Blah Blah Flowers

Ooh, one of my photos is in the Grauniad! I only took it originally for the Monty Python plaque. Still, it makes a change from odd pictures turning up on Wikipedia pages...

Labels: internet, photography, photos, The Guardian

A pictoral history of the Internet. Even if you know the story, it's very prettily told here. [via Grinding]

Labels: internet, science

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to prevent Internet Service Providers (ISPs) from filtering content for UK users.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to commission a momument to Oliver Postgate, Peter Firmin and the children's TV characters they created.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to acknowledge that a large proportion of the workforce in this country is single, and that reference should be made to 'the hard-working population' of this country rather than the constant references to 'hard-working families'.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to scrap ID cards. (again!)

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to cancel the 2012 Olympics in the face of the current recession and the country's existing debt burden.

Labels: censorship, children, Government, ID cards, internet, Internet Service Providers, Olympics, petitions, Television

Culture Secretary Andy Burnham has no idea how the Internet works.

Film-style age ratings could be applied to websites to protect children from harmful and offensive material, [he] has said...

He said some content, such as clips of beheadings, was unacceptable and new standards of decency were needed. He also plans to negotiate with the US on drawing up international rules for English language websites.

Yeah, good luck with that one. I've just finished reading Nick Cohen's Pretty Straight Guys from 2002 and although there are several sections where he drinks deeply from the cup of crazy to lambast everyone who didn't want the US and UK to bomb Iraq to buggery he does have a fairly effective go at the Blair Nineties. And this just reeks of the whole 'let's take hoodies to cashpoints and make them pay the police fines on the spot!' nonsense that one of that crowd proposed way back when.

Knee-jerk nonsense just to grab a few headlines before being quietly abandoned when someone sits the relevent Government minister down and explains how life is in Real Town is no way to run a Government.

Labels: Government, internet, stupidity

DEFRA have produced noise maps for a large number of urban areas throughout the UK.

Labels: Government, internet, pollution

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to give the disabled the same benefits as the pensioners get each year especially the fuel allowance.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Uphold the principle of 'Net Neutrality'.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to force isp's to abandon plans to make content providers pay for elevated speeds on there network.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to support the campaign by Terry Pratchett and the Alzheimer's Research Trust for a drastic increase in public funding for dementia research.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Revoke the VAT-exempt status of the Church of Scientology Religious Education College Inc.

Labels: Alzheimers, disability, internet, Internet Service Providers, petitions, Scientology, Terry Pratchett

6 billion Others doesn't go fully live until next year, but there are some videos you can watch now. It's a project to try and remind us that we are not alone, that we are all part of a larger whole, the 'sea of humanity' which includes everyone from the humblest immigrant worker in New York to the President of Russia. From where it stands now it looks like it will be well worth coming back to next year.

Labels: documentaries, internet

Why Firefox is Blocked. I don't know who is responsible for this, as everyone is linking to this page and not whatever site it is that, if you try to go there using Firefox, redirects you to this. But the whole 'if you block viewing adverts then, if you see my site, you are stealing content from me!' thing is hilarious. The Firefox myths and Firefox cult links make me wonder if it's a 'Thou shalt have no other gods before me' thing.

The Guardian Unlimited says that it's the work of Danny Carlton.

Personally, I don't mind banner ads that much, it's more annoying when sites like The Guardian drop the box down over the text you're trying to read offering you information about the latest car or some plane ticket dealy.

Labels: internet

1. Post some comments about the film The Queen . This may actually involve you getting hold of a copy of the film but it's by no means bad, so you'll have a pleasant couple of hours.
2. See how long it takes for Lorraine Grimes to find your review and, if she feels you have been unsatisfactorily complimentary to Helen Mirren's workwomanlike performance in the film, chide you for missing the point.

No, I have no idea who Ms. Grimes is either, or why she feels a need to big up Helen Mirren round the webternet but then I do Nirpal Dhaliwal Watch, so I'm definitely casting no stones here.

Labels: internet, movies, Royal Family

The saddest little web server.

Labels: computers, humour, internet

This a terrific little story: Pat Dollard, Hollywood Guy Gone Gonzo. [via LinkMachineGo]

Serbian vampire hunters stake the body of Slobodan Milosevic to make sure he can't come back from the dead. Afterwards they gave themselves up to the police but I'm preparing to bust them out should Margaret Thatcher die in the near future. WE HAVE TO BE SURE IT'S OVER!

Remember that website with the teeny-tiny tourists standing on paving-stones the size of tennis courts and looking over kerb drops that were deeper than the Grand Canyon? Perhaps they'd like to visit some of the miniature properties on this site. Fantastically detailed castles that fit into gaps in masonry, beach huts in an undusted room corner.

The Long Now Foundation. Because slower/better is better than faster/cheaper. They're the people that invented the clock that ticks once a year, bongs once a century, and the cuckoo comes out every millennium.

Readings from Beowulf in ye authentic olde English. Possibly of interest to people who liked the Riders of Rohan bits of Lord of the Rings . Wikipedia Beowulf page.

Here's an interesting little video, Joshua Ramo on Movement, Enlightenment and Why He's Still Single. It's looking at the concept that while knowledge (or perhaps information) is easier to access in the IntertubeWebbed world today than it might have been forty years ago, has the speed of (or time it takes to) understanding that knowledge increased at all and how that relates to the personal quest for enlightenment. [via Aula]

Labels: art, Conservatives, internet, Iraq, literature, news, philosophy

"Tired of the LIBERAL BIAS every time you search on Google and a Wikipedia page appears? Now it's time for the Conservatives to get our voice out on the internet! to make a real half-arsed effort to do something about it.

Conservapedia, for when you want to obfuscate issues rather than debate them. And it has that crunchy American bias that you'd expect from drawing from such a narrow pool of contributors, nothing for Tony Blair, a paragraph for Margaret Thatcher with at least two factual inaccuracies that I could spot and one dodgy sentence which would appear to say the opposite of what I expect they mean. Sadly, they are locked up tighter than wikipedia so I couldn't make corrections, being a helpful sort and all.This is what happens when you let school projects loose on to the Internet.

Labels: Conservatives, internet, Margaret Thatcher, politics, United States