Black Box Driving Revisited

This has been reported again, this time in the guise of "speed inhibitors" that force a driver to keep to the speed limits in force.

I am in favour of some reporting device that tells you the speed of a road - like modern GPS devices can do. This is a big help when driving in areas that are not well known and I think it does cause drivers to slow down once warned.

But the full blown inhibitor sounds bad - it would give a culture of driving as fast as the inhibitor will let you rather than what the conditions dictate.

Another step toward the black box system?

National Archives 1978

There has been a news story about the release of papers under the 20 year rule from 1978.

One of the releases was the preparedness of the UK to respond to Soviet attack. Nothing earth shattering here but Callaghan was surprised to learn that the Phantom air defence fighters only had a couple of days of ammunition.

It is annoying it was a surprise and it is something our politicians have been guilty of since - knowing what you actually have to do anything with. I'm not convinced that any leader since then had much of a grasp on this either and the situation is probably worse today.

The reports do make interesting reading however - and they are quite detailed in some respects.

Book read: Sink the "Belgrano" by Mike Rossiter

I picked up this book while Christmas shopping. I've read several other accounts of the 1982 conflict and this was a very controversial part of the war that has never really received much historical analysis.

The book does a reasonable job of describing the events of the time and their wider context. I imagine it was difficult to piece together the operational information which must have been sparse.

It does describe quite well the conflict between the task force command and Whitehall over the control of the submarines. In total three were sent to war, in some ways it was the only strong British advantage with surface ships long since over specialised in anti submarine warfare and with limited air power.

The sinking ensured that the Argentine fleet could not go into the open sea, and neutralised the danger of their aircraft carrier and escorts. In fact it was this ship that the British were trying to find, but never did during operations.

The description of how closely tailed the Belgrano was is interesting - I simply did not know that such close quarter trailing was possible without detection.

The book also describes the Argentine side, a ship full of conscript sailors and the loss and survival of those who were rescued.

Book read: Who runs Britain by Robert Peston

I got this book as a present - I wasn't expecting too much, at best someone describing the financial turmoil of the last year.

I'm glad to say I was very wrong. This is a description from a British point of view of the workings of goverment and big business in the last 10 years (and a bit further, but mainly focused on the "New Labour" era).

It describes private equity in detail, the buyouts of public companies and what implications it has for Britain. It covers the rather shady political party funding and how that clouds our leaders judgement - essentially giving powerful businessmen unfair tax breaks. This is by no means a new thing, and both our main parties are guilty - but I'm glad someone has written about it, the accusation that they are bought men can then be refuted if it can be.

It covers in detail the attempted buyout of M&S by Philip Green - a deal that failed but with an interesting history. Finally it covers the implications for everyday people, the failure of pensions investment, and the complete failure of the stakeholder pension schemes.

An excellent read if you have any interest in business or the workings of the British establishment. I read it in two days and that is something I would rarely do with a book.

Listening: Automatic for the people by REM

This is my current listening in the car, a rather sentimental album but with some great tracks. For me personally it takes me back to my University years of the mid 90s, so another album of memories.

It helps set a nice and reflective mood for the year end.

Film: Quantum of Solace

Finally got round to seeing this before it finishes it's cinema run. I'd heard mixed reviews but I thought it was a well done film.

It is absolutely all action, the stunt scenes just keep coming - and in some ways the plot struggles to get heard, it's a follow on from Casino Royale with Bond needing to stop a plan to take over a vital natural resource.

Overall worth seeing 7/10.

GCSE Standards - Some good news

I read today that there is a plan for a double GCSE maths qualification that includes a course on everyday finance and applying maths in finance. It's scheduled for 2010 - and admittedly it's for top tier students, which is a shame.

But it is an excellent idea, I think it's both useful and will make maths more accessible and meaningful. Also it will help the balance of the finance companies (who know lots) and the consumer (who learns through experience).

Listening: Time by ELO

An album of memories for me, and not too bad songs (slightly cheesy by today's standards and still suffering from a 1970s hangover).

But I remember these songs from a friend of mine playing them who was a fan.

Also quite a good album in the car - an almost but not quite classic.

