Antisocial networking

Snubster

40,000 ecstasy pills later…

Here you go John, this might remind you of less middle-aged times...

middle age strikes (yet again)

The single off the new Mark Knopfler / Emmylou Harris album is really good.

I need one of these...

It's an alarm clock that runs away and hides after you hit snooze, so that you have to get up and find it next time it goes off. (Of course, Tom and John have something similar - children.) They've also come up with a duvet that starts glowing in the morning to wake you up.

Write up of Tom's event

Another blogger has written up Tom's event last week (as posted below), with some good links. Also some stuff on www.ntk.net.

Little Sparta

The poet Ian Hamilton Finlay has died. His garden "takes its place in the great tradition of poet-philosophers' gardens stretching from Epicurus to William Shenstone."

Technology 2.0

I invited Seumas to this event I was helping to run last night in collaboration with NTK. And I'm very glad he came. Not only was it good to see him, but it was Seumas who fixed things during the obligatory technology failures when speakers changed laptops.

I was very pleased with the event itself. Six speakers talking about their latest ideas/products in the technology/audio-visual field. These included: Promise TV, a new TV hard-drive that surpasses Sky Plus+ and will hopefully bring the end of adverts; a well-argued lament around the lack of innovation in the evolution of video games controls; an anthropologist's observations of information flows on the isles of Scilly and how he is turning this into Trampoline, a new knowledge sharing software system; a conceptual art project that attempts to visualize information connections (I didn't really get this one); and an open source approach to geographic mapping, based around Flickr.

Contact request

Seumas do you have Carlos's email address? If so can you email it to me - I just tried the old lgu.ac.uk but it bounced back.

Fukuyama - I Was Wrong

Interview: Neocon admits he was talking arrant drivel.

Quite a lot of us could have told him that years ago if he'd asked.

Wiki advice

Can anyone tell me how to go about setting up a wiki - preferably a method for non-technically competent people? Is there something like Blogger for doing wikis, for example? Thanks.

Belfast City Airport to be renamed in honour of George Best

Don't quite know what to make of this, seems a bit odd - I think I like straightforward geographical names for my airports. Belfast City Airport is nice btw - views across to the great Samson and Goliath cranes at Harland and Wolff...

Ubuntu

OK. Seumas. I've got Ubuntu installed on my old (and currently only) laptop. All seems good but wasn't able to log in as root. I've just read somewhere that root log-in on Ubuntu is disabled from the get-go and users therefore use sudo instead. This is where I reveal my lack of linux knowledge (haven't touched it for 12 months or so): what is sudo?? It now occurs to me that I don't think I was asked for a root password during the install process, so this kind of makes sense but I'd appreciate a bit of clarification on this.

As mentioned the distro seems pretty good, nice user interface, runs OK on my aged 800Mhz, 128MB laptop (well Firefox does, not really tried doing much else with it). Good that it all comes on one CD too.

Oh No, They Killed Scientology!

Quite enjoying this spat between South Park and Scientology. The episode in question involves one of the kids being mistaken for the new L Ron Hubbard, and revealling all the details of their supposedly secret belief system. It's all about aliens inhabiting human bodies thousands of years ago, and is completely nuts. The episode involves Tom Cruise going off in the huff and hiding in the cupboard, as an excuse for endless jokes about him not coming out of the closet, and R Kelly singing songs about it. You can watch the episode here (scroll down to Nov 16 05).

Did you know that Beck is a Scientologist?

Happy Birthday To ME!!!

Self-promotion is, of course, the new orange, so have a great St Paddy's day and drink lots of ethanoholicy type drinks in order to proclaim my celebrieviation. Cheers!

Fun with Nanotech

I don't know if nano technology will save the world or not, but it does look like being quite fun

del.icio.us

Have you seen this del.icio.us site? It seems to be a sort of online bookmarks list which you can store links to all the articles you read and share them with your friends - sort of like a blog without the witty and informative commentary. Then there's a bit of peer-to-peer knowledge exchange on top. Charles Meaden's got a page here (he came to Fitzrovian once). (Thought a bit of internet techno news would counteract the doom and gloom, but I now see that his pages are full of Iraq and climate change stories.)

How to Talk to a Global Warming Sceptic

Useful link. Not that the sceptics are likely to be terribly concerned with factual refutation of their arguments.

question for seumas

What's a good linux distro for an 800Mhz 512MB laptop. Just want to websurf and wordprocess - can you provide a URL to the ISO files?

Top 10 Dictators

The World's 10 Worst Dictators.

It's a Channel 4, Sunday night list show hosted by Jimmy Carr waiting to happen. I like no. 8 best - I think he's the one who's renamed the days of the week after members of his family.

Seriously, though, it has always amazed me how these people manage to get into those positions in the first place, and that countries are structured in such a way to make it possible.

