This entry was posted on
Saturday, August 16th, 2003 at
1:27 pm and is filed
under Uncategorized.
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Date
20030816
Time
13:27
Independent poll shows 25% of voters in favour of Lt. Gov. Cruz M. Bustamante. Arnie follows close behind at 22%. Poor old Gary Coleman doesn’t even appear to rate a single digit.
BTW, all the short-cuts made to bring this ridiculous recall in under budget have finally elicited a response from the folks who are supposed to authorise such changes to the voting system. Apparently they may act.
Altogether now: Ooooooooh!
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Date
20030816
Time
15:50
Bye-bye Idi Amin. I’m sure that history will forgive you.
You were, after all, merely a harmless buffoon who liked to play soldiers… right?
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Date
20030818
It’s War! And Things Is Getting Ridiculous!
Time
09:21
US unveils new secret weapon – photoshopping!
1. Using photoshopping for political ends? Damn, wish I’d thought of that. Devilishly clever, the U.S. Army.
2. I do hope that said army plans to seek the permission of the creators of these images before using them on the streets of Iraq.
3. I do hope that The Guardian sought of the permission creators of these images before using them on their front page.
4. I can’t help but wonder what would happen if an Iraqi citizen chose to put up posters of George Bush with breasts.
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Date
20030818
Time
09:26
US troops shoot Reuters cameraman in Iraq. They mistook his camera for a rocket propelled grenade launcher. Easy mistake to make.
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Date
20030818
Time
09:28
Hanging Day on the possibility of U.N. reform. Read, learn and laugh out loud.
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Date
20030818
Time
09:31
Dale and his readers ponder the significance of the Universal Church of the Interactive Network.
Note to self: find out who this Lain fella is.
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Date
20030818
Time
09:33
The beginner’s guide to Sumo wrestling (link via TTR2).
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Date
20030818
Time
09:35
Homeless woman incarcerated for stealing a shopping cart. She spent a week in the cells before a journalist pointed out the obvious.
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Date
20030818
The Big Blackout
Time
09:38
Power outage traced to dim bulb in the White House. Deregulation strikes again.
Also, see John Wehr’s photos of New Yorker’s aimlessly wandering the streets and read some tips from Iraqis for dealing with a blackout in hot conditions.
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Date
20030818
Time
09:46
Build a goddess in your own back yard. Remember, you’re not breaking the second commandment if you refer to it as an icon.
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Date
20030818
Time
09:49
Hospital elevator doors sever doctor’s head in freak accident.
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Date
20030818
The Political Weblog Movement
Time
09:51
Tom Watson and Richard Allan have been interviewed by BBC Radio regarding the political effectiveness of weblogs. Yours truly also rated a mention. Cheers, Tom.
The content has been syndicated, thus the report from Elena that I scored airtime on Australian radio. An archived sound file should appear here later today.
I may be getting my wires crossed, but I’m pretty sure that this eventuated because of interest in Tom’s Teens page. This post from Tom seems to confirm that.
While we’re on the subject, Wibbler reports that FHM forgot to scroll down and included a link to the Teens page in their newsletter, citing it as genuine.
It amazes me that, with at least a dozen giveways in the text and now the new message at the bottom of the page, that this continues to fool people.
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Date
20030818
Flash Games
Time
10:05
Throw things at your boss and go ‘Tony Martin’ on some intruders. Then do try to get some work done. The economy won’t fix itself.
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Date
20030818
It’s War! And Somebody’s Telling Porkies!
Time
10:08
The Guardian on biased reporting of the Hutton Inquiry.
Rupert Murdoch’s major rag The Sun is running a week-long feature on asylum seekers to keep the masses distracted, starting with this wonderful piece based on a survey of Sun readers. I’m sure you can guess what the results are.
UPDATE – Topping the Blogdex chart this morning is a right old Beeb-basher of an article. Find out what other bloggers are saying about it by clicking here or here.
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Date
20030818
Photoshopping
Time
10:54
Hehehe. Here’s a right-old blast from the past that I tripped over today when looking for images of anti-war protestors.
This week’s B3ta comp is the double-take challenge. I woke up with this in my head this morning (that’s why I had to go anti-war image surfing). It’s just been front-paged (read the related B3ta thread here).
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Date
20030818
Christianity Watch
Time
13:39
Almost forgot to blog this: Vatican ‘ordered abuse cover-up’
The initial spin is that this was for the good of the victims.
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Date
20030818
Time
17:32
Warren Ellis writes a book via a weblog! Bloody great, and only up to part 6 if you want to jump on board.
(Ellis is the author of Transmetropolitan, a downright tasty series of graphic novels. His main/personal weblog is here.)
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Date
20030818
Time
17:39
Be the geekiest kid on your block with a Star Wars credit card!
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Date
20030819
The Political Weblog Movement
Time
09:20
That radio interview with Tom Watson and Richard Allan is finally live at this page (NetNews 17/08/03 ).
Direct links to media files: Realplayer | WMV
Hehe. ‘Honestnessness’….?
Do excuse me, it was my first radio interview.
