Social network sites are becoming more and more popular and do have their place as a means of communication and, increasingly, as a source of up to the minute news. But there are limits, boundaries which should not be crossed. We have seen, recently, a couple at the altar Twittering and updating their Facebook pages during the wedding ceremony. One …
Stuck in the Channel Tunnel
Five Eurostar trains broke down in the Channel Tunnel due to the wrong type of cold weather, trapping 2,000 people, some of whom were stranded in the tunnel all night. The trains were on their way from Brussels and Paris to London when, upon entering the warmer climate of the tunnel, the electrics failed and they ground to a halt.
Photography and Section 44
Taking photographs, quick snaps or otherwise, can be a great pleasure and a means of capturing a holiday moment, chronicling the growing-up of kids or recording a momentous event for posterity. In the UK it has already become very difficult to photograph your own children, be it at play or, for example, taking part in a school sports event without …
Banks and drugs money
According to the head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, drugs money worth billions of dollars kept the financial system afloat at the height of the global crisis. It is alleged that the only liquid investment capital available to some banks on the brink of collapse last year was drugs money and that a majority of the $352 …
Top ten films
At the London Film Critics’ Circle Awards, Francis Ford Coppola’s ‘Apocalypse Now’ was crowned Best Film of the Past Three Decades. The film stars Marlon Brando and Martin Sheen is an adaptation of Joseph Conrad’s 19th Century colonial novella ‘Heart Of Darkness’. The film, by all accounts, was quite a bizarre affair, with tantrums by the likes of Brando, Sheen …
Bad influence
According to Professor Wilton: It represents a conservative political ideology that punishes individual initiative, opposes critique and change, and relegates females to supportive roles. OK, if it’s not NuLabour, then what is it? Any attempt by the down-trodden workers to break out of this controlled hierarchy to gain individual power, show initiative or dissent is met with punishment, usually because …
Live-search and Goggles, the mind boggles
It seems that hardly a day goes by when there isn’t some new announcement or launch of a new application from Google as they continue along the path to world domination. And the domination of our everyday lives. The Chrome Browser, Android phone system, a new Operating System, Google Wave, Street View, Google Goggles (try saying that after a few!) …
It doesn’t always work
An article in the ‘Daily Wag and Cleavage’ suggests that road signs for cyclists in the Elephant and Castle are over-exuberance on the part of officialdom and a sign of the domination of elf ‘n’ shifty concerns in modern life. In this case, though, the picture shows that all the effort – painted signs every few metres – appears to …
Meanwhile, in the Ukraine
Thanks to Ken for finding this one. This is the winner of the Ukrainian ‘I’ve Got Talent’ contest (can’t believe I missed it) and it is excellent, and different.