Image editing Gimp

I only have an occasional reason to edit photos before getting prints. I'd always heard the the Gimp package was difficult to use, and in my Windows days I'd used a camera provided image editing package.

But now that's all gone with my move to Ubuntu so I tried Gimp. I have to say very impressed - it is extremely powerful - I'm only doing something very simple, but I got the task done easily.

A good example of open source packages not having to languish behind paid for or closed software.

Film: Brick

A film directed by Rian Johnson about a high school student who discovers his ex girlfriends body after having received a disturbed phone call from her saying she was in trouble.

He goes about solving the murder through the course of the film and gets into a web of drug dealings and low life involved in the trade.

Slightly far fetched in story line, it's an engaging film none the less. Some of the dialogue is very fast though, it feels like you are having to listen in rather than it being performed for the benefit of the audience, although this does make it feel a little more authentic.

Not a bad film 6/10.

GCSE standards

The papers today are full of critiscism of GCSE and the government continual dumbing down of education standard in a perverse attempt to claim rising standards.

When I was studying you could see the syllabus content was falling, for A level maths I remember going back in the papers year by year got progressively harder!

Although I do not see any point in maintaining a "gold" standard that loses relevance by trying to stay in the 1950s I was shocked to read that a 20% exam score could lead to a grade C!

The reports had high acheiving students given a test from the 1960s with predictable failure especially on numerical based work in science.

They also mention the iGCSE - apparently an international standard that is in widespread use but not recognised by our education system.

Film: Three Colours Red

The third in a trilogy of French films by director Krzysztof Kieslowski.

Another thought provoking and poignant film, that I first saw in 2006 but definitely deserved another viewing.

The central characters are a model called Valentine and a retired judge who meet after Valentine has run over his dog. He is a cold and cynical character who is spying on his neighbours by intercepting their mobile phone conversations.

The plot is interweaved with other characters lives who the main ones do now know about. A mirror image of the judge's life is happening to a young judge Auguste.

Eventually Valentine travels to England and is caught in a ferry disaster. Only seven survivors of which she is one.

A really good film 7/10.

Film: Three Colours White

The second in a trilogy of French films by director Krzysztof Kieslowski.

A quirky and humorous film about a Polish hairdresser Karol Karol who has married a French woman and moves to France. She is seeking divorce after failure to consummate the marriage. The film revolves around Karol's attempt to rebuild his life.

After returning to Poland penniless, he befriends a fellow Pole who he sets up in business with (after persuading him that he does not want to end his life). The successful businessman Karol now fakes his own death to have his former wife come to his funeral. She is then framed for his murder and the film ends with Karol visiting the prison where she is held and seeing the cell in which she is sitting.

Was this entrapment, or an attempt to win her back we are not told - a very thought provoking film and a good 8/10.

Listening: Thomas Dolby and Propaganda

Thomas Dolby: Astronauts and Heretics 1992
Propaganda: A Secret Wish 1985

I've decided to listen to more music in the car rather than sombre news channels - which at the moment are not carrying much news you would want to hear.

I picked these from my collection, hard to believe how old they are now. The technically flawless Propaganda songs and the quirky Dolby tracks.

Film: Seven Years in Tibet

A film from 1997, with Brad Pitt - who it seems wanted a more serious film in his history.

About Henrik Harrer a real life Austrian climber whose life climbing mountains is interrupted by the second world war. To avoid arrest he settles in Tibet, a secretive and closed society.

He befriends a young Dalai Lama, and the film mainly revolves around this friendship and the Tibetan struggle against the Chinese.

Not a bad film, once you can put Pitt's accent to one side 7/10.

President Obama

Well the predictions were right, and I'm really pleased. Of course we'll all be disappointed surely as the weight of expectation is too much?

The news stories said it all though, people who had never voted before voting and no surprise it was a record turnout. Sorry for McCain but he was swept away by history making.

But one thing we can say for Obama straight away there is going to be some great speeches, the art of public speaking is not dead. Of the few I've listened too, I've never heard a mistimed line or him stumble over his words like Bush - he's clearly a sharp intellect and a good communicator.