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Date
20030819
Only Interesting to Bloggers
Time
09:24
Harsh words, ill-advised posts, and a visit from Child Protective Services. It all looks very messy. I’m staying out of it.
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Date
20030819
Games
Time
09:31
Lemmings and zombies, death and disease. What a lovely way to start the day.
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Date
20030819
Time
09:46
Mark Wards gets in on the dangers of Word documents and, as Hanging Day points out, pads this summer story with superfluous technical cleveryness.
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Date
20030819
Time
09:52
A satellite image of NYC looking pretty dark.
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Date
20030819
Time
09:53
Single males ‘between the ages of 21 and 30 with a steady job, a love of children, strong morals, and no criminal baggage’ can feel free to audition for a chance to date this woman’s daughter. Think carefully before you do. Can you imagine what this woman would be like as a mother-in-law?
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Date
20030819
The Political Weblog Movement
Time
09:56
*sigh*
I’ve commented before on my doubts about Howard Dean being presented as Political Blogger Prime. That he rarely posts on his own damn site might suggest to some that he doesn’t quite get it.
Now, Howard Dean’s team has admitted to spamming.
To their credit, they’ve admitted the mistake (resulting from trusting a dodgy contractor) and seem pretty serious about not letting it happen again.
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Date
20030819
Time
10:02
If you’ve recently been overheard making disparaging remarks about George W. Bush that may or may not be feasibly construed as a threat, then take heart. With this handy guide to SWAT team hand signals, you’ll know exactly what the squad of black-clad government-approved gun-nuts on your front lawn are up to right up to the moment when they slap the cuffs on (or accidentally pop a cap in your ass).
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Date
20030819
Time
10:06
A criminal recently broke into a the home of an artist and found what he thought was a head in jar. He immediately informed the authorities. For the exciting conclusion to this story, tune into the BBC or Canada.com News.
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Date
20030819
Christianity Watch
Time
10:14
Ahahahahahahaha!
This quick study of Christian sex-education LPs is a fantastic find from The Ultimate Insult. The relevant MP3 files are pretty hefty, but Scott’s 100% on the money when he says that they’re worth the download.
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Date
20030819
Only Interesting to Bloggers
Time
10:16
RSS feeds, aggregators… * oh, sorry… I dropped off for a moment there.
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Date
20030819
Time
10:19
Hooray for the triumphant return of the Tasmanian tiger!
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Date
20030819
Yet Another Lame Quiz
Time
11:43
How Tolerant Are You? is a quiz meant to promote this campaign. They want to ‘get people of all faiths and none to give time to each other.’
Prince Naseem thinks it’s ‘wicked.’ In a good way.
1. The quiz is spread over two pages for some reason.
2. It hits you with an email capture function before you can get to your results.
3. Then, when it presents your results, it doesn’t allow you to show these on your website via a simple copy and paste mechanism. It does allow you to forward a link to another person by email via a pretty bog-standard referral tool, but that doesn’t let you automatically reveal your results, either.
This is not how the quiz format is supposed to work, people…
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Date
20030819
It’s War! And Somebody’s Telling Porkies!
Time
13:05
No 10 knew: Iraq no threat.
Downing Street chief of staff, Jonathan Powell, sent the following private warning a week before the dodgy dossier was released:
“We will need to make it clear in launching the document that we do not claim that we have evidence that (Saddam Hussein) is an imminent threat.”
Now, let’s look at what the world leaders had to say for themselves in the eve of war:
Tony Blair: “Iraq continues to deny that it has any weapons of mass destruction, although no serious intelligence service anywhere in the world believes it.”
Oh, really? What about our own intelligence service, then?
George W Bush: “Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised.”
Other governments? Oh, that’ll be us then. Sorry, we were wrong. Actually, we were lying our asses off to help out our special-friends-in-need, but it certainly got the job done, didn’t it?
Stress levels rising. Red mist descending. Please pass the kittens.
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Date
20030819
Time
16:01
Blast hits UN building in Baghdad. It was a car-bomb, not a confused marine.
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Date
20030819
Time
17:22
It seems like every man and his dog wants to tell B3tans about the giant gerbil infestation in China. Trust me, they know.
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Date
20030820
Time
10:25
Some mornings it just doesn’t pay to get out of bed.
I have a hat-full of headaches today, so there’s going to be very little bloggage.
I would, however, like to draw your attention to the following shameless attempt by The Sun to downplay the importance of the Hutton Inquiry.
Oh, and do update and scan today. Judging by the number of virus attachments that arrived at my main email address this morning, at least a few of you seem to be infected with the Nachi worm (which bizarrely, seems to have been created to destroy the MSBlast virus). The Symantec profile on this is here.
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Date
20030820
Tony Blair’s Email: The Delivery!
Time
20:03
Well, how about that? I did it!
You can now email Tony Blair via this web page – and it only took 304 days, 17 hours, 44 minutes and 54 seconds to make it happen.
I’ve just sent the following email via the service:
Dear Tony,
Congratulations and welcome to the Interwebnet. You may get some stick about the web-based format and the front-end filtering on this email service, but I think it’s a damn fine idea.
