Random Comments from South London

Thu, 08 May 2008 21:11:30 GMT

So the state behaving anti-socially makes it okay, then?

Thu, 08 May 2008 18:56:49 GMT

Open Tech 2008, registration opened today. I've already registered :)

Mon, 05 May 2008 19:08:39 GMT

Just downloaded free Nine Inch Nails album - The Slip. Released under Creative Commons BY-NC-SA. Cool!

Mon, 05 May 2008 18:34:50 GMT

Went to collect a computer from ruudboy yesterday. It didn't enjoy the journey home and wouldn't POST. I ended up taking it all apart and found a loose screw between the motherboard and the case. It now has Ubuntu Hardy on it.

The drive in there is 200G though, which seems like overkill. My music drive is 80G and full. I'm considering putting a smaller drive in the box, and formatting the 200G drive and using it as a new music drive. I'll re-rip my music, and then copy across the music on the music drive I don't have on CD.

The machine is an athlon 3000, so better than my current little shuttle. It has some kind of 128MB radeon card in it which runs compiz. I think I'll swap in the 512MB Nvidia card and some more RAM. It'll probably get my audigy too.

I've re-used one of my old computer names, this box is colossus, named after a WW2 machine. The last computer I had called that was a duron 750 which was used for Radio Radio as a media store.

Sat, 03 May 2008 19:11:33 GMT

My photos from the London Mayor and Assembly count and results

I was an election observer for the Open Rights Group, the British equivalent of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Sat, 03 May 2008 11:52:03 GMT

As you may well know London now has a Conservative mayor, and the far-right BNP got a member on the assembly. I took loads of photos which I'm currently sorting out.

Nick Griffin (BNP leader) was in the assembly hall. The Tories were wearing sweatshirts with "for a Greater London" on the back and they gave speeches complaining that outer London had been neglected in favour of inner London. The Lib Dems came 5th in some places - behind Respect and the BNP in City and East.

Fri, 02 May 2008 07:51:00 GMT

OH NOES! Twitter broken! 500 server error!

Life EPIC FAIL.

Thu, 01 May 2008 22:16:59 GMT

Done two stints of election observing today. I'm doing an 8 hour stint of e counting observing tomorrow at Excel. We are due to finish at 8pm, I expect it'll overrun, so expect the results tomorrow evening (sometime).

London elections

Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:34:37 GMT

Tomorrow (1st May) is the elections for the London Mayor and Assembly. These happen every four years, and always on a Thursday.

Wikipedia is good enough that I don't need to write a great piece on how they work, but I do need more than 140 characters so I'm writing this here rather than twitter.

London mayoral election, 2008 is elected by the supplementary vote system. You have two votes - a first choice and a second preference.

In most elections it seems to be between two candidates. You may really like the candidate from a smaller party, but you are aware that it is going to be between the Labour and Conservative candidates. If it is close your vote for the Greens could give it to the Tories! With this voting system you can vote Green 1, Labour 2. You are not saying you particularly like Livingstone, but you can still say you prefer him to Johnson, and you don't have to worry that a vote for the Greens could mean that Johnson gets it.

The London Assembly election is more complicated! The assembly is elected by the Additional Member System which is designed to be more proportional. This means that you again don't have to be forced into voting for the major parties, minority parties *can* get elected as it tries to reflect the percentage of the vote across the entire capital, whilst still giving you a local representative. 14 members represent local areas and 11 are cross London to make it closer to how everyone voted, percentage wise.

I like these sort of elections as they mean that you can have a more finegrained vote than in a normal first past the post contest. You could vote to give the government a bloody nose, and still take account of the fact that you see the official opposition are worse!

Tue, 29 Apr 2008 07:18:32 GMT

About to go to a workshop on interviews. I've got the demonstration of ecounting later in the day which has been moved from City Hall due the burst water main/flooding.

I woke up at 8pm so I've kept myself up all night doing Ubuntu bug triage, and compulsively loading and using twitter. (yes I'm addicted).

Internet direct debit bounced as I guessed it might. I recklessly withdrew money I shouldn't have so I could have some social fun. *sigh*

Fri, 25 Apr 2008 23:07:20 GMT

Went to see the Open Rights Group yesterday to get my election observer tshirt and pass. I then went to the Ubuntu Hardy release party in a Dutch pub called De Hems off Shaftsbury Avenue. Stayed there until the end and took loads of photos.

Naturally I didn't make my 9am meeting, nor did I make the London.pm pie and mash event. Sorry nou.

I am planning on attending the tube walk tomorrow :)

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 18:45:13 GMT

I'm planning on going to dorkbot tomorrow evening. It includes things such as 8 Bit Larynx: Controlling the 128K Sinclair Spectrum sound chip with beat boxing and the automatic comedian.

The new Ubuntu is out on Thursday. There is a London release party, but unfortunately not at the Pembury. It's at De Hems, 11 Macclesfield Street, London, W1D 5BW and is organised by Canonical. I *may* go, but I probably can't afford it.

There is a tube walk from Crossharbour to Mudchute which I may also go to, finances depending. I can get there and back, but I can't afford the curry :( Bah.

Mon, 21 Apr 2008 22:47:14 GMT

London Connections speculates on whether the East London Line extension phase 2 has been funded, and the news is embargoed due to the forthcoming elections.

I haven't had any party election materials sent here, my evicted downstairs neighbours seem to have received some. I think this may mean that Southwark (or Royal Fail) have lost my electoral registration form. If I can't vote that would really annoy me.

