All humans can be divided in two groups - those that love categorising things, and those that like criticising other people's categorisations. It seems that humans have an in-built desire to put things in firm categories. This causes a great deal of arguments. Let's have an argument today! Here's an excerpt from a recent IOPC press release: Misconduct proceedings to follow social media investigations A total of five police officers from different forces will face misconduct action…
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This is Britain as you've never read it. This is Britain as it has never been told. From Newcastle to Cornwall, from the birth of the twentieth century to the teens of the twenty-first, Girl, Woman, Other follows a cast of twelve characters on their personal journeys through this country and the last hundred years. They're each looking for something - a shared past, an unexpected future, a place to call home, somewhere to fit in, a lover, a missed mother, a lost father, even just a…
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Every few years, a dodgy stat does the rounds claiming you can save £££ if you switch off all your gadgets at the wall. The standby mode of your TV is bleeding you dry!!! Energy Saving Trust@EnergySvgTrustA quick way to #saveenergy at home is to turn off tablets, laptops and consoles as soon as you stop using them, and ideally unplug them.This is a big potential #energy saver and could save you up to £30 a year.Find out more here:ensvgtr.uk/pS1ut#EnergyEfficiency pic.x.com/q2CWdlkaBH❤️ 9💬 3🔁 01…
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This self-published book is a bit of a mixed bag. There has been a lot of thought put into it but, in the process of explaining the author's theories, they've forgotten that brevity makes a book like this readable and enjoyable. It could really have done with a strong editor to tighten things up. The first two chapters are filler. There's a mini introduction to evolution and the basics of the theory of knowledge. I'm not really sure what they're doing there. It seems to be an attempt by the…
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Unreadable. Full of grammatical errors and run on sentences. Just incredibly difficult to read. There may be some useful information in here, but I'll be damned if I can find it. Seriously needs to be edited down by someone with a strong grasp of the English language. Here's a typical sentence: "One of the key workplace trends of the future would be the downfall of the corporate ladder, dating back to the Industrial Revolution when thriving businesses were developed on a strict order." I…
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I am so easily influenced. After 18 months of watching streamers using nifty microphone arms, I cracked and purchased one. Oh, I could claim that I needed to free up space on my new desk. Or that I need the mic closer to my mouth to pick up the delicate sounds of my voice. Or perhaps that a spring-loaded arm would reduce vibration noise. But I just wanted to look cool on video calls. So sue me! In time-honoured fashion, I got the 2nd cheapest model with the highest number of (probably fake)…
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Welcome to acronym city! The Court of Appeal of Brussels has made an interesting ruling. A customer complained that their bank was spelling the customer's name incorrectly. The bank didn't have support for diacritical marks. Things like á, è, ô, ü, ç etc. Those accents are common in many languages. So it was a little surprising that the bank didn't support them. The bank refused to spell their customer's name correctly, so the customer raised a GDPR complaint under Article 16. The data subj…
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Previously, I've written about using Footnotes in WordPress Markdown. A reader notified me that the footnotes weren't very accessible. This blog post describes the problem and proposes a solution. The Problem Using WordPress's JetPack, markdown footnotes are rendered as: Some text <sup id="fnref-1234-1"><a href="#fn-1234-1" class="jetpack-footnote">1</a></sup> ... <li id="fn-1234-1">The footnotes. <a href="#fnref-1234-1">↩</a></li> There are two main problems with this: The <sup>1</sup> …
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One of the joys of working with a diverse set of people from all around the world, is that English idioms are a constant source of bemusements. "It's raining cats and dogs" is quickly mapped to the more poetic "Es gießt Schusterjungs". Recently, I mentioned how our team had a "get-out-of-jail-free card". Whereupon a person messaged me privately to ask what I meant, and if there was any real risk of us going to prison? I started explaining about the board game Monopoly. "Ah! In my language, …
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(Written mostly for myself) Install DroidCam I use DroidCam - which converts your Android into a wired or wireless webcam. Set the resolution nano /etc/modprobe.d/droidcam.conf Add the following text: options v4l2loopback_dc width=1280 height=720 Most video call services are limited to 720p, and streaming 1080p and higher via USB isn't always possible. Interact with the Android My Android's screen faces away from me - so I can't easily touch or interact with it. Here are two useful…
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Here's another idea which I tried to launch, back when I worked for a phone company. Disposable phone numbers. The pitch was simple. "As a woman on a dating site, I don't want to give my phone number out to strange blokes in case they don't like it when I eventually reject them." The idea was that we'd partner with a dating service and, for the low price of £X per month, give users a temporary phone number. Calls and texts to that number would be routed to the user's regular phone number. At …
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In his sharply crafted, unnerving first collection of speculative fiction shorts, Courttia Newland envisages an alternate future as lived by the African diaspora. Robots used as human proxies in a war become driven by all-too-human desires; Kill Parties roam the streets of a post-apocalyptic world; a matriarchal race of mer creatures depends on inter-breeding with mortals to survive; mysterious seeds appear in cities across the world, growing into the likeness of people in their vicinity.…
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