I hope you enjoy the benefits of immediate feedback, and maybe even get a kick out of successfully answering the odd email or two.
All the best,
Tim Ireland
https://www.bloggerheads.com/
PS – OK, that’s game. I win. Now *you* get to make naked pictures of *me*.
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Date
20030820
Tim Ireland’s RSS: The Promise
Time
21:51
Fair comment.
OK, it will take a lot of effort to migrate to a new system to sort permalinks and what not, but I’m sure I can handle an interim RSS feed. Good enough?
Somebody showed me a sample via Sitescooper or something like that, but I’ll take any suggestions if you’ve got ’em.
Fast, easy and effective. That’s all I ask.
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Date
20030820
Tony Blair’s Email: The Delivery!
Time
22:35
Aaaand, KableNET are first with the story!
No mention of the campaign (funny, I sent them an angry email days ago) but this article does point out that the facility was ‘tested and developed (over) the past nine months.’
If Tim Yeo dares to poke his head above the parapet and take credit, I am going to be very upset and uncontrollably vocal about that.
Oh, has anyone else noticed how closely they followed my specifications? I’m having a quiet little think about that, let me tell you.
I can’t help but wonder how much of that £11,000 I’m entitled to…
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Date
20030821
Tony Blair’s Email: The Delivery!
Time
09:00
We did it!
You, me, and everybody else who linked, mailed, faxed and acted to support the 11-month-long campaign.
For those who missed the announcement late yesterday, you can now send an email to Tony Blair via the following URL:
http://www.number-10.gov.uk/output/Page821.asp
I was up until 2am sending ‘thank you’ emails to everybody who supported the campaign (if I’ve missed anyone, I do apologise).
Special thanks go out to the following people:
My local MP Sue Doughty, who tabled the first written question in Parliament.
Tom Watson, who backed the campaign in many ways (we deleted 9.1Mb of Tony Blair’s email in his office), tabled a follow-up question in parliament and was so inspired by the way we took action on this that he decided to join us in the blogosphere.
My two Downing St spies (who should probably remain anonymous), who provided vital inside information.
Kevin Marks, who provided us with the fantastic interim measure of an email-to-fax address.
And – last, but by no means least – Cherie Blair, who took the time to answer my email, was very sporting about the whole nude image thing, and whose timely influence helped me to (finally) get through to Tony’s interwebnet team.
Now, we move onto the small matter of the design of the service. It gets a chilly reception at The Guardian, along with the inevitable comparison to the recent changes at Dubya’s website, but if you take a close look at the specifications laid out back in January you’ll see that the new service pretty much follows these specs to the letter.
The specifications called for ‘a form format with a hidden destination,’ and this is precisely what they’ve delivered. I’m not sure what form the automated and direct replies take yet, but I’ll be watching very closely and will let you know as and when.
The specifications also contained the following recommendation:
“I accept that you don’t have time to read everything (or even close to 1% of it), this is why those who do deal with your email should classify each and every valid message according to the issue it addresses and the position it takes on this issue – then make a record of it (e.g. hunting-for, immigrants-against). A table can then be drawn up to give you a weekly overview of direct feedback. A simple program should suffice, but it will have to be reasonably intelligent, otherwise you might get the idea that a policy of hunting immigrants will win you the next election.”
The Downing St site, which actually has a modest filtering device on the front-end to start this process, also announces that:
“All e-mail messages are read and each month the Prime Minister receives a report on the issues raised, together with a representative sample of individual e-mails.”
That’s not only a damn fine result, it pretty much warrants an invoice.
Updates will follow throughout the day. Given that the release from Downing St makes it clear that work on this facility began in earnest 9 months ago, I can’t wait to see if Tim Yeo will dare to take the credit.
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Date
20030821
Tony Blair’s Email: News and Linkage
Time
09:37
Heh. The BBC hasn’t mentioned it on their news site, but at least they’ve told the kids about it.
TTR2 is encouraging people to email Tony Blair today, as is Wibbler.
Hip-hips and huzzahs:
Bar Room Philosophy
Martin Lloyd’s MBA Experience
Ramblings and Revelations
Voxpolitics
Off On a Tangent
Slugger O’Toole
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Date
20030821
Time
09:55
Bride-rage ends in arrest! The story is great, and the accompanying mugshot is to die for.
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Date
20030821
Time
10:20
Pauline Hanson jailed for electoral fraud! My day just keeps getting betterer and betterer. (Link via this excellent entry at Bar Room Philosophy.)
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Date
20030821
Time
11:13
Sobig-F fastest growing virus ever. Ten scrubbed copies of this have arrived in my Inbox over the last hour alone. There were well over 100 that arrived yesterday.
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Date
20030821
Search Engine Optimisation
Time
11:19
Yahoo prepares to dump Google. Testing is taking place via their Australian portal, which will surprise a few bods who expected this to take place in the UK first.
Don’t expect change anytime soon. If the Inktomi database isn’t up to scratch, this could take a while.
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Date
20030821
Time
12:14
The Guardian has launched a new weblog with a great central porpoise.
