Thanks to Daniel for clueing me in on tweaking the stylesheets on WordPress templates (don’t know much about him, but he blogs like a nice chap).
This current template is named Benevolence (how lovely), but I’ll be mooching through the options available to me soon. Perhaps I’ll come up with a truly groundbreaking blog design!
I can but dream….
Is it too much to ask? It’s been nearly two weeks since the London Mayoral election, and the ‘Who Does What’ page on the GLA website still hasn’t been updated:
The GLA is made up of the Mayor – currently Ken Livingstone – and the 25 members of the London Assembly. The Mayor and Assembly members are elected every four years. The next elections will be in May 2008.
Come on people! It’d only take ten minutes to fix!
Despite my determination to limit my blogging to times when a) I’m not in work, and b) I have something original to actually say, I’ve decided to add a new link to my blog roll.
The Alice Dale Blog (not to be confused with the great Iain Dale’s Diary, as if you would) is a fairly new blog on the ever-popular subject of feminism.
Now, you may well be aware of my approach to feminism, or you may not. Suffice to say I take great pleasure in calling certain Über-Feminist chums of mine ‘Mrs’, purely because I know it winds them up something rotten (which I find personally hilarious).
This blog is written by someone more on the ‘dangerously sensible’ side than most others I’ve met, and is regularly-updated (especially compared to mine) with comprehensive articles and links to publications across the interwebs.
Have a look and see what you think. I think with an invested audience around it, there could be some very interesting comment wars discussions, which I will of course stick my nose into every now and then.
But there is a very good explanation / excuse, in that I haven’t had the interwebs at home in months.
Should be sorted once I phone BT this afternoon. Although saying that, no doubt I’ll have to wait 2-3 days (and pay some ridiculous fee) for someone to flick a switch and get me back online….
In the meantime, I’ve been hammering my mobile internets. Facebook / Google Reader / Twitter all work brilliantly on my N95 8gb. I would write about it here, but I’ve promised to do a piece on cre.a.tive first….
As part of my efforts to drag my friends (some of them kicking and screaming) into the ‘blogosphere’, I’m inviting them to contribute guest posts to this blog. If you’ve thought of starting a blog but don’t want to start your own just yet, get in touch and I’ll save a spot for you right here!
My first guest post is by Mallori Merandino, currrently residing in Washington DC.
We are all aware that technology has crept into every crevice of modern life. Sometimes though, I think we forget just how important it is. For instance, today I found myself posing the question, “should I even bother to pursue things with a guy with no cell phone?” Ten years ago, that would not have been an issue, let alone a legitimate problem. Today, a person’s technie situation is both legitimate and vital to the dating process.
Typical scenario: girl meets guy at bar. What next? Well, in 2008: girl gives guy her cell number; guy sends witty text, girl stalks guy on facebook, witty texts turn into flirty texts and maybe a phone call, then a date. Is this reliance on technology good? Maybe so, maybe not. Having a cell phone allows the daters to have some freedom- texting is a great way to break into conversation without the awkward pauses, and personal numbers avoid having to go through roommates or parents. But there are bad, very bad, things that go along with having cell phones. Drunk dialing/texting is the leading cause of premature breakups.* Predictive text is as evil as it is convenient, especially if your cell is like mine and predicts “boning” instead of “coming”. And cameraphones are good for nothing. It is one thing to be silly, drunk and horny. It is another to have a topless pic of me circulating via text.
It is basically a toss-up with computers/the internet as well. Gchatting/instant messaging has all the benefits of texting, but without the annoying slang, and is easier to get away with at work and be successful at if you have fat fingers. Facebook is where it gets tricky. I like that I can check your profile to make sure you don’t have “killin dem hoes” as an interest. It saves me time, and possible injury. Checking out pics of the ex’s new fug girlfriend is fun too. However, getting messages in response to my change in relationship status is annoying, and makes me feels like poo. Oh, and please don’t judge me by that picture taken at 11pm on St. Patrick’s Day, though I will judge you on how many application requests you send me.
So back to my original question: are we so reliant on technology that it’s become difficult to even date without it? In my humble opinion, yes. Whether it is good or bad, the technological component of dating has become ingrained in the culture, and taking it out forces a re-structuring of the process- which is doable, but yes, effing difficult. More difficult than dating a techie, because at least a techie can fix your broken printer and buy you cool gifts.
*Not an actual statistic.
Following on from this post from Guido, I’d like to highlight Tom Steinberg’s petition action email list calling for parliamentary bills to be published in an internet-friendly manner.