Environmental Freakout (slight return)

Just been looking at James Lovelock's The Revenge of Gaia on Amazon and getting freaked out. This review in RealClimate seems a bit less doom laden but still not exactly comforting...

Short Sharp Science

The New Scientists has launched a couple of blogs. They look quite good - Short Sharp Science, and Technology Blog.

About Time

Excellent four-part documentary series started last night on BBC4, in which a world-renowned physicist examines the philosophy, history and science of time. Although it didn't mention Seamus's bete noir, the alarm clock, it did cover the tyranny of 'public time' - apparently Henry Ford and WWI are largely to blame.

It also filmed some fascinating experiments about biological body clocks and how we perceive things time differently (rats on cannabis and cocaine were quite amusing). For instance, a man was given a LCD which was flashing too fast to read the number being displayed. He was then dropped from a crane at a height of 12 storeys. As he fell (into a safety net), he stared at the LCD and could read the number. The idea that is in moments of intense panic/stimulation, our brains process information faster - hence the reported sensation of things appearing to slow down when people are involved in car accidents etc.

In a completely different vain....

Have a look at www.fluideffect.com. More to the point, go to their portfolio, click agree and then go to the before/after section. You'll find some pictures of celebs (don't worry; safe for work). Now you'll see a link to the left that says "click to see before". What this does is shows you what the picture looked like before they touched it up in photoshop (or whatever). Very interesting. Incredible shrinking women and everything! And now you realise that I did mean "vain"...

Hunger Site

www.thehungersite.com is an interesting idea. Click on the button and the sponsers give money to hunger charities. Simple.

Stop the war! oh

I meant to post this a couple of days ago, on the third anniversary. Fat lot of good it did.

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

Just finished the latest novel by Jonathan Safran Foer. It's ambitious, brilliant in parts but only partly successful. It is similar in style and structure to his other book "Everything is Illuminated", in that it is half based around an eccentric, very funny narrator and half around his forebear's various recollections and adventures through global traumas - specifically the bombing of Dresden and 9-11. Anyway, worth a read.

Climate Change Experiment

The BBC and the Met office are doing one of those things where they use the idle power of your computer to run climate models and simulations - BBC Climate Change Experiment.

Are there any IT issues we should know about with such things, John and Seamus?

On a related matter, I heard a thing on the radio the other day that I thought was clever. Environmentalists in the US have come up with the phrase 'What would Jesus drive?', therby getting the message through to vast swathes of the population who might not have given it much thought before. Let's face it, it wouldn't be a Hummer, would it?

Finally, saw an article about 'off-grid' living in a copy of The Times I found on the tube yesterday. It included reference to site called www.off-grid.net, and an off-grid holiday cottage you can rent in Argyll.

Dulux are getting in on this North London bohemian racket...

Cartoons

In case you're curious, these are the cartoons.

They're not very good, but not all that offensive either, from our perspective. Funny old business.

Second Chance Tuesday

They've resurrected First Tuesday - second chance tuesday. Do you think we can sue?

Cartoon Time

I think this bloke answers the question he raises: " 'They want to test our feelings,' protester Mawli Abdul Qahar Abu Israra told the BBC.

'They want to know whether Muslims are extremists or not. Death to them and to their newspapers,' he said."

The world's gone nuts.

Four killed in cartoon protests

Participant Productions

Oh well, Google might have fallen from grace slightly, but there's always e-bay founder Jeff Skoll's Participant Productions, dedicated to funding popular movies with a liberal message. (Independent Online Edition >Feature in Independent.)

The Global Id

Interesting piece about Google in London Review of Books.

Lewis!

Pretty well done I thought, a welcome return. Didn't really engage with the plot but summertime Oxford is extremely easy on the eye at the dog end of January...

The Lethal Standby Button

Sorry to do the first environmental post of the new year - freaking out about this was one of the Fitzroy themes of 2005, and I'm sure it will continue this year. Amongst all the news of shrinking ice-caps etc, this news item made me very depressed about our incapacity to do anything about the environment. If we are struggling to do something about the TV Standby button, what hope have we got?

What's the best day for setting your auction to finish on ebay?

Read this somewhere but have forgotten, does anybody know?

Also - *still* haven't been able to get on that surname distribution site. Tried last night but no dice.

Ohrwurm

I was just telling someone in the office about the German work 'ohrwurm', or earworm, used to describe one of those annoying tunes that gets stuck in your head all day against your wishes. I checked it out on Wikepedia (to find out what the German word was), and discovered Maim That Tune, a service that offers alternative tunes that, whilst annoying in themselves, will drive the original earworm from your head...

Song Search by Tapping

Read about Songtapper in Metro this morning. Apparently, if you tap out the rhythm of a tune on your spacebar it identifies the song. Although in common with all my posts these days, I can't seem to get into the actual application...