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Date
20030821
Riding High on Blogdex
Time
12:33
I’ve checked today’s blog with the Gender Genie and I’m sure you’ll be happy to know that I don’t write like a complete girl. (Unless of course you test any of my articles or campaign pages. For some strange reason, these ooze oestrogen.)
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Date
20030821
Tony Blair’s Email: News and Linkage
Time
13:12
ZDNet – Prime minister gets email: “The news is seen as a personal triumph for Tim Ireland, an Internet enthusiast who has spent the last three years campaigning for the prime minister to become an email user.”
Inches and linkage. Result!
Of course, the core campaign has only been running for 11 months, but I’m sure we can forgive minor inaccuracies on such a happy, happy day.
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Date
20030821
Tom Watson: Campaign Hijacker
Time
14:22
ITV reports on the launch of the service and gives credit to Tom Watson.
*What*?!
Right, nude images of Tom start in 5, 4, 3, 2…
(Yes, I’m kidding. This isn’t the first time Tom’s comments have been edited to remove vital big-ups and name-checks. That’s one of the reasons why the man runs a weblog.)
UPDATE – Oh, I do love the arrogance of established media. From the same release by Tom comes this piece from the BBC. Please note that, as a mere mortal, I am deemed unworthy of a name-check on the BBC website. And rightly so.
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Date
20030821
It’s War! And Somebody’s Telling Porkies!
Time
14:42
Bogus Blair, Bogus Bush: “For the most part, American media is doing a lousy job of following the British investigation of how Blair and his aides spun the case for war with Iraq. From a journalistic standard, that’s bizarre because the story of official deceit in Britain is also the story of official deceit in the United States.”
Well said, that man.
UPDATE – Today, the Hutton Inquiry revealed David Kelly predicted back in February that he would be ‘found dead in the woods’ if Iraq was invaded.
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Date
20030821
Photoshopping
Time
15:35
I’m in a jolly good mood today. Does it show?
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Date
20030822
Time
09:46
Bloody hell! 130 copies of SoBig waiting for me this morning – at 100Kb a time. One can only imagine how this is crippling the network. It must be hell for modem users, too.
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Date
20030822
Time
09:49
Popmates – pick your favourite album, movie and book and find a partner. A neat idea, but where’s the function that lets me seek out people who hate the stuff I like? I think that’s where the secret of true love lies.
My wife and I have a great partnership, but she hates it when I play Sgt. Pepper over and over, she can take or leave Star Wars and I’ve never been able to get her to read 1984.
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Date
20030822
Time
09:58
Your Marketing Sucks! Heh. A snappy title, and the manifesto looks pretty good. I may just buy a copy. (Link via Off On a Tangent.)
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Date
20030822
A Blog Is Born
Time
10:14
This new blog from Iraq comes highly recommended from Hanging Day. It even got a heads-up from Salam Pax.
From a comment on the bombing of the UN building:
“You know what? Something like this could never happen to the Ministry of Oil. The Ministry of Oil is being guarded 24/7 by tanks and troops. It has been guarded ever since the fall of Baghdad and will continue under Bremer’s watchful eye until every last drop of oil is gone.”
This entry will chill you to the bone.
Ignore me for the rest of the day. Go and read her instead.
If you need it, Hanging Day have even taken the the initiative and sorted out an RSS feed. Enjoy.
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Date
20030822
Time
12:36
PRESS RELEASE
After an 11-month campaign to bring about a serviceable public email facility for Tony Blair, marketing consultant Tim Ireland has decided to invoice Downing Street for his contribution to the development of the service.
“The campaign went well beyond a simple demand for the service,” said Ireland, “the aim was to bring about a truly viable and beneficial solution and to that end I provided a lot of information about how that could be best achieved.”
Ireland was in an excellent position to do so. Via a quirk in search engine results, a hoax address he created in 2000 started getting regular email intended for the PM, which provided an excellent overview of how a simple published address would be used – and abused – by the public.
In January, he submitted to Downing Street (and published on his weblog at bloggerheads.com) full specifications for a workable service, including recommendations for a web-based interface, subject filtering and weekly reports to be reviewed by the PM.
The new service uses a web-based interface with subject filtering and monthly reports to be reviewed by the PM.
“I’m very happy that an efficient facility has finally been put into place,” said Ireland via his weblog, “This new system is beneficial to the public and to Tony Blair, at minimal cost to the taxpayer. It’s a very well-conceived system, and I should know. I conceived it.”
The £2000 invoice submitted to Downing St is for ‘provision of specifications for Tony Blair’s email facility,’ but adds that there is ‘no charge’ for ‘provision of impetus.’
Tom Watson, a Labour MP, active blogger and valued supporter of the campaign, said: “There is a remarkable similarity between Mr Ireland’s proposal and the format of the new Downing Street email facility. At the very least he deserves credit for coming up with a very good solution to a difficult IT problem.”
The small matter of simple recognition appears to be on Tim Ireland’s mind as well. The invoice he faxed to Downing Street closes by saying that ‘an official statement from Downing St acknowledging my contribution to the project will be accepted in lieu of payment.’
