donpaskini: People power

Democracy in action. A practical example of how motivated individuals can change government policy. Excellent - all round.
donpaskini: People power

Keep on running ...

(Cue for song.)

Alastair Campbell tweets

campbellclaret

out on bike, bumped into Christopher Chataway out running. 79 next week and he still looks like an athlete. Nice chat. Agreed we'll do GNR

Awesome or what? I've got teens of years to go (maybe). Dr Ron meanwhile summarises his 2009:

The bare bones of 2009 are that I ran 1433.5 miles ( 2307 K ) bringing my lifetime recorded totals to 152,991 miles ( 246,213 K. )

I ran 32 races 16 of which were trail races. That 32 makes a lifetime total of 2297 competitions. I gained no new countries and in fact had no races at all abroad.

The highlight of my year was 3 weeks island hopping in Greece with my wife, May. Santorini, Ios, Sikinos, Folegandros and Thirassia. Great weather, new runs and scenery. Plus May started tentatively to run again.

and:

December 20th, one of my favourite training runs completed 45YEARS OF NOT MISSING A DAY'S RUNNING. My elder son Steven accompanied me as we struggled through snow and ice up a road named Apple Street, then Cock Brow. To an area known as Windy Harbour where there are magnificent views of the surrounding countryside. Job done. For that day. The STREAK continues.

At least one run every day for 45 years! Awesome? Obsessive? Yes - both in my book. In spades. (And I've run up Apple Street and up to Windy Harbour - and them's fair hills.)

What kind of voting systems should we have?

I just tried out the TUCs voting quiz which aims to select the voting that comes closest to the ideal for one and discovered the system that best suits my own prejudices and requirements is (.... drum rollll ....) First Past the Post! tadaaa!

Probably right actually.

I'm worried about Germany

They don't seem to be coping with the snow as well as we are. The BBC reports motorways blocked, 160 people stranded overnight in cars, advice to build food stores ahead of expected shortages and homeless people freezing to death.

Elsewhere, The Observer reports 216 cars torched by "anarchists" in Berlin overn the past year - in protest, apparently, at rising property values leading to the breakup of established communities and the loss of open spaces in the old communist quarter.

Imagine how the British press would handle these kind of things if they were happening over here.

Reflecting on the recent unpleasantness ...

Now that the events of yesterday (or was it the day before?) are fading from memory, I recall the only other thing I remember about Geoff Hoone - and that somewhat tangential:

HEARD ON SKY NEWS

"Umm Qasr is a town similar to Southampton", UK Defence Minister Geoff Hoon told the House of Commons yesterday. "He's either never been to Southampton, or he's never been to Umm Qasr", said one British soldier, informed of this while on patrol in Umm Qasr. Another added: "There's no beer, no prostitutes, and people are shooting at us. It's more like Portsmouth."

(via William Gibson).

Swindon gets free broadband - everywhere

Well, I hope it works out, but there's lots of 'yes but's and 'I don't understand's.
The Council website says:

The Council has teamed up with the concept’s originator Rikki Hunt and digital technology firm aQovia to create the company Digital City UK, which under the brand name ‘Signal’, will install a Wi-Fi wireless mesh covering the whole of the Borough of Swindon.

'Signal' FAQs here in amongst which they say the will make profit. aQovia is here and seems to be an existing Cloud player and how do they make money?

The aQovia Services eco System (SeS) is a unique set of custom built systems that enable application developers and managed service providers to rapidly package and deliver their network (wireless and wired networks) oriented services to the market via a managed service approach.

So they seem to provide cloud space for other service providers.

So, to recap, from Swindon Council's viewpoint, they are one of three partners in a new commercial venture (Signal). aQovia are there as principal technical providers, Rikki Hunt (try Google) is there because it was his idea, SBC are there ... well to provide a GBP450,000 loan and (presumably) ease access for the broadband - planning permissions, Building Regs etc. So we - the entrepreneurial Council Tax Payers of Swindon are lending the thick end of 1/2 million quid - against what security? But wait a minute, we are also 'partners' - doesn't that mean we share the risks as well as the profit?

On the pure mechanics of it, we are about 180,000 souls - 70-80,000 households. Many will already have broadband, so this initiative will only be of interest to those who a) haven't got it and b) want it. How many's that? 10-20,000? Let's say 20,000, which sounds a big overestimate to me. They have to generate the cash-flow to keep the company going and make enough profit to at least pay off our loan. How? Presumably a lot of these people don't have broadband because they can't afford it, or a wifi enabled computer. These cash-poor people are going to generate all Signal's income? I don't think so. aQovia are going to use the network, once it covers the whole of Swindon, to push their services to businesses primarily. The broadband-deprived of Swindon are being used as front to put in place a hefty infrastructure to be used by aQovia is my guess.