Film: Lost in Translation

My rare film watching has had this added to the roll call. A really good and different film, about two people - a washed up actor and a newly wed woman in Japan. He's working on a whisky commercial and she is with her photographer husband.

Subtle comedy in many ways, but the film poses many questions about life and "what is it all for" but it is in no way a sad film, more sentimental, reflective and thoughtful.

Very atmospheric sound track too - I instantly remembered it from the trailers of 2003 (I was surprised to realise it was that old a film).

A good scoring 8/10 I think.

Economics Editor - credit crunch winners

I have been watching Newsnight a lot more recently as the events have been historic and worth getting some extra background detail on. The programme is not too stuffy but you do get the feeling they are trying to maintain a standard that other early evening news journalism has given up on.

The winners in the crunch so far, well I'm sure there are plenty - but the economics editors are now known faces on TV. Robert Peston is a permanent fixture on the BBC news it seems and Paul Mason seems to have got his own Money Programme series explaining the financial meltdown.

New suits all round - glad to know it is not all bad news!

Halifax - pressure selling

Good documentary on tonight summing up the credit crisis in the UK. The episode tonight explains the HBOS fiasco and highlights the fact that staff were given bonus payments based on sales of product (and hence the at the counter pressure to take out a credit card, insurance, or to consider your mortgage options).

Essentially a culture of building up debt with your depositors - it hasn't served them well!

Communications Monitoring

Some of the press this week has covered a monitoring scheme that will cover all e-mail, and mobile communications to be monitored and stored - if the reports are to be believed.

I always used to think the old argument of "well if you've nothing to hide, what do you have to worry about".

That's still true, but what you have to worry about is the money the government will waste in procuring such a system given their track record of IT infrastructure projects. ID cards, NHS, inland revenue, it's a long list.

So I say no on that basis, targeted monitoring yes - not everything that's ever sent. I had this thought as I drove behind a van today that had "I love my country, but fear my government". Yes fear that they will blow your money for no gain!

Newcastle Utd

A club in real meltdown it seems. The owner is being hounded to sell out after the fans have turned on him for undermining Keegan. Keegan has deserted rather than try and get better conditions to work under - even though I agree with his stance, it does feel like he quit the club a little too easily.

Meanwhile Kinnear is appointed, who hasn't managed for a good few years. Probably not a bad manager in his day but this surely has to be too difficult a task. He was second choice after Venables who was not keen on a short term contract measured in games.

It is hard to think of worse conditions. As for the players they are still getting paid, are usually fairly resilient to instability - after all they are contractors not permanent fixtures. But this level of disruption even has got through to pitch level. All very sad for what is a great footballing region.

Banking crisis - it gets worse

Another bank fails in the UK, this really is a massive clearout. The US cash injection into the markets still is not guaranteed, there is talk of a large fall on the markets next week if it does not materialise.

We could face years of tight credit markets, the financial institutions have done massive harm here and there is a strange expectation of bail out. Those at the bottom of the pile must be thinking it is one rule for them and one rule for the rest.

In some ways this is the sharp correction we all secretly knew was coming, the only ironic thing is that it is such a big correction it is taking the banks that made bad lending decisions with it. Maybe global debt markets were not such a good idea after all.

Banking Crisis

A week that books will be written about. Much worse than 1987 and 1992, not quite the 1930s though (well let's hope not).

The US goverment bail outs are now happening and this seems to have bouyed the markets both sides of the Atlantic. The money involved seems incomprehensible. The focus is clearly on retail banks, investment banks will probably be allowed to go to the wall.

Lessons learned, short term profiteering, reliance on a bonus culture, the house rise bubble - we' re in for a tough 2 or 3 years ahead from this point.

Housing Market

The UK government has finally laid the cards on the table with their measures to support the falling housing market. Stamp duty threshold rise, loans, and help against repossessions.

I'm not sure what to make of it, the previous housing market slump of the early to mid 90s was a factor in the Tory loss in 1997 - Labour could be thinking of that. It is probably not a good idea to overly support a market which has risen for too long and before it started looking like a slide they were always keen on seeing the market top out and fall back gently.