—
Links and Contacts
New email service for Tony Blair:
http://www.number-10.gov.uk/output/Page821.asp
Original specifications:
https://www.bloggerheads.com/x-archive.asp?viewblog=20030120&date=20/01/03
Campaign:
https://www.bloggerheads.com/can_weblogs/tony_blair.asp
Please refer any questions about this press release to manic@bloggerheads.com
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Date
20030822
Time
14:31
SoBig update: Organised criminals marry spam and viruses.
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Date
20030822
Flash Music Video
Time
15:56
Stickman: Weapon of Choice is… sorry, I just don’t have the words for it. Turn your speakers on and click for yourself. (Link via the B3ta newsletter.)
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Date
20030823
Updates
Time
18:50
My Photoshopping gallery has now (finally) been updated from a sequential selection to a categorised one. I wasted an entire Saturday afternoon on it, but it may be rough in places. Watch your step.
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Date
20030825
Time
09:10
Australian readers: If you have a copy of yesterday’s Sun Herald, please hang onto it. I may be requesting a scan of the Sports section tomorrow.
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Date
20030825
Time
09:18
Cackhanded ‘viral’ marketing from the music industry? Heaven forfend.
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Date
20030826
Time
09:09
Connection… slow… downloading.. *ungh* purging… 702… copies… of.. SoBigvirus… from… mailserver!
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Date
20030826
How Weblogs Work
Time
09:12
An associate of mine brought an online diarist to my attention when that diarist made a mention of Tony Blair’s email late last week. His email address was published on his site, so I sent him a copy of my press release.
He got in touch with Tom and myself yesterday an not only published a short write-up, but also got in touch – via Tony Blair’s new email facility – to ask how likely it would be that I would actually get any form of recognition for my input.
I’ve got a crazy feeling that this diarist is more likely that you or I to get a reply. And when you see the diary entry you’ll know why.
Inches and action? Heh. I love it.
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Date
20030826
Only Interesting to Bloggers
Time
09:15
See blog entries pop up across the globe in real time. (Fabbo link via TTR2.)
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Date
20030826
Photoshopping
Time
09:17
The launch of the revamped and – finally – categorised photoshopping collection has caused yet another revival of the Star Wars Photoshopping Project. I even got a couple of (v.good) suggestions over the weekend for the first time in a long time. Funny what a little context will do.
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Date
20030826
Riding High on Blogdex
Time
09:20
Greg Dyke, director general of the BBC, has announced plans to give the public full access to all the corporation’s programme archives.
There’s an excellent piece on this over at Hanging Day, which is also charting well.
Oh, but it bears mentioning that your personal share of the archive – if stored on a recordable CD – may not last as long as you think.
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Date
20030826
Time
09:24
Texas man has wallet returned. It was found in Okinawa – where he lost it in 1957.
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Date
20030826
Christianity Watch
Time
09:28
Autistic 8-year-old boy dies when smothered by sheets during prayer service. They were trying to exorcise the ‘evil spirits’ responsible for his condition.
Not that all American are religious nutbags, but I’ve wondered aloud in the past how a country built on the idea of the separation church and state should be so ruled by religion.
Well, not just religion. Rupert ‘The Evil One’ Murdoch provides several state-approved channels for the heathens, too.
Can I just take this opportunity to apologise for Rupert again on behalf of all Australians? We really are ever so sorry that he got out. Someone left the gate open during the daily feeding. Of virgin’s blood.
UPDATE – Oops. I forgot to be fair and balanced:
Muslim girls in Norway are not allowed to ride bicycles. Blame ignorance, not Islam.
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Date
20030826
While we’re guzzling branded soft-drinks, pop over and have a peek at Richard’s Can Universe. Richard can look at a can of Coke from fifty paces and tell you which country it comes from. That’d be a great party trick… if he ever left the house.
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Date
20030826
Time
09:48
Do you have loud conversations on the tube? Look out – this man eavesdrops.
Pick of the day before the day before yesterday:
“That Dominic Mohan was on my tube. He reads all the papers at once. And he has an i-pod. He smells a bit.”
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Date
20030826
Time
09:52
A Queer Girl’s Top 10 Gay Myths
You go, girl! BTW, I’m on your side and all, but we do have to talk about this whole ‘we own the rainbow’ thing. The Bible did kind of get there first by branding it as God’s promise never to destroy the world by flood again (so, famine fire or pestilence next time, is it?) and it really was quite cheeky to hijack it as your own personal logo.
Why not use kittens instead? Everybody loves them, and they’re ever so fluffy. Oh, and they eat fish (so if you’re a gay Christian, you can have an exciting chase scene on your car window or bumper).
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Date
20030826
Tony Blair’s Email: The Delivery!
Time
10:19
Watch Shout99 give the service a test-run.
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Date
20030826
Time
10:20
This is an interesting development: creative whoring for fun and profit, aimed squarely at the Farker market. ‘People like to laugh… apparently.’
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Date
20030826
Time
10:49
This story is mainly about the flak the new Acropolis museum is getting, but what makes me smile is the British Museum being kind enough to consider the remote possibility of loaning the Elgin marbles – named not after their creator but the guy who stole them – back to the people we stole them from. On a temporary basis. Perhaps. (Link via ionica.)
