I don't often venture into American politics. It is hard to know whether Trump is a master strategist - as Dilbert seems to think - or merely a chaos monkey. But, somehow, he seems to have stumbled on genius tactic. Trump has repeatedly called for Clinton to be thrown in jail. This has provoked a howl of rage from the liberal media elite. In a civilised democracy the victor simply doesn't…
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Cheques (checks if you're American) are an amazing legacy technology. Invented in the 17th Century, they immediately transformed the financial landscape. They allowed anyone to transfer both vast and trivial sums of wealth with ease. Whole industries grew up around them - one of my first jobs was programming binary loadlifters repairing computerised cheque-readers - they're an example of a…
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A former advisor to the Prime Minister was recently convicted on charges of downloading indecent images of underage girls. I don't want to go into detail about whether or not his punishment is adequate, but I would like to talk about this curious remark made by the Judge during his sentencing: beginning today and lasting for two years, you are prohibited from using any device capable of…
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2024 Update. Some of the Tweets in this post have been deleted. You can see them on the archived version of this page. It is a truth universally acknowledged, that any photograph which doesn't fit your political viewpoint must have been photoshopped. A few weeks ago, as I was driving down the M40, I saw a giant "Vote Leave" poster with a fairly repulsive message on it. Terence Eden is on…
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At this point, I think it is a certainty that the UK will vote to leave the EU. The people who are anti-EU are passionate about their cause - every single one of them will be out to vote. For the rest of us, the EU doesn't occupy our every waking thought, we're happy to benefit from it but if the weather is rainy, we might not vote. With all that said, I'd like to take a moment to point out…
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I was listening to the excellent RHLSTP - because I am one of the cool kids - when the guest, Richard Bacon, made a curious confession about his adventures bringing News Bunny to the State Opening of Parliament. I got a letter from Black Rod - who runs both houses […] and it says that I am banned for life from the House of Commons and the House of Lords. It's at the 7 minute 20 mark on the v…
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Eight years after I published this blog post, I helped officially release all these domain names as open data! Funny how life works out, eh? Would you like to know every domain name the UK Government had registered? Of course you would! There could be all sorts of interesting tit-bits hidden in there (ProtectAndSurvive.gov.uk? EbolaOutbreak2017.nhs.uk? MinistryOfTruth.police.uk?) Rather than…
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Earlier this year, I attended a lecture given by Alan Rusbridger - the outgoing editor of The Guardian - entitled "The World After Snowden." Held at Oxford University, and attended by journalists, technologists, and former spies - it was an exceptionally interesting talk and provoked a lively debate over dinner. In light of the publication of the disastrous Investigatory Powers Bill, I've…
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It was the best of FoI requests, it was the worst of FoI requests. While some data holders are wise, others are foolish. Some strengthen our belief in the promise of open data, while others leave us reeling with incredulity. I hereby present a tale of light and darkness, which will bring you equal measures of hope and despair. Earlier this year, I decided to embark on an open-data-quest. I…
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There's a pernicious myth - often spread by tabloids - that the poor and hungry don't deserve the meagre possessions which make life worth living. You see this in headlines like "Benefit Scum Have Flat Screen TV!" It ignores the fact that a) they may have bought the TV when they had disposable income, b) that a TV can provide nearly limitless free entertainment, and c) Flat Screen TVs are…
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Twitter, as part of its never-ending quest to alienate users and appease the rich and powerful, have shut down Politwoops accounts. Politwoops monitored politicians' Twitter accounts and noted when they deleted a tweet. Most of the time deletions were done for the same reason we all deleted content - mispellings, broken links, etc - but occaisionally they caught politicians attempting to flush…
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Here's a very silly idea. Can we use the number of followers each candidate has to predict who will win the election? No, probably not - but let's give it a try anyway, eh? Hypothesis Support on Twitter - as measured by the number of followers - is a reasonable predictor of electoral success. It is likely that the incumbent MP will have a large number of followers - having been in the public …
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