But this time round there is an added twist, the banks have screwed down lending - having been caught out themselves. It's probably the biggest factor here - getting a mortgage is now much harder, it does not matter that you will not get taxed on the purchase.

Football Economics

The lower divisions of English football may have had their recession after the collapse of ITV Digital - but the premiership shows no signs of having less money spent on it.

Man City now enter the big spender league with an owner with hundreds of millions to spend. I'm sure the fans will enjoy the ride no matter what happens - even if most of them have no idea who their owner really is.

Keegan quitting Newcastle today was also a sign that he knows there's no competing with the sides with good backing.

I know one thing though, not all these clubs can finish top or win honours this year - someone is going to be disappointed.

Bowman Radio

There were some good articles today covering Afghanistan in the media. Good to see as it is an under reported conflict.

Historically the British army has always been poorly provided for. This is a major news item now and it has been bought into the nations minds. The frustrating thing is we spend enough money on equipment procurement.

Today's example was the Bowman radio system, to provide secure communications. So a couple of billion spent there, 15 years in the making. But it turns up as too heavy, with no battery life indicator, and limited range. Maybe it can be improved but it made depressing reading.

Book read: Ghost Rider by Neil Peart

The author is the drummer from my favourite band Rush. In 1998 his daughter was killed in a car crash and then his wife died under a year later. The book describes his recovery process. Part of this was a couple of years bike touring as a way to keep himself from staying in the home environment where all the memories were.

On one level this is a great travel read - he tours all over western America and into Mexico. It also contains transcripts of letters written to friends on his travels.

The main backdrop is the sad circumstances he finds himself having to deal with. He comes across as a genuinely decent and thoughtful man. Subsequently to remarry the book ends in 2002 and the early production of tracks on the album Vapor Trails.

Book Read: A History of Modern Britain by Andrew Marr

This was a short series on TV, describing the UK post war history through the politics and the leaders of the 1940s right through to the present day. The series was an excellent history so I bought the book, and it too is an excellent read. My postwar history knowledge certainly benefited from reading this, and for the bits I had lived through it was interesting to remember back to the country of those times (70s, 80s, and 90s).

Although the message is somewhat despairing, painting the Britain of squandered opportunity and political incompetence, Marr is never slow to describe the good things that our post war leaders had tried to achieve. The NHS formation, the misguided battles with devaluation, the reforms of Thatcher, the list is not short. The book is also good on detail and describing the feelings at certain times in history - it's either taken a team of researchers or a huge amount of work on Marr's part.

Not short at 600 pages, but something that was very readable - I'm glad I made the time to read it.

Freeview PVR Take Two

I still have my Topfield but bought someone a Humax 9200-T. Having set it up and played around with it I was very impressed, another company that almost "gets" it in this forgotten market.

Twin tuner, 160GB hard drive, series link support, and all the on screen menus are well organised. It also has card support but that side of freeview is fragmenting into custom boxes so will likely die out (as will the providers supplying them).

One extra bonus - and believe me every STB manufacturer needs one of these as it's an unreliable software business. A real on/off switch at the back. Better than a software controlled one which is no good because the reason you went to switch it off was because the software had crashed.

Oympics Beijing Opening

I saw some of the opening ceremony of the olympics today. Typically these are quirky affairs which are overlong and drawn out. But the bit I saw was very impressive visually and played on the Chinese heritage of centuries.

Then a worrying thought, what is 2012 going to open like - what will we draw on? Not that opening ceremonies get remembered or have been that great in the past. I'm guessing Australia had nothing to worry about from Atlanta, and Greece had the same levels of history to use as a backdrop as China.

So London? Most of our history was about war and empire building, so we cannot mention it. Maritime history, our royal family? Something more contemporary maybe the London of today - hooded gangs wielding knives, traffic jams - we could work those into it!

Well probably the least of our worries, 4 years left and the foundations just laid of the new stadium will be an achivement to get that in on the £450 million budget.

Book read: The Trouble With Physics by Lee Smolin

I got this book a couple of months back and have completed it today. The early chapters explain in layman terms where Physics has got to in the last 30 years. This an interesting read for me, the various unification attempts, quantum mechanics, gravity, fundamtental particles, and string theory.