Freecycle revisited

Had another look at the local freecycle site. It works via yahoo groups (do they all do this?) which offer a "daily digest" email option so your mailbox doesn't get too bombarded. Quite interesting, though haven't been tempted by anything on offer yet and don't have anything I want to get rid of at the moment.

Surname Distribution Profiler

This project by UCL showing geographic distribution of UK surnames looks potentially interesting. Unfortunately, it was on BBC News so is now down due to heavy traffic.

Bicycle refurbishment

There's a bike refurbishment place opened up at Waverley station. I think these schemes are excellent.

Google Analytics

Just found out aboutGoogle Analytics. Temporarily closed to new subscribers, but looks useful - let's find out if anyone else reads Fitzrovian...

Get back to work, George

Get back to work, George

The Seven Basic Plots

I got this very interesting book for Christmas. A colossal work, which I'm only 100 pages into, but already full of nuggets. The guy has spent the last 30 years consuming the world's literature and films, and distilling ever story from the Odyssey to Star Wars into one a small number of plot structures. I don't buy it all - but some of the links and commonalities he makes are very striking.

Ogre to Slay? Outsource It To Chinese

The full article's not available, unfortunately, but the gist of it is that lazy, well-off American kids are paying Chinese kids to play the boring early levels of online games for them until the point where it gets interesting and their character has lots of power/money/rayguns or whatever happens in these things.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas to everyone! I'm up on the Isle of Lewis at the moment, spending Christmas with my sister & family. The main advantage to this is that my nephew is eleven, so I get to play with all the cool presents he gets....the lightsabre is very cool, and I got him a remote control hovercraft. Brilliant stuff! Hope you're all having fun and eating and drinking to excess...

CIA Chief Admits To Torture...

after Six-Hour Beating, Electrocution.

Bad Santas run wild in Auckland

Sounds like a right laugh. Let's start a Santarchy chapter.

UK Most Wanted ...

Was just looking at the new most wanted list of criminal suspects. All the crimes seem to have been in Yorkshire or Greater London, so I guess you're safe John, especially if you stay away from Weegieland. Some of the entries full of typos, e.g.:

"However it si believed that he was mundered at Stone Road address."

Wikipedia "as reliable as Britannica"

Surprised and pleased to read this

Ah, makes you proud - slight return

Homicide rate hits 10-year high

Tookie

Arnie has terminated Crips founder Stanley 'Tookie' Williams, despite there being some some doubts as to the extent of his culpability for the crimes for which he was convicted, and his apparent reformation in prison.

All the same, you wouldn't have wanted to mess with him in his heyday - if this guy was in a film you'd think it was over the top:

Best of the Fitz 2005

Well, the end of the year is approaching and the reviews are starting. I thought I'd present my Top 5 Fitzroy Tuesday trails of 2005:


Cosgrove Puts the Boot In (Feb 14)
http://fitzroytuesday.blogspot.com/2005/02/cosgrove-puts-boot-in.html

The Portable Virtual Privacy Machine (March 2)
http://fitzroytuesday.blogspot.com/2005/03/portable-virtual-privacy-machine.html

Contemporary Scottish Bar in London (May 19)
http://fitzroytuesday.blogspot.com/2005/05/contemporary-scottish-bar-in-london.html

Philosophical muti-storey car park ticket machine (November 26)
http://fitzroytuesday.blogspot.com/2005/11/philosophical-muti-storey-car-park.html

Well, the weather in Edinburgh has been ridiculously cold this week (November 19)
http://fitzroytuesday.blogspot.com/2005/11/well-weather-in-edinburgh-has-been.html

Thriller in Manila

Anyone catch the program about the Muhammad Ali / Smokin' Joe Frazier fight series last night? Think it was called The Fight. Completely gobsmacked by the final showdown - armageddon, basically. (Also not a very flattering portrait of Ali, I thought).

Prescription Meds

Herbal viagra... Become a property millionaire... Cheap home insurance... Russian brides... Forward this to 100 people and earn $$$$$... Stock tips...

Sorry, just trying to attract some higher value Google ads for the Fitzrovian christmas drinks kitty.

Poetry Corner

I haven't seen this mentioned before, so I thought you might enjoy some of the poetry of D.H. Rumsfeld ...

Re-cycling - geddit?

Got any old bikes? They'll ship em to Africa.

TV Arials & Freeview

I got myself a Freeview box the other day. Now I'm looking for a good arial, because my reception isn't that great. I figured Amazon would be a good place to search for them as they have customer reviews, but Amazon obviously think there's only one reason anyone would want to watch TV...

Philosophical muti-storey car park ticket machine

The machine displaying this is near the foot of Techno Bridge, incidentally. (Greenside Place has a handy car park for Saturday shopping in the New Town).

The long goodbye

Good article.

Publicity

Am thinking of trying to raise the profile of FitzTues, maybe by getting it listed on some UK blog directories. Thoughts?

