August 2011
“I pooped in Marco’s house!”
– Heather, who got to meet Marco and take a dump in his house before me. Jealous.
Phone hacking: News of the World reporter's letter... →
Nick Davies for the Guardian:
Rupert Murdoch, James Murdoch and their former editor Andy Coulson all face embarrassing new allegations of dishonesty and cover-up after the publication of an explosive letter written by the News of the World’s disgraced royal correspondent, Clive Goodman.
In the letter, which was written four years ago but published only on Tuesday, Goodman claims...
Nim: the unproject →
Geoffrey Pullum on Project Nim:
The documentary Project Nim, about Herbert S. Terrace’s effort to have a chimpanzee reared from birth like a human child and taught sign language, is an excellent piece of film-making, and you should see it. But if you go to it expecting to see something about research and data and results, there’s a surprise in store for you. I now think this was...
‘I have lived over half of my life’ →
Today on The Long Good Read — where the Guardian reposts its “#longreads” — is… a woman having a midlife crisis.
Doing some real good with that #longreads movement. Thank god.
Misc Thoughts on Paywalls
When the NYT announced its paywall it seemed like a remarkable number of people just didn’t get it, and still don’t. It was certainly a unique strategy — allowing so many holes in the paywall — so I’m not surprised at such skepticism. But since the launch, the WSJ and Financial Times have adopted a similar model, and the New York Times is massively outperforming their...
“Absolute explosion” — How BlackBerry BBM fed the... →
Mike Butcher talking to a “contact” about the rioting and looting in London:
He explained how there are many young kids who look up to the older guys – who are effectively gang members – and hang off their coat tails.
As soon as the teenagers get wind of a place that’s been robbed they turn up to see what happened and that’s when a new incident can potentially take place,...
Who needs S&M when you can write for the... →
Robert Webb — writing for the New Statesman — talking about getting sacked by The Telegraph. All other possible observations aside, this is a great piece of writing.
The friendly men ordering lunch were reassuring. They said the column would appear on a Saturday, an edition that attracted a younger, less tribal readership. I could write about whatever I liked, including politics.
...
UK riots: Big Brother isn't watching you →
Russel Brand, of all people, has a nice thing in the Guardian about the riots.
I felt that, and I had a mum who loved me, a dad who told me that nothing was beyond my reach, an education, a grant from Essex council (to train as an actor of all things!!!) and several charities that gave me money for maintenance. I shudder to think how disenfranchised I would have felt if I had been deprived of...
Years of liberal dogma have spawned a generation... →
If you live a normal life of absolute futility, which we can assume most of this week’s rioters do, excitement of any kind is welcome. The people who wrecked swathes of property, burned vehicles and terrorised communities have no moral compass to make them susceptible to guilt or shame.
Most have no jobs to go to or exams they might pass. They know no family role models, for most live in...
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New Whirled Dictionary: hard drive →
n-w-d:
hard drive n 1 a difficult journey by car or carriage, esp. one’s daily commute. 2 the path of such a journey.
No idea who’s behind it but New Whirled Dictionary is pretty much the best.
Hacker Group Anonymous Vows To Destroy Facebook On... →
So I guess Facebook might be down for a couple hours on November 5th while some teenagers “destroy” it with DoS attacks.
Stock photography at the ready, media.
Stealing Mona Lisa, Vanity Fair, May 2009:
The shocking theft of the Mona Lisa, in August 1911, appeared to have been solved 28 months later, when the painting was recovered.
Stolen: How the Mona Lisa Became the World’s Most Famous Painting, The Smithsonian, June 2011:
One hundred years ago, a heist by a worker at the Louvre secured Leonardo’s painting as an art world icon
Who stole...
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“Close behind followed two more aides––Bachmann’s personal assistant, Tera Dahl,...”
– The Transformation of Michele Bachmann
Not quite sure why, but this made me laugh.
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Raised Expectations →
There is a simple rule on the internet - and that is you do not feed the Trolls. Trolls being the people who write something in order to start an argument. You know, the sort of people who say that Hitler was an alright sort of bloke in a holocaust support forum.
But… but… The article in the Daily Mail yesterday by ‘Liz Jones - professional troll’ was beyond the...