The books main message is that research has followed a narrow path for too long, and it's difficult to bring new ideas to a field which do not fit with the majority view. The author is particularly dismissive of string theory because of this.

The final chapters lay out what would make the situation better. It feels like research science careers are built on backing the current research areas and there is very little room for anything else. The author makes an interesting comparison to venture capital who expect 90% of new businesses to fail, and anything less then they are not taking enough risk. He argues it would be worth having this view on research to try and stimulate new areas where current theory has stagnated.

Film: Bullet Proof Monk

I don't watch that many films but someone bought me this as a joke. I liked the name and in fairness it wasn't quite as bad as I thought it was going to be.

Still a good versus evil battle, fairly cheesy plotline - and ok production. I managed to sit through it and avoid turning it off. Certainly not an important piece of cinema history.

A struggling 4/10.

Old school photo

I saw an old school photo today from my class in 1978 my first year at school. It was quite strange seeing it especially putting names to faces - some easy some needed thinking about.

There were only about 20 kids, and I remember the class was mixed ages. I think this smaller class size explained why the school closed and merged with one nearby. I remember starting there and the teacher complaining she now had 30 children!

It has to be said life was a lot simpler back then, no computers, mass communication was a thing of the future - we were still living off the last year of a failed Labour government (ring any bells?). Thatcher hadn't happened yet - and the gulf wars were still a long time away. Having said that the country didn't feel like a failure, but then a 5 year old isn't going to be on top of that sort of detail.

One sad story a boy I recognised in the photo I knew died shortly after leaving school. Of course you can never know, but to think from that photo he only had 12 short years left.

Aircraft Carriers

The UK has just signed a big defence deal for two new aircraft carriers - the deal has been many years in the wings with initial design work already done.

It was a strange decision in the 1960s to cancel the future carrier programme. The UK made do with helicopter crusiers that were only really saved by the versatile Harrier. We've also now gone more into helicopter landing platforms - good support vessels for land force support.

With all the equipment shortatges in Iraq and Afghanistan it's a very strange decision to be placing orders for carriers. Especially when the aircraft to put on them might be beyond our budget (10 bn I heard), also the destroyer escort has been cut back to six ships. The news item I saw kept on mentioning "powerful ships" but in reality they are vulnerable in the extreme.

Windows Free (Almost)

A couple of months ago I replaced by 6 year old laptop with a new one from Dell. I wasn't that keen on Vista having used it. My main complaint was just speed, I'd seen it on a good spec laptop just feel so sluggish and that was before any eye candy was turned on.

I was a big fan of Windows XP - it really was Microsoft's best go yet at a home O/S. In the end I bought a Dell preinstalled with Ubuntu (a distro I'd never used before). Overall I'm really pleased and impressed by Ubuntu - they really have simplified Linux installation and package management. I have re-installed to a newer version and there were a few issues getting wireless drivers to work.

I'm not anti-Windows by any means, but what would make me go back? I keep hearing about Windows 7 and I think they could do a lot worse than follow Apples lead of a reliable kernel (why write your own?) and shipping dev tools in the O/S to encourage development on the platform.

NHS 10 year plan

The NHS is 60 years old so what a good day to publish a 10 year plan (Stalin would be impressed, he kept himself to 5 years).

I've read the reports of the proposals, better accessibility sounds good although I think it will be a struggle to run 8am-8pm surgeries. One paper I read gave an example of how blood tests are currently done, 1/2 day off work to get a form from your GP, followed by another 1/2 off work to go to a hospital to have the test. So the taxpayer actually funding this hardly gets an efficient service.

But then there are gimmicks, "dashboards" of stats to show what a hospital is like. As with so many other professions when will we learn that quality is so difficult to measure, and in trying to measure it you can affect it (as people chase targets and game the system - they always will).

Walk: Hambledon

Went for a 4 mile walk around the outskirts of Hambledon a small village a few miles north of Denmead.

Hambledon itself is the disputed birth place of cricket and has a historic cricket club (the MCC of it's day I'm guessing). The walk started off through a church and then over some fields which look across to an impressive hill landscape.