From the ashes

Review in the New Yorker of interesting-looking new history tome:
Postwar

The St James Centre Techno Bridge has won an award!

From the Institute of Structural Engineers. Apparently it's just called the Greenside Place Bridge. Still most excellent however.

Well, the weather in Edinburgh has been ridiculously cold this week

and I have been using the coolest promotional windscreen ice-scraper I have ever encountered...

because it's beholden upon me to post stuff i notice about Alan Moore

Catching Up with Alan Moore

Latest thoughts on property market..

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4421496.stm

Well at least the telly's not #### this time of year

(forgive the ## prudery but am typing this in an extremely corporate environment). Rome pretty good, Bleak House impressively techno-fied and The Thick of It just superb (tho last night's final episode the weakest of the 2nd series I think).

Is it just me...

Like the title of this book, although I fear it could be one of those wacky stocking fillers they always bring out at this time of year.



(more)

Internet Identity Workshop

I don't know why I find this fuuny

Scotland's murderous heart

Ah, makes you proud.

Wherever I lay my hat....

I'm moving flat. Place I'm in is closing down, so I'm off to see other bits of London. There's a reasonably nice place I saw in Finchley that I'll probably go for. Anyone know what that area is like (I only visited it once)? Is £360 + bills a reasonable rent? They do have wireless broadband...

(Unfortunately, I couldn't find any gratuitous link to throw in here...oh yeah, Age of Empires III demo is out)

Bumper stickers

We don't really have this political bumper sticker culture here.



By the way, did you know that Jews invented the weekend?

Patriotic Posters

Some satirical, Bush-baiting WWII style propaganda posters etc. Weird thing is, I bet right wingers would be happy with some of this stuff at a less ironic level.

T-shirt for Tom:


I'm not at work today, can you tell?

Best hairstyle ever

If only I could grow my hair like this:




(full story)

Un-Restoration

They're knocking down that burnt out hotel you can see from the East Coast mainline at Dunbar. Hurrah I say, about time too.

The Other Hurricane

Time for one of our regular global warming freak outs...

Inside the new St James Centre bridge this morning.

Techno City or what? (Image taken with my cameraphone and thus a bit ropy I'm afraid).

21st Century Crusaders

The US Military-Industrial Complex gets a little carried away...

Shining

Remixed trailer for an old classic.

Serenity

This looks flipping excellent.

Russian MP3s

Tom tells me that allofmp3.com, a Russian pay-per-download site, is great, safe and dirt cheap. Apparently it's not exactly legal per se, but gets away with it because of Russia's lax copyright laws.


(Tom, is this the one you were talking about?)

Deadly plague hits Warcraft world

Always interesting when things like this happen.

Cost of War

Rolling total of the cost of Iraq. Those are some big numbers.

Literature for the time poor

book a minute

No Direction Home

One for you, I think, Tom: The BBC are showing Martin Scorsese's Dylan documentary on the 26th and 27th of September.

A Slobbering Slugfest

The Hitchens - Galloway debate was apparently not very eloquent, but Radio 4 are broadcasting highlights on Saturday night.

The extinction of UK frogs?

Has anyone been following this story over the last few years? The lethal amphibian funghi has now spread to the UK: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4249136.stm

Oxford Bar

Continuing the tradition of visiting literary watering holes I'm going here for a pint this evening.

Norway's formula for a happy life

Oil money + welfare state + equality = good place to live

(see here)

Don't dumb me down

Good Bad Science piece in today's paper.

After the Flood

A few good post-hurricane pieces in the current New Yorker, including this one laying into Bush, which is always good.

Serious Games

Does anyone know anything about 'serious games' - computer games with real-world, practical applications, such as training etc. Especially keen to hear about anything that doesn't involve training the US millitary to kill people...

HBO: Rome

This looks the business. Should be on BBC at before too long as they co-produced it with HBO. In line with HBO's anti-establishment ethos they've released a Firefox only browser theme...

"an insurmountable aversion to everything but the pursuits of philosophy and general learning."

He said it - great Wikipedia entry on David Hume.

New statue at Harrods

Oh yes

Oblique Strategies

Eno and Schmidt

Top fact

The bloke who owns the Independent, Tony O'Reilly, was pro-Iraq war.

Songs and stuff

monkeehub, which is apparently just one guy, did that brilliant "Creep" flash video that I'm sure I linked to many moons ago. Anyway, after you've depressed yourself watching that, you can cheer yourself up again by watching the even more brilliant JCB song which is doing the interweb rounds at the moment. Summer type nostalgically excellent stuff. (Sound obviously required and probably don't even bother if you're on dial-up)

Festival Fun

Although Shavers Weekly always used to herald this time of the year with their 'Oh No, Here Come the Festival Wanks' issue - anything good on at the festival, John?