Highlights
Count Binface and electoral theatre
Don’t be a costumed loon — It’s trivially easy to stand for Parliament in the UK. Any loon can do so. You need ten electors to nominate you and £500 for a deposit – and it’s actually been getting easier. The deposit was introduced in 1918 (£150 – quite a lot of money then). Before […]
I hate this
But does it matter? — I don’t usually say that sort of thing here. I try to be more measured, less personal. I’m talking about the police face recognition vans obviously. This might not surprise you: I mean that I don’t like them. I’m an old git after all, a man who’s written here before […]
Where is my patriotism?
Come, love of country, fill my heart… — I do love Britain. I guess I love England more. London most of all. I hope that in my life I’ve honoured the place I live and not disgraced it or undermined it (I support England and GB in sporting events – I fly a little flag […]
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Telly events
Are you planning to go to either the Edinburgh TV Festival 22–24 August or to the RTS’s Cambridge Convention 18–20 September? If you are, drop me a line.
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Spoiler shame? Not really.
David Liddiment knows his stuff (and his column is one of the several very good reasons to buy Media Guardian Mondays) but he’s reading the BBC’s mission through the distorting…
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The wonders of capitalism – or something
I don’t pretend to understand the food manufacturing business at all but this invention – “the first media technology that is put into the mouth” according to its promoters (at the…
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Deflation – don’t sweat it…
Brad DeLong (who is, like, you know, the Dickens of economists or something – at least in terms of output – and, as far as I know, is also the…
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Brands have been wiped out for less
Nike is a big firm and golf is a teeny tiny part of its portfolio but the economic fallout from Tiger Woods’ decision to dump his custom-engineered Nike clubs in…
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Holiday diversions, part 1
The Royal Airforce Museum at Hendon is a top day out with the kids – especially now that, like all national museums and galleries – it’s free. It’s a pretty sobering…
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Biotech overload
Glenn Crocker in New Scientist says that too many biotech firms are started and too few allowed to go bust when it becomes evident that they’re not going to work.…
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No. I do not have a Nectar card
Rachel Shabi in The Guardian’s Saturday magazine has got herself all worked up about loyalty cards and RFID tags. She’s probably right to worry. In the advanced economies we’re consumers…
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Berger on Palestine
John Berger is brilliant and infuriating: Bolshevik, poet, monk. The man who gave his Booker Prize money (for G) to the Black Panthers and radicalised a whole generation of art…
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A new role for Government: bullying the well-off
James Crabtree and Noah Curthoys from the Work Foundation’s iSociety research project have written a report about e-government targets. They think the current goal of getting 100% of government services…
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Thinking ahead
At the House of Commons event the other day I ran into a futurist called Susan Clayton. I like futurists. They do important work reminding us to remember our descendants.…
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Early retirement, Mr Kaufman?
You don’t have to be a Dykista (A Dykie?) to think that DCMS Select Committee Chairman Gerald Kaufman’s attack on the corporation yesterday was unprincipled, opportunistic – really a politically…