Complaints already from local IT businesses who weren't given the chance to bid - some good points from a firm called Fourtiers (pdf).

Meanwhile SBC are cutting funding for a popular Dial-a-Ride scheme for the disabled and others who can't get about.

And there could be a lot of fun for people who do have broadband, using their 2hrs/day to upload content to something (anything) on the Web. Live football anybody?

Malasian Christians can continue praying to "Allah"

The Malaysian High Court has overruled the government ban on non-Muslims using the word "Allah" to refer to "God".

Which is good on a number of different counts.

Why I am Labour #4 - It's history is still relevant

Hat-tip to Labour List for this:

"I’m afraid my heart is bitter tonight, and so the thoughts and feelings that pertain to Christmas are far from me. But when I think of the thousands of white-livered poltroons who will take the Christ’s name in vain, and yet not see His image being crucified in every hungry child, I cannot think of peace. I have known as a child what hunger means, and the scars of those days are with me still, and rankle in my heart, and unfit me in many ways for the work to be done."
Keir Hardie, writing in the Labour Leader, Christmas 1897.

That so few children in this country will have been hungry this Christmas is due in no small part to previous generations of politicians - of all parties, but Labour more than any. That so many children around the world are still hungry shouts that we still need people who can talk like Keir Hardie - and act like Gordon Brown ... Oh Yes. (IMHO of course)

Wintertime in the Waterpark

North up the A419 to (confusingly) South Cerney. A flying visit showed most of the smaller lakes completely frozen, on one of the larger ones there were Shoveler and Tufted duck, Black Headed gulls and coot. A heron and an Egret working the stream nearby, and on the footpath between the stream and the lake - this chap (or chapess, I'm not good on foxes). Quite tame, came towards me quite fearlessly, maybe looking for food.

Merry Christmas all.

Beautiful downtown Swindon ...

Fortunately the tropical plants that bedeck Swindon's gardens appear to have survived the recent extreme weather: and it is possible for the determined to battle to work through the drifts.

This though is Swindon South (so the equatorial side) - it's grim up North ...

Green IT from both ends (of the A419)

Students at Cirencester (Capital of the Cotswolds) College deabate whether IT is the main cause of pollution. The British Computer Society provides speakers for and against. And since the BCS is based at the Swindon end of the A419, and since Swindon is home to 2 car plants and owes it's existence to the steam engine the outcome could hardly be in doubt, could it ...

Can't help feeling that kids engage much more deeply with the big political issues than older folk. Should people over 30 be allowed to vote I wonder?

Britain's greenest town?

According to the Indie, the good people of Todmordan have committed to making the town self-sufficient. The way they've gone about it sounds good to me because a) it's bottom-up - they deliberately didn't look for grants because they didn't want any constraints on how they were going to work; b) they say they aimed at what they saw as the lowest-common-denominator - food (what's next? housing?) and talked to people about it; c) their technique is both simple and challenging - for example sowing food plants on waste ground.

Indie report here. The good people along the A419 should be looking at this :)

Fartlek

Which on this occasion took the form of 3 sets of four strides down the touchlines of the football pitches behind New College, wih a jog along the goal-line as recovery- 10 mins out and 10 back, half an hour altogether. No footy today because of recent heavy rain, but the skies were blue, ground a bit plashy but firm enough, the air crisp but not really taters-cold. Pretty good.

Was meant to be a gentle reminder to my body about what middle-distance running is supposed feel like.

Why I am Co-Op - #1 Co-Ops work

Today's Startups Newsletter tells me:

More than half of all social enterprises have seen turnover increase during the past year, the Social Enterprise Coalition has said.

Released in conjunction with today’s Social Enterprise Day, the ‘State of Social Enterprise’ survey found that social enterprises were outperforming the wider economy.

Only 20% of social enterprises had seen a dip in revenue compared to 43% of small businesses as a whole.

And also - and perhaps not unconnectedly:

The research also suggested social enterprises are breaking down the so-called ‘glass ceiling’. At 26%, twice as many social enterprises are women-led compared to all small businesses. In addition, more than 40% of board members on social firms are women compared to just 5% of AIM listed companies.

Why I am Labour #3 - Against the Odds

Against the Odds is a short video shown by the Labour Party as a party Political Broadcast. It's special because:

1. I don't believe any other party could produce such a video. In particular, what would the Conservatives have to show of their history?