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Date
20030826
Time
14:55
Is Yahoo! entering the blogfight with a competing service? And, if so, will it really blow as much as they promise it will?
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Date
20030826
The Ship/Fan Interface
Time
16:05
Origin of 45-min claim revealed – and it wasn’t made up by Gilligan.
Corporations played a large role in developing President Bush’s energy policy – and, at a guess, we’re probably not supposed to know about that.
Hands up everybody who’s sick to death of being lied to and cheated with an increasing amount of cheek….
Thought so.
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Date
20030826
Time
17:07
One of the world’s biggest ever trade fairs for guns, bombs, military planes, small arms, mines and tanks is taking place in London from 9th – 12th September 2003.
From the boycott site we get this wonderful titbit of information:
“The last DSEi exhibition took place over 11th September 2001, the day of the attacks on New York and Washington in America. While many businesses around the world closed, the arms fair stayed open. For three more days, countries including America, Israel and 14 different Arab nations continued to shop, side-by-side, for weapons to attack each other with!”
Warms the heart, doesn’t it?
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Date
20030827
Time
09:30
Running out of disk space. Have to clear the decks. With you in a mo…
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Date
20030827
Tim Yeo Speaks!
Time
09:31
Reportage over at the FT continues, and they’ve not only taken Tim Yeo to task over the shameless hijacking of the original campaign, they’ve also managed to squeeze a quote out of the man:
“I thought of the idea independently. From what I have heard of what he has been doing, I don’t think there would be any benefit in contacting him.”
1. I thought of the idea independently…
Then he’s either a liar or a fool. The most cursory search for information about Tony Blair’s email address and what action had been taken to date would have been necessary before pulling a stunt like this, surely. Such a search would have brought up numerous references to this website.
2. From what I’ve heard he has been doing…
Heard? Heard? You’re just peripherally aware of it then are you, Tim? Your arse is too far off the ground to be worried about such petty concerns? Wrong. You and I both know that you’ve been watching this action closely all along, and denying its importance and your awareness makes you look like an arrogant tosser.
3. I don’t think there would be any benefit in contacting him…
I got in touch with Tim Yeo a full week before I took any action. (You can check my archives from 11 June 2003 onwards to confirm this.) All I wanted was an answer to my email. Then it became clear that – just like Downing St – he thought that the most prudent course of action would be to pretend that I didn’t exist. From that point on, I was after an apology. A promise was made that all activity would cease the moment he apologised. Kind offers were made time and again. If you take note of this kind offer of amnesty you’ll note that it asks a number of things of Tim Yeo. The one thing he did do was take on board my suggestion that he actually table a question in parliament on the matter. He submitted a question the day after this entry – and milked the resulting answer for yet more publicity. While still pretending that I didn’t exist. He’s made a right tit of himself all along and it’s there for all to see. No benefit? There were benefits from Day One – and benefits remain. If he doesn’t want me stalking him right up until the next election, all he has to do is talk to me like a human being.
Finally, we have this:
“Yeo too, is launching his own website in the autumn.”
It won’t save you, Tim. People don’t navigate by URL, they navigate via search engines – and I’m going to be there every step of the way with alternative reports. You’ve got my details. Get in touch.
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Date
20030827
Time
09:49
Hooray for Slim Goodbody, Super Hero of Health!
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Date
20030827
Wedding Bells
Time
09:51
Wrong stripper turns up late to bachelorette party and gets beaten up by bride-to-be’s mother. He was covering for a mate, did a lousy job (a short performance with not enough love for the hen) and got bruises, scratches and head injuries for his troubles.
Wedding guest bites off man’s finger. He also smeared cake on a 9-year-old boy and knocked a 49-year-old woman out cold.
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Date
20030827
Only Interesting to Bloggers
Time
09:58
Yahoo introduces RSS feeds.
On the subject of (ahem) my overdue RSS feed (here’s an RSS primer for the uninitiated), we have a minor technical hitch. The format I’m using does not have code denoting the start and finish of any given post. IT also names post as 1, 2, 3, etc. instead of 01, 02, 03. This is why things turn out so higgledy-piggledy in the archive.
The original developer is long-gone, and I just don’t have the ASP hummus required to fix this kind of thing myself.
Right now I’m quietly considering my options.
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Date
20030827
Photoshopping
Time
10:06
A veritable cornucopia of wonderfully naff retro images for you to use and abuse (link nabbed from ultimateinsult.net).
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Date
20030827
Summertime News
Time
10:08
British Romans in fashion faux-pas shock! Socks and sandals? No wonder the Empire crumbled.
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Date
20030827
Time
10:10
A pocket lexicon of teen lingo. Here’s a tip: why not just use words from your shared vocabulary?
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Date
20030827
Time
10:14
Find out when you can get a good peek at Mars. A £5 bet on overcast conditions in Britain tonight….
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Date
20030827
Time
10:16
The number of American troops killed in postwar Iraq now exceeds the number killed during the intial conflict. Is is still too early to start using the ‘V’ word?