Continuing through a small copse, another field, and a steep tree covered climb called dog kennel lane. Crossing some fields you could see Portsdown Hill. The walk finished with some country lanes back to Hambledon village.

Book read: The Gambler

A short story by Fyodor Dostoyevsky the troubled 19th century author. I'd read Crime and Punishment and this was not quite in the same league. The characters and their traits are good, as is the backdrop of the random chance of gambling. But I never felt it was particularly focused in telling a story - reading about the book on Wikipedia it seemed to indicate the book was finished quickly to pay gambling debts!

Walk: Southwick to Portsdown Hill

A couple of my friends have started to do some local walks at the weekend in preparation for a coming walking holiday in Wales. We started this walk a couple of weeks back and did the Portsdown Hill to Southwick part but got lost trying to go back on the second part of the walk.

The guide book we were using was a bit imprecise so this time armed with a map we tried to redo the second part of the walk.

It was mostly a success, some very nice countyside on the outskirts of Portsmouth. We made one wrong turn which added a couple of miles to the 5 mile walk. This turned out to be a blessing as it allowed us to do all of the Wayfarer's trail. This then led onto Purbrook Heath road and past Southwick house. The final part of the walk was a hill climb back to the top of Portsdown.

I hardly knew all this countryside existed and it's hard to believe you are less than a mile from one of the densely populated cities in the country (Portsea island).

Train Documents

I find it hard to believe the recent documents left on the train are accidental. It feels more like hard pressed civil service types wanting to expose the goverment. Still if someone managed to leave our Iraq or Afghanistan policy recommendations I'm sure it could do with an airing in the press, just in case it gets over filtered on it's way up to senior ministers.

Suppose these are just genuine mishaps it probably does point to this thing is happening all the time and now the media has become a bit over sensitive to it. Like the personal information problems earlier in the year it doesn't fill me with confidence that someone can even leave the office with this information, it is after all "national security".

Credit Perception

In just a few short months we've gone from the extreme of having people falling over themselves to sign you up for a mortgage or other form of debt to an extreme shortage. Quite strange and indications of a tough rest of year. Add to that the oil and petrol prices and things are not looking quite so rosy for the UK economy.

Increasing debt, repossessions, and presumably rising unemployment and business failure. Have we just had it too good for too long, and now this is the payup time? Would things have always been this way had we not had historically low interest rates.

One thing I'm pleased about, it's the banks who are feeling the pinch first. They are going to have to get used to lower profits for years to come, and many are now forced to devalue their stock with share issues. It has been a long time coming but the economy is going to go back to valuing cash and not credit.

Book read: Man's Search for Meaning Viktor E Frankl

This is a short 150 page book that describes concentration camp life and techniques the author had for survival. It's split into two books, the first part is about the camps which leaves the reader in no doubt about what the camps were like with many observations. It stops short of graphic individual recollections as the author felt this had been covered in many other works.

The second part of the book covers an anaysis technique called logotherapy - really the professional career of the author after the war. In this he tries to define man's search for meaning and applications to his patients (some people contemplating/attempting suicide, some unhappy with their lot and looking for some deeper meaning). If psychotherapy is lying on a couch while a professional tries to coax out your problems then logotherapy could be sitting up straight and maybe having to hear what you do not want to (a little flippant he admits but a good description).

Overall a good book, thought provoking and something to make us realise how reasonably lucky some of us are in today's world.

The final quote of the book is:

So, let us be alert - alert in a twofold state:

Since Auschwitz we know what man is capable of.

And since Hiroshima we know what is at stake.

Portsmouth FA cup winners 2008

A not bad game yesterday, more tense than action packed. Good to see two sides of support who don't do this sort of thing every year actually enjoying the moment.

Still Portsmouth won, lets hope the next war does not start soon.

Lame duck primeminister

Or so the recent headlines would have us believe. It isn't looking good though, you know politicians are in trouble when they say openly they are going to learn from mistakes and listen more. I don't think things ever got that bad for John Major!

I can't imagine there is a career respecting Labour front bencher who would like to take the reins from here. I also feel the votes have been against the party in power rather than for the opposition (it's easier when you don't have to see your policies through).