2. Labour history is very important to many Labour people - it overrides personalities, policy compromises and electoral defeats, keeps the core motivated and brings in new blood: it gives a constant sense of direction. Again, I don't believe other parties have that to the same extent.

3. It became a PPB not on the say-so of Downing St or the Party hierarchy but by the efforts of an initially small group of party members - initially one I suspect - who saw it at a conference and thought it was great. Again, I don't see ordinary members of other parties having such a nationally visible impact. Good for them and good for Labour for listening.

And I like the video :)

And the odds are all against us - again.

Swindon gets free internet access

Guardian report (above) says the A419 (Swindon bit) is to get free internet access. Sounds like it will be delivered over phone lines - so residents only, no free rides - it's financed part by the local council and part by a private company who hope to make money by getting people to pay for faster connections. Access will be limited in some way - but still ...

Why I am Labour #2 - The Open University

Should you not know about the UK's largest University and its creation by Jenny Lee under Harold Wilson's Labour Government - read all about it here.

Labour's manifesto for the 1966 general election contained a commitment to establish the University of the Air. In that election, Mr Wilson was returned with an increased majority and in September 1967 came the crucial Cabinet decision to set up a Planning Committee 'to work out a comprehensive plan for an open university'.

Jennie Lee gave her name to the University's first Library beside Walton Hall. In 2004 a new University Library, housing her political archive, has opened. It is the centre of a massive digitisation project enabling millions of users to enjoy University Library facilities wherever they are.

The OU does world-class research, for instance in planetary science and space research:

PSSRI's position as one of the world's leading centres for planetary
science and space research has been reaffirmed by the 2008 UK RAE results.
PSSRI were part of the cross-disciplinary submission made by CEPSAR that saw 70% of its research activity fall into the highest categories (4* and 3*) of world leading and international research excellence.

But the OU has always been about teaching and last year ranked second (the top University) in the HE Student Satisfaction ratings - and still produces stories like this: Shelagh gets her degree at the ripe old age of 81

Magic! What Labour and the OU are all about - giving people chances they would otherwise not have to show what they can do.

Craig Murray to libel lawyers ...

The British Libel Laws are grossly unfair, biased in favour of the rich and a source of punitive punishment for those the courts find against and significant income for those they find in favour of.

All the more courageous therefore for Craig Murray to respond to a letter from a libel lawyer claiming his client has been traduced by saying of the client:

Anyone who one year supports Islamic terrorism, and the next year supports the invasion of Iraq and the occupation of Afghanistan, cannot be fairly described as stable. Indeed the one thing both viewpoints have in common is a support for killing people for political ends.

And, in the spirit of inclusivity Mr Murray comments:

I am very sorry that you wish to waste more taxpayers’ money in trying to defend Quilliam’s non-existent good name. Of course you will profit personally: why should you not get on the taxpayer funded gravy train too?

All the dirt - including lawyers' letters on Craig M's blog ...

Remembrance Day

My contribution.

Charles Sorley was a pupil at Marlborough College, 5 or 6 miles from the Southern end of the A419. He walked, ran and reflected on the Downs as many Swindonians still do today.
He was killed by a sniper at Loos at the age of 20, and this was one of several poems found amongst his belongings - When You See Millions

When you see millions of the mouthless dead
Across your dreams in pale battalions go,
Say not soft things as other men have said,
That you'll remember. For you need not so.
Give them not praise. For, deaf, how should they know
It is not curses heaped on each gashed head?
Nor tears. Their blind eyes see not your tears flow.
Nor honour. It is easy to be dead.
Say only this, 'They are dead.' Then add thereto,
'Yet many a better one has died before.'
Then, scanning all the o'ercrowded mass, should you
Perceive one face that you loved heretofore,
It is a spook. None wears the face you knew.
Great death has made all his for evermore.

Decorating and Indecent Exposure

Spent the weekend decorating youngest's bedroom.

Ran out of Matt Mushroom Sunday pm. Drove to local Homebase and on getting out of the car, felt large volume of fresh air where fresh air should not be. Discrete inspection by son confirmed jeans had split along the whole side of the back pocket and about as far again further South. Homebase shuts in 20 mins. Persuade son to remove jacket so I can tie arms round my waist with body hanging behind me covering left buttock which otherwise would receive longest exposure to sunlight for some time. Edge carefully along paint shelves to discover last of Matt the Mushroom is the one back at home, empty. Engage manager in dialogue about desirability of keeping adequate stock levels and expected delivery dates (Monday), all the while conscious that any further slippage on the part of son's jacket will trigger screams, guffaws and, very likely, store lockdown, attendance of armed police and a life on The Register. Withdraw with dignity more-or-less intact and return home to find we've no white gloss either.