My voting observer stuff is ready. I'm going to go to the Open Rights Group offices to collect it as the post is currently terrible. A packet I sent *first class* took 10 days to arrive, and I haven't even had any letters for about 5 days. Who knows what important mail I'm missing. I'm certainly not buying anything mail order at the moment.

One laptop per child's keyboard not fit for purpose?

Sun, 20 Apr 2008 18:03:34 GMT

New flickr account

Free account only, anything in scope will be added to Wikimedia Commons. All licensed under Creative Commons BY-SA.

transport nerding - East London Line extension phase 2

Sun, 20 Apr 2008 14:23:21 GMT

East London Line extension phase 2 from London Cxns (with photos). This will be connecting the East London Line at New Cross to the South London Line (Victoria<->London Bridge via Denmark Hill) near the Old Kent Road.

Thameslink 2000, as well as cutting capacity on the Sutton loop, also means that the South London Line will stop. There is considerably more money bringing in commuters from outside London than there ever is in inner South London railways. People are saying that the East London Line extension phase 2 will happen to compensate for the loss of the Victoria to London Bridge service. The gentrification of Bermondsey probably means that their local unhappiness has more weight than it would have had a few years ago.

This is the schedule of works, dated 2001. Let's hope it gets the money :)

vodafone woes

Sun, 20 Apr 2008 14:11:17 GMT

Vodafone's kiddy filter broke and was stuck on 'on' yesterday evening. Like all good censorship it grows exponentially, now all of Live Journal and Wikipedia's image search (*) seems to have been added to the block. I posted to Vodafone's eforum saying I was really unhappy and they've deleted my post as "offensive". Maybe questioning filters-on-crack is offensive to Daily Mail readers, I dunno. There was certainly no swearing.

(*)Wikimedia Commons, to be exact. 'Go' finds your page, 'Search' brings up content control.

Fri, 18 Apr 2008 21:23:54 GMT

Had a meeting at an agency this morning where I was told "as a returner.. job market very competitive.." etc. A bit depressing but she told me to ring her fortnightly, and recommended that I sign up with 3 agencies - which I've done.

One of them, Brook Street (Lewisham branch) rang me back quickly, told me the best I could hope for was £7.50/hour and told me to come in and register. Nobody wants to work in Lewisham (unlike the west end), and once I actually get someone to take the risk with me the others will follow..

Adecco's webapp is somewhat old. Under web browser skills it asked me for my abilities with Internet Explorer, Netscape Communicator and Mosaic. I gave advanced for the first two, and medium for the last as I've not used it since 1994 ;)

I applied for yet more jobs in the afternoon and then went to Fare Shares food co-op on the way home.

I also bought three CD singles (bad secretlondon):

Goldfrapp - Happiness
Fragma - Toca's miracle 2008
CSS - Lets Make Love and Listen to Death from Above

Wed, 16 Apr 2008 16:29:55 GMT

Looking at Fraudband Britain and the speedtest here Vodafone HSDPA now seems to be giving me about 3000 kbps. This seems too high, as they claim 7200 kbps, but only in central London.

Anyway, its a million times better than it was a few months ago, which was caused (according to Vodafone) by me using Ubuntu, and not a lack of capacity on their part..

Wed, 16 Apr 2008 14:41:59 GMT

Temping interview yesterday was phone based rather than admin, and was for the Council's pest control people. Dealing with cockroaches all day would probably be a bit grim, but it's a job none the less.

Had a meeting with another agency today about a considerably nicer job working for a charity in the City of London. I'll hear whether I get an interview ~ Mid May.

I was invited to a job event at the local hospital. It turned out to be one guy handing out leaflets with their website address. Totally pointless.

Went home via Cash Converters to find out that it's turned into a church :( Where am I supposed to get cheap electrical goods now?

Off to the Sandpit this evening for gaming fun :)

Mon, 14 Apr 2008 13:01:40 GMT

I didn't get the job I interviewed for on Friday :( There was no negative feedback, they say I gave a good interview, there was just a better candidate.

I have an interview for temping work tomorrow..

Sun, 13 Apr 2008 18:16:14 GMT

Decided to stay in tonight. I did the travel miles across London thing yesterday :)

Sun, 13 Apr 2008 11:59:45 GMT

Went to ewtikins long hair party at abigailb's. I left before they all went to the pub as I was tired. ewtikins put my hair into a fancy plait which was fun and different, I should play with my hair more often.

I should go to the Pembury this evening as it's mirrorshard's birthday drinks. Hopefully there will be some decent games being played, I'm not so keen on the intellectual masturbation ones of late..

Cake and the tax man

Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:57:23 GMT

Chocolate teacakes were wrongly classed as a biscuit for two decades

UK tax officials acknowledged that chocolate teacakes had been wrongly classed as biscuits in 1994, prompting M&S to launch a legal battle to have the wrongly-paid VAT returned.

Under UK tax rules, most traditional bakery products such as bread, cakes, flapjacks and Jaffa Cakes are free of VAT, but the tax is payable on cereal bars, shortbread and partly-coated or wholly-coated biscuits.

Wikipedia on 'chocolate coated marshmallow treats' aka chocolate teacakes

London vote match

Fri, 04 Apr 2008 18:39:14 GMT

London Votematch

The number of people thinking of voting for Boris on the grounds that they think he's 'cool' or something scares me..

Thu, 03 Apr 2008 01:47:47 GMT

People stopped by the police taking photographs of underground stations, something I've obviously never done at all, ever.. (some background)

Abortion as a search term removed from US govt funded academic database on population and family planning "As a federally funded project, we decided this was best for now"

Bank/Monument - Still wondering why passageways without escalators have been closed for escalator refurbishment?