Such a development would make access to information (through sites such as Tom’s fantastically useful TheyWorkForYou.com) not only far more specific and relevant, but would also allow techie-types to play around with the data in more creative ways, hopefully clarifying the work of parliament and politicians for the greater (ie non-geek) public.
Sign-up now! If not for yourself, then for me!
I’m still finding my feet with this so it may take me a while to settle on a background colour, style-sheet etc. blah blah blah.
To be fair, some of these templates are superb, but I still plan to add my own personal touch to it. Just not yet.
By the way, this template is ‘Fauna’ by Joen Asmussen, thanks Joen!
[Originally posted at cre.a.tive, March 12th, 2008 19:50:27]
Following on from my previous post, and with today’s Budget announcements, I wanted to bring up the use of visualisation software and it’s potential for deeper public understanding of a wide range of issues.
If you haven’t seen this video, it will change the way you think about statistics. It’s a TEDtalk from 2006 by Hans Rosling, whose organisation Gapminder offers free visualisation software for global poverty data and the like.
The simplicity of his presentations, and his obviously heartfelt passion and enthusiasm, draw you in to a world where a huge numbers actually mean something to you. This is vital when we are bombarded with statistics almost everyday, whether from the government, think tanks, or consumer groups. People can lose grasp of the real plight of people in large sections of the world, national or corporate profits and debts ranging from the millions to the trillions, and other such subjects that use really, really big numbers.
I’d be interested, after reading posts like this, as to what we’d see if someone plugged the numbers of this and past Budgets into visualisation software, and compared them to national statistics on areas such as poverty, health, and crime. Political maneuvering aside, it could reveal some interesting correlations.
Indeed, what’s the point of the government recording so much data on its citizens if only a small section of the population can understand it?
Gapminder was bought by Google last year (and you know how much data they have). You can use the software online here. Have a play around with the data, and you’ll gain new perspectives on the world.
[NB: There is another, more recent, presentation from Dr Rosling here.]
[Originally posted at cre.a.tive, March 12th, 2008 13:55:02]
It’s funny how the internet works. There I was, quietly checking my Google Reader, when I come across this post by Dizzy. Leaving the ‘who said what first’ aside, the idea of ‘crime mapping’ (the possibility of a Google Maps / Police incident report mashup) is a fascinating one. Incidents could appear as markers on maps, just as when we search for restaurants / pubs etc., with its specific details and pleas for evidence just a click away (possibly with a direct email link to the officer overseeing the case). Stacks of paper in casework folders would be revisualised in a simple and clear interface. This isn’t impossible technology; the tools needed are already in our hands.
[In fact, simply the ability to 'Geotag' photos (already available on devices such the, soon to be reviewed, GPS-enabled Nokia N95 8GB), is a development that will have a huge impact as its user-base grows, and one which I'll be exploring in a future post.]
There is a flipside to sharing police force data with the community, though perhaps only for those who are, shall we say, more sceptical about members of the constabulary….
RateMyCop.com is (or more correctly, was) a site where the public rate and comment on police officers in their community. It’s mission, according to the website, being:
>”… to compile information on cops’ performance and to provide a forum where users can freely share individual accounts. Good, bad or indifferent. Most of all, we would like to hear your stories. Your appreciation and your disapproval. Did you witness a cop doing a good deed, or were you involved in an unfortunate altercation? Tell us about it. Tell others about it. Let it out. Don’t feel intimidated by the badge to remain quiet.”
There was uproar from US police forces, who claimed that having their officers names and badge numbers available on the internet placed them in danger. With RateMyCop.com linked to from sites such as reddit.com and digg.com, and with a number of bloggers coming out in support of the project (here for example), it seemed that a new day in police accountability had dawned.
Then this morning (good old Google Reader once again), I find this post, claiming that GoDaddy, the host of RateMyCop.com, had pulled the plug. According to the article the site had been shut down for ’suspicious activity’.
There lies RateMyCop.com, 28/02/08 - 11/03/08.
There are of course innumerable differences between both the behaviour and the public perception of the police forces of the UK and US, but I do wonder how a UK based ‘RateMyBobby’ would pan out. In my mind, it would go hand-in-hand with the development of ‘crime-mapping’, so those contributing to the safety and security of communities are seen to be more accountable and available to law-abiding citizens.
Accountability for public sector workers, from those walking their beat in some of most deprived areas in the country, to those sipping fine wines in the corridors of power, is one of the ever-growing powder kegs in British politics. Whether or not the internet and digital technologies will be used to light the fuse remains to be seen.