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Date
20030827
Time
10:18
Government scientists in the 1950’s, curious to know how we would hold up under a nuclear attack, drew up secret plans to sell radioactive meat to the public. It’s not revealed whether the plan was put into action, but given that these documents were scheduled for release in 1972 and they haven’t seen the light of day until now, I’d say the chances are pretty bloody good.
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Date
20030828
Christianity Watch
Time
09:23
Ten Commandments monument moved. I watched Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore speak out on TV last night. It scared me. The quote given at this CNN report doesn’t do the reception of his statement justice, so here’s the full version including crowd responses just for you. No, this isn’t a joke:
It is a sad day in our country… Praise Jesus! …when the moral foundation of our law… Speak it, brother! …and the acknowledgment of God… Hallelujah! …has to be hidden from public view… Amen! …to appease a federal judge. Go tell it on the mountain!
(OK, so maybe I made that last one up.)
UPDATE – In Tarrant County, Texas a lone protestor is demanding the removal of a statue of a sleeping panther on the grounds that it is a pagan image.
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Date
20030828
Photoshopping
Time
09:31
The infection… it spreads!
Thanks to Martin, we have a nifty scan of this unexpected tangent to the Star Wars Photoshopping Project from the 24 Aug edition of Sydney’s Sun Herald. The chap featured is Willie Mason. They appear to be making fun of his new hair-do.
Incidentally, I knocked out a fresh entry to the gallery yesterday after an excellent suggestion from Lewis Henson that I do The Matrix. You can see the result here.
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Date
20030828
Time
09:43
A handy find from The Ultimate Insult – Jetable offers disposable email, ideal for signing up to forums, making one-off Usenet posts, etc.
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Date
20030828
Time
09:45
Canada bans passport smiles. You must wear ‘a neutral expression.’ At all times. But think happy thoughts… happy thoughts… happy thoughts…
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Date
20030828
Time
09:52
Holiday Inn has declared today to be Towel Amnesty Day. A cold-hearted marketing monster pretending to be human, but fun all the same. After all, they don’t want their towels back, they just want you to tell them why you stole it. 25 100% legal souvenir towels are up for grabs for the best stories. (What, no shampoo or shower caps?)
As an added nicey-nicey touch, a crisp American dollar goes to charidee for each story told.
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Date
20030828
Time
10:03
Would-be pig thief brutally murdered. He was quite literally butchered like a hog.
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Date
20030828
Time
10:05
From the man who brought you claims that the U.S. Air Force flew Saddam out of Iraq comes this report about new American ‘super tanks’ used in Iraq that shoot fire and lightning.
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Date
20030828
Time
10:09
Mother charged after buying beer for her teenage son and friends and putting on a strip show for them. It was to make up for ‘a failed birthday trip to ride go-carts.’ The Smoking Gun has the paperwork. Me, I’m dying to see the mugshot.
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Date
20030828
Time
10:12
Guerilla Parenting (via TTR2).
I love this bit:
“Warning: Police may confuse your activities with illegal grafitti vandalism.”
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Date
20030828
Follow Up
Time
10:14
Former POW Jessica Lynch honorably discharged from Army. Sadly, they didn’t send a SWAT team in to stage a brave rescue from the Camden-Clark Memorial Hospital – but you’ll be happy to know that publishers are lining up with book deals.
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Date
20030828
Time
10:17
Germaine Greer is scheduled give a public lecture at the Department of Film, Television and Media Studies at the University of Auckland. The only problem is that she faces arrest upon entering New Zealand for swearing during an Auckland Town Hall meeting. In 1972.
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Date
20030828
Flash Games
Time
10:20
Bomb Bandits! (via FunJunkie). I sniggered at the name, but sucked at the game.
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Date
20030828
It’s War! And Somebody’s Telling Porkies!
Time
11:04
You may want to read the full story of Tony’s time in power before taking a peek at what some think will be the final chapter. This latter page is sure to feature update links and/or partial transcripts later today. A full transcript should be available via the Hutton Inquiry website sometime this evening.
Bring forth the interrogation droid!
UPDATE – Dossier wasn’t case for war says Blair. This BBC page also has a link to a blow-by-blow account.
UPDATE – A fine analysis of Tony’s lawyerspeak from Hanging Day. It’s not the first time he’s played the ‘exteremly serious’ card, and I seem to remember a certain document used as a central device in the justification for war not only by us, but the US as well.
Oh, and there’s a few thoughts from Bar Room Philosophy that you may wish to consider.
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Date
20030828
Time
15:41
Smoking Gun uncovers 1977 interview with Arnold Schwarzenegger. It’s fruity stuff. You may have to lower your chair.
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Date
20030829
Time
09:20
The site’s been down since about 6:00pm (GMT) last night. Sorry about that. One of our hamsters died. I woke up to find him dead on the wheel, the poor chap.
