think making this stuff is easy?

I’ve often thought that the idea of a “Top 10 Chart” is somewhat poorly-thought out. Inevitably it will start to drive itself along; a book which hits the number one spot may sell twice as many copies and stay there for twice as long. Thus less popular books won’t make it into the chart and […]

OK, now I’ve given up on lots of conventional news sources (not entirely true), how do I get my news? Web 2.0 isn’t something which means very much to me, although perhaps others have a clearer idea of what it means. I think that much of the definition comes down to the idea of “community” […]

A corner of this page discusses the current proliferation of Digital Rights Management techniques: ZDNet Executive Editor David Berlind suggests that CRAP or Content, Restriction, Annulment, and Protection, is a catchier phrase than DRM – Digital Rights Management. Why does he think this technology is crap? Once you’ve bought music or other content to play […]

Breaking my BBC posting rule already, here is a link from Bad Science showing the worst swear words in existence. Unfortunately for me, the bird was right; the first in the list is a word I’ve been known to use from time to time, and she was possibly right to discourage this. Rather like the […]

Apparently, Microsoft are going to re-write 60% of all the Vista code over the next few months. This is an interesting story. Mostly because it’s complete rubbish. Here’s a thorough debunking of the idea. I have NO idea where that 60% thingy came from, as best as I can figure, the site that published the […]

The Human Rights Acts used to be hot conversation. Every vaguely right-wing newspaper would rant about how they’d open the door to all sorts of nonsense. Developing stories, such as the tale of prisoners demanding pornography as their “human right,” didn’t help matters. In the end, although I can’t find a reference, I don’t think […]

I like ranting about the BBC because they’re an easy target. They state lots of opinions, and they never fight back. But in response to another good example of bias I’ve seen, I’d like to clarify some points. Firstly, I do believe that the BBC contains an institutional bias on various major issues, including the […]

Ken Livingstone has embarassed himself again. Ken Livingstone attacked David and Simon Reuben for their role in an ongoing dispute about the Stratford City development in east London. He suggested the brothers “go back (to their own country) and see if they can do better under the ayatollahs”. He’s starting to sound friendlier and friendlier […]

And where better to start than with a title like that? From Yahoo! News, (does anybody else still giggle at that random exclamation mark?) the following: NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Older women who say talk shows and soap operas are their favorite TV programs tend to score more poorly on tests of memory, attention […]