Sigh.

Why I am Labour #1 in a series

We are in a recession, Labour has changed the rules on Housing and Council Tax Benefits to give some of the poorest families up to £20.00 a week more. So I'd guess more than twice that many kids will be a little better off.

More than 200,000 working families will gain about £1000 a year, thanks to new rules around Housing and Council Tax Benefits, making them an average of £20 a week better off.

Good say's I - and I don't believe the Tories would have done that. In fact we pretty much know they wouldn't - they will cut government spending on the day they take office (heavens forfend).

Comment here full details (with pros and some cons) here

Marathons

Meb Keflezighi has just won the 2009 NY Marathon in 2:09:15. From the FAQs on his website, we learn he has been a professional runner for 10 years.

When did you decide you wanted to become a professional runner?

a. 1997, after doubling in the 5k and 10k in the NCAA outdoor championships.

Ron Hill was the first person to get under 2:10. He did it 39 years ago winning the Commonwealth Games title in Edinburgh. He had a full time job and was working on building up a shoe and clothing importing business at the time. (Part of his training was running to and from work and his firm thought it was outrageous of him to ask to put in a shower at work at his own expense.)

Which is not to take anything away from Meb like - just saying ...

Albatross chicks killed by plastic

From Chris Jordan. Not pretty and this is his intro to the photos:

These photographs of albatross chicks were made just a few weeks ago on Midway Atoll, a tiny stretch of sand and coral near the middle of the North Pacific. The nesting babies are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the vast polluted ocean collecting what looks to them like food to bring back to their young. On this diet of human trash, every year tens of thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway from starvation, toxicity, and choking.

To document this phenomenon as faithfully as possible, not a single piece of plastic in any of these photographs was moved, placed, manipulated, arranged, or altered in any way. These images depict the actual stomach contents of baby birds in one of the world's most remote marine sanctuaries, more than 2000 miles from the nearest continent.

Some commentary here, but the above - and the photos - say it all, really.

Open University's iSpot website identifies moth never seen before in UK

Anyone can post pictures of wildlife or plants they've seen on the OU's iSpot website. If you don't know what you've found you can ask an expert. In this case, somebody did just that on behalf of their 6 year old and the answer was - a moth that had never been seen in this country before.

The site is funded from the National Lottery BTW.

Cameron - says one thing, did another ...

From DC's speach to his Party's Conference:

To the young mum working part time, trying to earn something extra for her family “from every extra pound you earn we’ll take back 96 pence.”

Yes, 96 pence.

Let me say that again, slowly.

In Gordon Brown’s Britain if you’re a single mother with two kids earning £150 a week the withdrawal of benefits and the additional taxes mean that for every extra pound you earn, you keep just 4 pence.

Full text here

Response?

... in 1998 (a year after the Tories were removed from power) there were 130,000 families facing marginal deduction rates (the technical definition) of over 90 per cent.

That has fallen to 60,000 thanks to the minimum wage, tax credits and lower income tax.

In fact, in 1998 there were 5,000 families facing 100 per cent deduction rates. Every £1 they earned was then taken in tax. The number is now more or less zero. (See page 90 of the Red Book for full details).

via The Financial Times, here

What God thinks about money

The Archbishop of Canterbury ("The ABC" to we Anglicans), speaking again about bankers - their lack of remorse for what they have so recently done, their greed, failure to recognise their failings - and their rapid return to top-level remuneration whilst poorer working folk pay for their unprecedented incompetences speaks of:

the... diffused resentment, that people are somehow getting away with a culture in which the connection between the worth of what you do and the reward you get becomes more obscure.

Or, as my gran used to say:

You can tell what God thinks about money when you loook at the kind of people he gives it to.

The Audenshaw Two are freed ...

After the verdicts, Mr Carus was scathing about the prosecution case and said the teenagers should have just been given "a slap on the wrists".

"I think this was an unnecessary, heavy-handed prosecution against two young lads who could have been dealt with in a more sensitive way.

"As the jury's verdict demonstrates, this was a waste of public money, hundreds of thousands of pounds.

"Bearing in mind their ages it's farcical to think that this was ever a serious design."

And the kids have spent 6 months in prison. And two police officers had to fly to Colorado to interview the lead detective on the Columbine Massacre case.

No explosives or firearms were discovered following the arrest of the teenagers in March, which came after Ross McKnight made a drunken phone call to a female friend boasting about carrying out Project Rainbow.

Hmmmm.