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Date
20030829
Tony Blair’s Email: News and Linkage
Time
09:21
The Guardian: TonyBlair@onlineatlast.gov.uk No name-check, but a mighty fine URL-check. It also contains a minor inaccuracy. I didn’t target Cherie to make her get in touch. I started with nude images of Tony then, when his office continued to ignore me, I started on Cherie. It was then that someone piped up with some solid e-mail addresses for the First Lady.
Note – if you’re a first-time visitor, you can read more about this exciting chapter by clicking here for the closing stages of the campaign. Alternatively, you can simply check out the archived weblog entry from the day I emailed her, which has a full transcript of the email sent and a very rare image for you to enjoy from the comfort of your own web shed.
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Date
20030829
Arrogance of Established Media
Time
09:26
The Mirror has swiped online content yet again by picking up the Arnie story blogged yesterday and giving zero credit to The Smoking Gun who originally unearthed and published the 1977 interview.
You can voice your displeasure here, or get in touch with their i-blog team (they don’t have many friends, so will be happy to hear from someone by email).
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Date
20030829
Time
09:35
Revealed: How RIAA tracks downloaders. Step One appears to be kicking your door down and seizing your computer.
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Date
20030829
Time
09:40
Today, it’s cold and miserable. Again. And I love it! I can’t wait to get home tonight and curl up in my burlap sack under the bridge. The bad news is that the cold weather has driven the flies indoors here at work. However, I brought a flyswatter in yesterday morning and we’ve got the little buggers on the run. I killed two with one blow yesterday when they stopped for a shag on top of my monitor. Please raise your coffee cups in a toast to dying happy.
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Date
20030829
Follow Up
Time
09:43
That bride who went on a drunken rampage has been fined $90 for creating a public disturbance. Shouldn’t her parents pay that fine?
(Also via romenesko’s Obscure Store… read about the man who published a fake obituary to get out of a court appearance.)
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Date
20030829
Time
09:48
Powerskip! A new German sport that lets you dance around like a cyber-enhanced fairy.
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Date
20030829
Time
09:50
Harrison Ford blasts US Iraq policy. Mind you, he waited until he was out of the country before he did so. The big baby.
In other news, Halliburton, the company formerly headed by Vice President Cheney, has won contracts worth more than $1.7 billion under Operation Iraqi Freedom. That’s far more than was originally claimed, and there’s more in the pipeline. So to speak.
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Date
20030829
Flash Music Video
Time
09:54
MTV roll out the Dancing Paul format yet again for God Save The Queen (link via TTR2).
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Date
20030829
Yet Another Lame Quiz
Time
09:57
The Jedi Test is a perfect example of how to suck all the value out of the personality quiz format.
Personal publishing is on the rise, largely thanks to a new format that allows people to express themselves through their discoveries. Personality quizzes go right to the heart of this (which is why they’ve played such a big part in the weblog explosion).
Where, may I ask, is the feature in this particular quiz that allows participants to display the results on their site and in doing so link to the quiz?
Some people never learn.
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Date
20030829
Time
10:07
Tour locations in London as featured in PS2’s Getaway. A fantabulous find from The Ultimate Insult.
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Date
20030829
Time
10:08
A new variation of the SoBig virus must have just kicked into gear. It’s been all quiet for the last 12 hours, and now they’re coming in thick and fast again.
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Date
20030829
Rupert ‘The Evil One’ Murdoch
Time
10:10
Al Franken talks about his big victory over the Fox News bullies.
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Date
20030829
Time
10:11
Are we really to good guys? Of course not – we just have a better publicity machine. Too bad it’s mostly internal. Y’see, this is why a lot have people have no qualms about blowing us up.
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Date
20030829
Friday Feedback
Time
10:32
The moment Downing St comes good on this invoice or due credit for the design of the email service I think we can pretty much call it a day on this long-running Can Weblogs…? project. The senatorial weblog campaign Can Weblogs Go To Washington? is still ticking along, but I think there’s room for another one if there’s a quick win up for grabs.
I’m open to suggestions, people. The word ‘we’ is not used in the royal sense. Emails to the usual address.
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Date
20030829
Time
11:31
My recent efforts have just been reviewed in Swedish. Would anybody care to translate? The credit link leading to this prayer has me ever so curious…
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Date
20030829
Time
12:18
FBI reported to be questioning 18-year-old suspect in the U.S. about the authorship of a later version of MSBlast (link via loving the alien). I’d be more impressed if they caught the rotten buggers behind SoBig, but as these guys look to be actual criminals (by and large smarter than your average attention-starved teenager), I’m not holding my breath.
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Date
20030829
Photoshopping
Time
13:50
The latest B3ta challenge just went live: Hollywood Premakes (how would current movies would look if made in the past).
I’ve only got time for one entry today, but it’s ever so user-friendly and you can see it here.
UPDATE – Front-page action! Huzzah!
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Date
20030829
Time
14:40
Steady on, fellas…
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Date
20030829
Time
15:47
Alastair Campbell is to resign as the government’s director of communications and strategy. (Thanks to Wibbler for the heads-up.) That’s one down…
UPDATE – make what you will of the BBC being so ready with an obituary, or drop by this page to leave a comment.
Best comment so far:
“Well he says he’s resigning. Have we had this confirmed by more than one source?”
