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 […]
Browse by year
Latest
-
Carter gets it
How does 15 years working his way up the greasy pole in an ad agency followed by two years in the number two spot at a collapsing cable firm prepare…
-
How news is made
Matt Wells writes up last week’s Oxford Media Convention in The Guardian. He focuses on Tessa Jowell’s broad hint that Greg Dyke “can’t take the licence fee for granted” at…
-
Improving on Shannon
Kevin Werbach directs me to this article from the NY Times about a fascinating extension of Claude Shannon’s basic research to bust historic radio capacity limits.
-
Hastings on war
Max Hastings, veteran war correspondent and editor – a thoughtful hawk – doesn’t want a war but doubts that we have a choice in The Sunday Telegraph. “I feel deeply…
-
The Manolo Blahnik of computers
How does Apple sustain a business ? a business that even makes a profit occasionally ? on a market share of less than 3% (so low, in fact, that it…
-
I would like to buy a car
I really would. But the Ford UK web site doesn’t work on a Macintosh. At least it doesn’t work in Netscape, Mozilla, Safari or Explorer (all latest versions) on two…
-
STAND and entitlement cards
The cyber-gerrymanderers (I’m going to keep saying that until it catches on) at STAND have done an extraordinary thing. They’ve reversed the voting for entitlement cards in the UK Government’s…
-
The Oxford Media Convention
My day in Oxford at the handsomely endowed Said Business School was fascinating – I’ve written a comment piece about it for The Guardian. Although billed as a conference on…
-
Mark Thompson at The Oxford Media Convention
Mark Thompson is Chief Exective of Channel 4. His speech at the Convention was outstanding. His principle point was that the old, Reithian language of public service means little to…
-
Ed Richards at the Oxford Media Convention
Ed Richards is The Prime Minister’s priniciple adviser on media matters. He’s a famously shadowy figure (he actually tried to dodge out of the frame as I took his picture!).…