If Brown wants to survive, he has to simplify - taxes, tax credits, persuade the banks that less profit for a few years isn't such a bad thing. But I can't see this happening - is this the shortest lived PM in history?

Bailing out the banks

The Bank of England is allowing our banks to swap mortgage debt for goverment bonds (at least that's what I understand of it). It feels like a classic case of nationalise risk and privatise profit.

I wonder if this bailing out will have a later payback, during the good times the goverment was often talking of windfall taxes. I think that could be a reality now with this move.

Book read: Four Weeks in May

I've just finished reading Four Weeks in May - a captain's story of war at sea. It's about the role of HMS Coventry in the Falklands war. I read a couple of indifferent reviews about this book, but once I'd started reading it I couldn't stop, finishing it in little over a day.

The author (Coventry's captain at the time) does a good job of describing life at sea whilst at war up to the eventual sinking, and life after having lost the ship. It's a good balance of technical operations, the people involved, and describing the loss.

It still confirms the theory that it was all "a close run thing". Landing ground forces before having held the skies meant that the British sacrificed ships to perform the landing.

Freeview PVR

The TV market in the UK is split into satellite/cable (where all the content is) and terrestial digital (BBC, and some other channels - free apart from the licence fee).

I really struggled to find a decent freeview PVR, they were thin on the ground. But I did eventually find the Topfield 5800. Not sold by many retailers in the UK, but pretty solid and reliable. It is also now has a software update for series linking.

Portsmouth FA cup finalists

Portsmouth have made the FA cup final, despite some poor games - including the semi final, they often aren't great games though.

Last time this happened was 1939 - I hope that isn't an omen.

Book read: Crime and Punishment

I read a bit, but not as much as I should. I've never read a "classic" under my own steam - a bit shameful really. In fact I probably see a lot of truth in the Mark Twain quote of:

"A classic is something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read."

I was lent Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky) by my friend and naturally it was a little daunting. I've put in the effort to read it, it's a dark tale of murder and rehabilitation from the central characters viewpoint. I'm glad I've read it, of course I'm now thinking will this be the only one I ever read?

Lower Tax on Smoothies

It's the Lib Dem conference and an important resolution has been voted on, lower the VAT on fruit smoothies. In itself not a bad idea, but I kind of get the feeling it's the only thing this party could easily agree on - that must be the only explanation of all the media coverage.

So that's fruit smoothies sorted out, what next?

Lower Tax on Smoothies

It's the Lib Dem conference and an important resolution has been voted on, lower the VAT on fruit smoothies. In itself not a bad idea, but I kind of get the feeling it's the only thing this party could easily agree on - that must be the only explanation of all the media coverage.

So that's fruit smoothies sorted out, what next?

School Selection

I live in a town where the price of housing varies on the "catchment" area of the schools. If you live in a good school area it reflects in your your price. The news has reports that people should have more choice for their children. Well a nice idea, it turns out that nobody wants to send their kids to a bad school!

We end up with ghetto type schools were none of the able kids have gone, I think it should be a fair distribution (within reason of distance for the pupil to travel) of the ability range to try and even things out. Maybe even sharing of teachers.

Needless to say I live the poor school side of town, but I'm not after a rise in house prices.

Army PR

Interesting news that HRH Harry has been out in Afghanistan, good for him as it's clearly what he wanted to do. Amazed that a deal can be struck with the press like that, there's always someone who must want to break the news.

Putting aside the slightly jingoistic reporting, it gets this campaign back in the news - but I think it's one we'll eventually lose - failing to achieve our goals (does anyone know what they are now?).

Harry himself seemed to express dislike of living in England - I suppose the press coverage and hounding; but in all honesty with a few sacrifices he could easily avoid being in the press.

Brain Drain

Reports are saying that high levels of qualified people in essential industries are leaving the UK to work abroad. This hit home with me because I have a cousin who is about to work out in Austrailia for a second time with the move possibly permanent.

I can think back to the 80s and similar phrases were seen I don't think it's a new thing (back then it was probably referring to academics and scientists working in the US). Maybe today the power and mobility is a little more with the individual, provided you can sell your skills. But as to why are people leaving it is probably down to:

• Over taxed population - not just high taxes, but ridiculously complicated.
• House prices, although other parts of the world have seen booms too.
  
