“Britain was accused yesterday of abandoning 91 Iraqi interpreters and their families to face persecution and possible death when British forces withdraw.”
I found this story yesterday but didn’t have a chance to blog it. Unlike other countries, including the US and Holland, Britain will not relax the rules on asylum for those people who have [...]

A great live-action recreation of the N64 game, GoldenEye Originally found on Break.com, here. This video from YouTube, here.

The Olympic stadium in Beijing won’t be the only thing covered in a cloud of smog next year. Chinese authorities also seem to be doing their best to create a smokescreen over other issues in the country, ranging from spitting in public to major human rights abuses. While lifting the cloud of smog which hangs [...]

“By effectively doubling the working life of every PC, re-use provides a simple and practical way for companies to reduce their environmental footprint and successfully re-distribute such valuable learning tools.”
The BCS Ethics Forum argues that we should preferentially re-use the 125 million PCs that we get rid of each year, rather than recycling them. As [...]

There are quite a few interesting articles out there which look at the problems arising from having “walled garden” social networks. ZDNet has an interesting article which looks at the “social capital” people have locked up on different sites such as Facebook and LinkedIn. Kottke talks about Facebook specifically, comparing the closed network with the [...]

“[Tony Blair said,] ‘Our values are not western values. They are human values, and anywhere, any time people are given the chance, they embrace them.’ These sentences betrayed a total ignorance of the range of customs, convictions and prejudices that govern human behaviour in a multitude of different societies.”
Jenni Russell hits the nail on the [...]

“But when, even the fumes of heroin fail to offer that satiating trip to the world of hallucination, the addicts move on to another addiction. The elite of south Gujarat, bored with the mundane dope, have found a new high — the scorpion sting.”
The Times of India reports on a new craze for the wealthy [...]

Picture this. You’re a reporter who wants to go undercover at a security conference in order to catch someone confessing to a hacking crime. However, your intentions are revealed online days beforehand. The conference organisers have your name, and ask four times whether you would like a press pass, but you refuse. Yet you still [...]

“There’s one vote that Rudy Giuliani definitely can’t count on in his 2008 presidential bid: his own daughter’s. According to the 17-year-old Caroline Giuliani’s Facebook profile, she’s supporting Barack Obama.”
It’s public knowledge that Giuliani’s children from his second marriage don’t have a good relationship with their father. However, supporting his potential opponent from the other [...]

“Forensic tests are being carried out on suspected traces of blood found in the apartment where Madeleine McCann was last seen … The BBC understands British police were invited to review key aspects of the case by their Portuguese counterparts.”
It sounds like the Portuguese police have been totally inept with their investigation. Having searched Robert [...]

“We shouldn’t have to be computer mechanics in order to be productive any more than we should have to be car mechanics in order to get from one destination to another with a car … By letting me be dumb about somethings [sic], I get to be smarter about others: the things that really matter [...]

“Apple has invented a novel method of disabling stolen iPods - by preventing them from charging … The company has filed a patent for a technology that recognises when a device is plugged into an unauthorised computer and, if it is, prevents any further charging.”
Similar to the way in which stolen mobile phones can be [...]

“Blame the 1970s. One of the problems holding back the uptake of energy-saving light bulbs has been that many people have still not forgotten the poor-quality versions they used then.”
Matt Prescott, founder of the Ban The Bulb campaign, takes a look at the performance of some of the many energy-saving bulbs on the market today. [...]

Microsoft has announced that it is to offer a free, ad-supported version of Works. I don’t quite understand the rationale behind this. If the company wants to keep making money from Works, surely charging for it and continuing to market it as a lower-end alternative to Office is the best option? However, if they are [...]

I love this picture - the colours, the composition, the unusual subject. Reproduced by kind permission of dailydolores from Flickr. Original here.

“To many disillusioned Italians, Selva’s ambulance stunt was just another act in the absurd pantomime of the country’s politics. Only 15% of the population expresses trust in political parties, and it’s no wonder considering how maladroit Italian pols can be.”
Time looks at the corruption and liberties taken by Italian politicians, here.

“Panorama found that films showing brutal fights between children are regularly uploaded to sharing websites … Police say the companies should monitor what is posted on their sites and remove any violent or criminal content.”
With the volume of videos added to YouTube every day, it’s just not feasible for them to check all uploads for [...]

3D Mailbox is possibly the worst idea in living memory. E-mail should aim to be one of the most productive applications a user interacts with. 3D Mailbox, on the other hand, thinks it’s a good idea to make you wander round a virtual world to check your messages. I can’t think of anything more pointless [...]

For some reason known only to fate, the laws of nature, my drinking habits, an excess of lethargy and my slacker tendencies, I haven’t posted on here for weeks. This post is mainly to apologise for this, but also to ensure that I get round to posting tomorrow lest I expose to all three of [...]