Order of the Bath

While reading the article in the New York Times linked by my previous post I noticed that there wasn’t a single link out for more information—not even the author’s blog was linked. By coincidence, the very next article I read from my daily RSS feed review was the web guru Tim O’Reilly on a very similar topic. That is that many web sites prefer to link to other articles or even just searches on their own site rather than more informative links to the outside world. Traditional news providers are bad for this but he notes that even search engines are beginning to provide information rather than link to it.

The web grew great on links—to continue it still needs those links.

There is an interesting article in the New York Times which starts by saying that Italy is allowing its quality controlled wines (their equivalent of AOC) to be sold in boxes. It goes on to say that, for ecological reasons, the rest of the world should do the same and the only hindrance so far has been the general poor quality of the wines that are boxed. It is an interesting idea that itches slightly, but I can see the point. The only thing that I would dispute is the statement that “all but a relative handful of the top wines from around the world” don’t need to age. Most wines need to age but “how long?” will determine if a box is a practical container during that time.

Now it is not my place to question God’s creation, but sometimes I wonder why some things exist.

We have just come back from holiday (that is why it was quiet on here) and the only thing that marred a very enjoyable break were certain insects. First, mosquitoes and midges—I was bitten on the back of my right hand and it swelled up so I could no longer close it. This took well over a week to go down. We were both bitten in other places and the presence of these beasts stopped us from enjoying the mild evenings sitting in the gardens.

Then there were the wasps. Fortunately only a couple of times they messed up a lunchtime picnic. Perhaps it is an irrational fear since childhood but I can’t stand the things. I thought they were attracted to sweet things like jam, fizzy drinks and beer but these seemed to love salami and smelly cheese. We also had hornets, huge ones, but fortunately they weren’t interested in us, but they insisted on getting into the car every time a door was opened.

Finally when we got home the house was infested with flies—big black slow ones. By the time we arrived most of them were dead but everything needed to be cleaned from flyspots and the corpses cleaned up; there must have been several hundred. We can only suppose that something had died under the floor but there was no smell.

So, please God, perhaps if you are doing a post project review, could you reconsider the need for these creatures?

I was in the process of preparing a post on this subject, particularly relating to Adobe, Sun, Apple and AVG, but Scott Dunn has beaten me to it so go and read his article—it is really good.

It is sad that major companies should resort to these tactics. Where I work we have an Ethical Standards Policy and I would hope that we would never do anything like this. The policy has the underlying principle “Would it look bad if reported in a newspaper” which works pretty well. That way you don’t have to worry too much about the grey areas as they sort themselves out.

Never mind that the product you are supplying is free—live with it and grow your reputation, not use it as a marketing platform for other products.

The York meeting will decide whether to accommodate opponents to women bishops and if they could opt to remain under the ministry of male bishops instead.

BBC News

I may be missing something but I don’t see what all the fuss is about. Whatever your opinion, there is already a system in place to accommodate you. After the Women priests decision some 15 years ago dissenters had a special provision made for them. If your church wanted to stick to the old ways then, after certain procedures were completed, you could elect to come under the authority of the Bishop of Ebbsfleet rather than the Diocesan. Now, presuming that those who object to Women Bishops are a smallish superset of those, surely the same procedure can apply and, in the majority of cases, is probably already in effect. I suppose that there may be a small minority who approve of one but disapprove of the other but it would hardly be worth making a lot of fuss over.

Parking cars is a real problem in our central city area and congestion is a big issue locally as well as nationally. When combined with lobbies from the Green interests as well it is a hot topic for debate. Recently the city council has issued a “consultation” document and a proposal to set one up in the greater urban area (there are already controls in the centre). The quotes are because it says a reasonable amount about the scheme but doesn’t allow much opportunity for response apart from directly lobbying the councillors. Also the public exhibitions are bang in the middle of the holiday season.

The initial thoughts were that it was a good idea. £40 per year does not seem unreasonable that a space, though not guaranteed, should be available. They say it is for administration and enforcement and, to adequately patrol the area will be expensive. A system that is not enforced will be worse than we have now. Studying it more closely we came up with some issues that they apparently have not considered (or are not telling us about). These thoughts may only apply to our immediate area and others have have a different experience. (Nice picture of our church on the front by the way.)