• Poor quality of life, for example commuting tedium.

Sat Nav Experience

I've always thought SatNav to be useful but probably just gimmicky. My previous uses of GPS on the move always had long times to acquire satellites, although this was with a fairly old receiver.

Now prices have dropped I thought I would try out the market leader. This is unusual for me, I usually back the up and coming brand, especially since some of the reviews of the leader said it was good with very bad customer service (amazing how quick companies get big and get like this).

Still I'm very impressed, a very well thought out device. I had a trip to do that I had only done once before, and it recalculated to the route I was taking and called the sequences of roundabouts very well.

So a happy customer, lets hope I don't ever have to call support...

The price of an engine

Microsoft's bid for Yahoo is an interesting move. Is a search engine worth that much? It's funny that the 20th century was about real engines, now we just are concerned with ones that find things for us.

What are they after? I can't see them taking over and trashing a brand. A lot of the analysis seems to be a move over the mobile space, before Google can really get established there. But is this really a quicker route for them to get there? Also moving to an unproven space is risky, it might not capture the imagination of enough people.

In terms of competition it's a bad thing, although MSN Live hasn't taken off - they could probably have stuck at it (after all they stuck at Windows ;)).

McJob Qualifications

Today's announcement that some businesses will be offering training that will end up with A-level equivalent qualifications came as a bit of a surprise.

I'm all for it. Having followed a fairly traditional degree I would say that route is unsuitable for most people - and in no way do I mean they are not capable, it is simply of no use. Yet the governments for the last 20 years have tried to inflate the numbers of graduates. That itself isn't a problem, what you were teaching them is.

I won't get into "easy" and "hard" degrees, truth be told a degree in Physics could be truly useless unless applied in the right career. I always thought the smarter people were the ones who knew it paid to study something which had some outside application. Although you can make an argument for degrees showing you have an aptitude for learning.

And this announcement today seems to indicate this is what employers are thinking. Given the state of education, I always think to myself could private enterprise do any better (it won't ever cover the numbers of course).

The downside? Well don't expect said hamburger firm to teach a course on healthy balanced diets.

CES Keynote

For once I watched an entire keynote from CES (Microsoft), mainly because it was the last before Gates stood down. Overall it wasn't bad, but it reinforced my belief that people into technology probably struggle to see why other (ordinary) people just don't get it.

The presentations had a few amusing things:

1. A car that calls 911 in the event of an airbag going off. How long before the emergency services ignore this if it becomes a standard on cars?

2. A social networking tool, the demo person showed herself booking an "appointment" with her mother!

It was ok really, but these people just felt like such cookie cutter employees, and had such weak examples of everyday use of the technology they were showing.

Organ donation

The PM has said he is in favour of organ donation by default for the UK. I think it's the right thing to, with an opt out for those who strongly disagree. The opt out might also disallow you from receiving a donated organ too.

But it occurred to me the government already taxes dead people during the inheritance process, so this is probably just a natural progression - the sort of thing Private Eye would write about.

Public sector wage restraint

The UK government is having a hard time persuading some public sector workers to take a tougher than usual pay round.

The PM has tried to show "we're all in this together" by pegging MP pay rise to 2%. Very laudable, but these people have gold plated pensions, very generous working benefits - how about no pay rise this year, no MP would have noticed - and the PR would have been gold dust.

HMS Diana

A rather sad story in the paper today about the use of a Royal Navy ship HMS Diana in the testing of the British nuclear bomb in 1956. For the purposes of "research" the ship was ordered to sail through the fallout area of the bomb detonation.

It's hard to think back to the set of circumstances that made this appear "a good idea". Britain was under pressure to get a deterrent? We wanted to know more about the effects? (surely WWII had provided plenty of evidence already).

Maybe that's just judging with hindsight, of course the story is most of the crew are suffering from cancers and now dieing off (or have died). The MOD won't provide compensation due to a legal argument about when claims can be lodged. It's shameful, I don't think there would be many people that would actually mind if taxpayers money were to compensate in some way their suffering.