Author Archive
Start spamming young…
Now, look, I know Twitter meant this image as a joke … … but the line “I’m a 7 year old SEO GURU!” just soooo reminded me of the Geekversity Instant Expert Shaun Stenning so breathlessly promoted by down-on-their-luck ‘property experts‘. I needed to visit Twitter’s how to respond to spammy mentions page after I […]
‘Frivolous’ Palin won’t be meeting Margaret Thatcher
Litmus test/IQ test Little Miss Polarising Sarah Palin faced a wee knock-back in her [alleged] efforts to ride The Iron Lady’s coat-tails … Margaret Thatcher to Sarah Palin: don’t bother dropping by — The Guardian, Wintour and Watt blog: It would appear that the reasons go deeper than Thatcher’s frail health. Her allies believe that […]
Negative credibility
Ha! I like this concept … Writing on The Guardian‘s Comment is free website — Andrew Breitbart and the unwilling suspension of disbelief about the right wing web maven who ‘exposed’ Rep. Weiner — Dan Gillmor referred to his model of ‘negative credibility‘ and included this neat graphic: Gillmor’s article is worth reading, as, like the erudite j-school […]
Make no little plans
Inspiring. Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men’s blood and probably themselves will not be realized. Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will never die, but long after we are gone will be a living thing, asserting itself with ever-growing […]
A cost of doing business – celebrity as meat
Good to read that Murdoch’s The News of the World has admitted hacking Sienna Miller’s phone message system and repeatedly violating her privacy … and news today that they’ve ‘apologised’ and are paying £100,000 in damages and costs to her. Big deal. Callous so-and-sos. It was purely business to them, the journalists, the editors, the […]
There’s no denying Sarah Palin is a talking point
I’ve resisted referring to Sarah Palin’s latest, umm, riff on American history, wherein she inserted words, actions, motivations and personnel into Paul Revere’s midnight ride … errr, he warned the British that ‘the British are coming’? PALIN: He who warned, uh, the British that they weren’t going to be taking away our arms uh by […]
Self-inflicted wounds
Hey. Remember my post Lying, my dear boy, just compounds the crime …? This whole ‘Congressman tweets picture of private parts’ hullaballoo proves the truth of it, huh? Oh boy. A journalist I follow on Twitter, Glenn Greenwald, asked the question: What % of those pushing the view that “any online sexual activity is newsworthy” […]
As part of this settlement, you agree not to tell the truth …
This clause, apparently an excerpt from a settlement between the borrower-victims of a mortgage issued by GE as part of the Blue Chip scandal, reminds me of something … “The borrowers agree not to comment adversely about the mortgagee or any member of the General Electric group of companies whether in New Zealand or elsewhere, […]
Sean Wood and Steve Goodey: Read the fine print
Oh boy! These, apparently, are the terms and conditions of the ‘lucky prize draw’ I referred to in my post Calling all gullible gamblers! They seem very complicated — totalling 1,114 words. An ‘Entrant Selection Draw’ followed by a separate ‘Main Prize Draw’ wherein a lucky punter (who needed to be physically be in the […]
Sarah Palin … who’s taking who for a ride?
This put it nicely. No one is fooled, really. But the conventions and protocols of “reporting” requires pretending otherwise. Contrary to a lot of our readers, I don’t think the answer is for the media to ignore Palin. Pointing out her ridiculousness doesn’t build her up and doesn’t give her oxygen without which she would […]
Dick Quax heir apparent no more
Final result THE full result of the Howick ward by-election for Auckland Council is: • Dick Quax (C&R): 11,600 • Maggie Burrill (Ind): 7023 • David Collings (Ind): 5393 • Penny Bright (Ind): 1491 • Wayne Young (Ind): 1349 • Ram Parkash: 1116 A total of 28,072 votes were cast, or 30.9 per cent of […]
Moral courage and standing in scorn, part 2 (in love)
What seems like a long time ago, but was only July 2009, in the early days of this blog, I wrote a post Moral courage — being willing to stand in scorn: So, in the end, each one of us has to find our own moral centre – the place inside us from which our […]
Bradley Manning – out of place in the US army?
The Guardian has produced a video of their investigation into the background of accused WikiLeaks source/security leaker Bradley Manning, showing he was (apparently) regarded as mentally and socially unfit to be deployed to Iraq. It reveals that Manning’s discharge from the army prior to deployment to Baghdad was reversed because of the severe shortage of […]
Blast from the past has lessons for today
A very clear and loud whistle was blown … Born in London from German parents, Frederick Voigt was the Manchester Guardian correspondent in Germany from 1920 to 1933. Voigt was one of the most important of the newspaper’s foreign team in the 30s, becoming famous for exposing the threat of the Nazi regime Today, when […]
‘Ethnic cleanser’ Mladic will face trial
About time. see Ratko Mladic: Legend, Monster And Coward – How The Serbian Soldier Rose To Notoriety by Sam Kiley at Sky News