There is a neighbouring street, presumably within our zone, which contains a number of restaurants, bars and pubs. Their businesses will suffer if they cannot attract customers from a wide area due to no parking being available. Although we often curse the load this places on space in the evenings, it dramatically affects the character of where we live. The business permits don’t allow for this. Similarly, our church is inside a zone close by (the one in the picture); we usually walk, but worshippers come from all over. There is very limited off road space—no more than 8 cars. It may also force it to get officious and get stranger’s cars removed.

What happens if our parking zone is full? The situation now is that we tour the area in ever increasing circles until we find a space but if those are barred to us due to being in another zone then what do we do? It rather depends on how large our zone is and what sort of streets it covers. They say a zone will be 300-500 households which does not seem very large.

Strictly enforced planning will need to be applied to stop the area being blighted by the loss of front gardens converted to off road parking. Also the practice of stripping the entire front garden to create a 25′ wide standing and corresponding haulage way must be stopped as this will remove a disproportionate number of street spaces. Indeed, existing wide haulage ways must be restricted to only that required for access.

They talk about providing double yellows (no parking) markings for corners and access ways. Although this is a serious problem with access to some roads becoming very difficult due to stupid parking, a strict adherence to the highway code requirements is unnecessary and would significantly curtail the available spaces.

Where does one buy visitors permits and what will be the arrangement for carry over to following years if too many were estimated. We will not be wanting to traipse down to the council house nor will we be happy to have too much capital tied up “just in case” nor if they expire prematurely.

They will charge £80 for a second permit and this is not bank breaking either though it makes you think twice about needing a second car. The third is shown as £500—now this clearly has nothing to do with costs, this is to stop people even considering getting one. I can see that they might want to use it to restrict multiple occupancy houses in the area (mostly students around us) but some of the families have three people where an adult child is working in a different part of the city but has not yet left home. Why force them to set up independently when there is also a housing crisis. The public transport would have to be a lot better to compensate. Those of us who live in the centre often work on the outskirts and there are few bus services.They say that even a second permit will not be available in some (unspecified) zones. This would be unacceptable.

A final thought came from thinking deeply about our immediate area. I came to the conclusion that, apart from the bar/restaurant evening load, our parking problem is mostly self inflicted. Stopping non-residents parking will make no difference at all because they don’t. We are too far from the city centre for commuters. The only way that is likely to affect us is if restrictions closer in force the commuters out to our patch. If that is the case, then where do you draw the limit? So when it comes to it, we want to manage our own parking, with help if needed to enforce safety restrictions where necessary.

In these troubled times I find myself agreeing with people that previously I had very little time for. Last week it was David Davis MP (Conservative). Today it is Helena Kennedy QC (Labour) on the same subject. She writes in The Independent…

The Government has justified its abandonment of civil liberties on the basis that this is what is required for security reasons and it is what the public wants. Yet when people are given the real facts, they are usually aghast at the catalogue of inroads into our liberties, often unaware of just how extensive the salami slicing has been. The steady flow of power away from the citizen to the state has been extraordinary.

One of the great values of being a British citizen has been the strong sense that we are not here at the behest of the state; the state is here at our behest. That was why policemen could not just stop us and demand to know who we were or where we were going. It was why we did not have to have an internal passport, as is now being put in train with ID cards. It was also why, if we were arrested, we would have to be charged promptly. We knew that to give police the power to lock people up for weeks on end while they went looking for evidence was a recipe for serious abuse.

It is the existence of these quiet but enduring entitlements that are at the core of our national being. When people hear the evidence they often take a different view of what government should be doing. David Davis knows that and wants to win the argument so that his own party sees it is not an electoral handicap but a bonus to espouse liberty.

Is this for real?

If so, as Matt says, we should be using headsets at all times.

Update: No, it is a hoax, but I was taken in for a bit. Now how was it done? and why? (answer 2)