Local MP Anne Snelgrove reports

13 organisations have taken part in the bid through the Council including the Salvation Army, Lawn Community Centre, Wiltshire Wildlife Trust and Swindon 105.5 Community Radio.

In total, 92 jobs will be created with £598,000 of funding from the Government.

Which is good - good that 92 new jobs have been created and good in that the SallyArmy, Wiltshire Wildlife Trust and the Community Centre round the corner are going to get things done that they wouldn't otherwise.

If you can think of any jobs that are needed and want to help out locally, try the Future Jobs Fund - takes about 10mins to read the bumf.

Killer tits

Reports of Great Tits killing pipistrelle bats in a cave in Hungary over a period of ten years - suggesting that this is learned behaviour (over how many generations?) perhaps following an opportunistic killing by a single individual?

Darren Naish, in this article, identifies reports of similar behaviour going back to the 19th Century.

Audenshaw High - my alma mater

According to the BBC a couple of pupils (from my home town, as well) said they wanted to blow it up. Not much changes then.

Obviously this is just day one of the case and more may well (better had) come to light. But so far we have a couple of teenagers feeling nobody loves or understands them; deciding they want to be famous like Tim McVeigh; saying really bad things about school like "I'd like to blow the place up" and one of their mates tells the police, and the police find out one of them has searched the Web using phrases like "how to blow up school" and they'd picked a date and everything ... Surely there's got to be more to it than that - sacks of fertiliser in the potting shed, that sort of thing.

Then again, had they been Asian, I guess they'd already be inside.

Back in my day there was a mock-hanging where the one being hung kicked over the desk, dropped, pulled down the light fittings which shorted through the metal runners of the desks before blowing the fuse. Police turned up, spoke with the Head and departed. No more said. (Head got a bit cross I think.)

Mind you, in those days it was a Grammar school - that's the difference, see?

All The News That's Free To Read

They want us to pay for news:

"Rupert Murdoch said earlier this year his News Corp. media empire would begin charging for online content on its portfolio of titles including The Wall Street Journal, the London Times and the New York Post" - see CNN.

Publishing news via dead trees was losing both sales and advertising long before the recession. IMHO we are seeing the end of a once successful business model - and maybe desperate attempts to try to change reality to fit a re-hash of the same model. People pay to buy a newspaper; they read news from the same news-gathering organisation that sells newspapers on the streets for free online so maybe that's why they're buying fewer papers. And that's hurting business so we make them pay to read online in the same way we make them pay to read on paper. Yes? No?

I'd say "No". One obvious problem is that unless all news outlets switch to "pay for content" at the same time those that don't will get more clicks, therefore get more advertising revenue. Conversely those switching will inevitably loose visitors - so loosing advertising revenue and becoming more dependent on income from charging - and into a rising charge spiral. One very big competitor that is very unlikely to charge is the BBC. Hence, (or am I being cynical?) the attack on said organ by Murdoch fils in Edinburgh - and the subsequent free and frank exchange of views with Robert Peston

But I reckon I'm a pretty average news punter. I click on sites from different countries to get a quick feel for what today's agenda is there (US, germany, Canada ...); if there's a topic of the moment, I have a quick look for it on left, right, and foreign news sites. But that's what it is - a quick: click, yeah, yeah, la-di-da, different angle, that's not what the last one said - and off. 5-10 seconds each I'd guess. Am I going to pay for that? No way.

But Murdoch misses a big point. The fewer news outlets are free, the more I'll use the BBC - but not just because it's free, more because I trust it in a way I do not trust News Corp or any other commercial news site that is almost forced to pick and slant its news with one eye on a powerful "Big Man" and the other on what the advertisers expect. Free news on the Web lets me compare. If I can't compare I'll look for impartiality. But there's more.

Even the very idea of "news" and news gathering is changing - has changed. What grips me more: News Corp passing on the official line on the Iraq war? Embedded reporters saying what they're allowed to say about what they're allowed to see? Or click on Where Is Raed? I can read The Baghdad Blogger's latest post telling me where the missiles hit, what people in Baghdad are saying, how daily life is changing - and then send him a question by mail and get a reply. What can News Corp (or the BBC) offer to compete with that? Where do you think I went first for news of the Iraq war? What engaged me most and made me think most? Who do you think I believed?

Microsoft's Polish Photoshop Disaster

Thanks to Bob Piper for pointing to one of the best PSDs ever. It says so much about so many things and it's so funny: the Apple Mac (in a MS ad?), the unconnected screen, the hand - the hand! the hand! look at the hand! ...

Is it true everything's so much lighter in Poland?

ROFLMAO