Fair Trade - The Movie. An eq.tv original.

...Please watch this great video and pass it on. Oxfam

Sick of spam...get Gmail...

...I just love the music on this one and as I have Gmail there's more time to learn esperanto. Thanks to Mashable

Al Gore for President!...

...Gore Vidal and the Condition of America. The one Gore wants the American people to vote for the other Gore. Vidal for Al. Their names seem full of puns. Perhaps Al could have Gore as Vice President. Then it really would be an Al Gore Administration.

Cardiffnet internet workshops...

...with the idea of going local and global we have set up a new workshop group in Cardiff called Cardiffnet intended to be an interface between the local and global in the Cardiff County area. A googlejuice bar with Web 2.0 munchies and blogging geeks for dummies. It will be hands on learning by doing for people into social networking and community. I hope it will also keep me off the streets and glued to my MacBook. Talking of which if anybody knows of any public open wifi in a nice Cardiff cafe or pub could you let me know? Then we can set up our first open meeting.

Scary movie...

...when you think about the odds we only have one choice.

Tantra for your pets...

...gets my weird bad taste award of the week. Sorry but I could not resist this.

This is maybe taking the New Age to the outer limits!

Google buys Jaiku...

...according to the Jaikido blog today. New user sign up will be by invitation only for the time being. As the search engine's share price soars to over 600 dollars there are rumors of a Google mobile phone coming out soon. According to the Telegraph it will not be a phone but a mobile operating system that will be offered for free in order that Google can gain a foothold in the small, but rapidly growing, mobile advertising market. All of this fits in with my view of the coming mobile internet being the next big thing as technologies converge and more people adopt a mobile online lifestyle. This time Nokia lost out but they are still very much in the game. I quite like Jaiku as it's fun and has many practical possibilities. What I have yet to find, though, is my favorite mobile phone.

Increase your WiFi signal...

...with just a mobile phone, your laptop and an Ethernet cable. Awesome!

The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein...

The Shock Doctrine
...We should arm ourselves with information to defeat the effects of the shock doctrine.

Riot at Shwe Dagon Pagoda East gate in Burma...

Nine killed in Burma...

...the dead included eight protesters and a Japanese man, identified as a video journalist working for APF News - with 11 demonstrators and 31 soldiers hurt. Update: According to Australia's ambassador to Burma eye witnesses say that the death toll was significantly higher, perhaps by a factor of ten.
BBC
After decades of brutal dictatorship, the people of Burma are rising--and they need our help.
Clicking below will add your name to this petition to Chinese Premier Hu Jintao and the UN Security Council:

"We stand alongside the citizens of Burma in their peaceful protests. We urge you to oppose a violent crackdown on the demonstrators, and to support genuine reconciliation and democracy in Burma. We pledge to hold you accountable for any further bloodshed."
Petition

and see Rachel for more updates.
Also photos on Saffron Revolution

iPhone turned into pocket Mac...

...by Victor and Albert who work for Martin Varsavsky's FON Labs. The race is now on to optimize the unlocked iPhone.
Update (Friday): It seems that according to Scobleizer a lot of people have been having trouble with iPhone updates, including many that have not hacked their phones. Will this be a PR disaster for Apple?
Wikinomics on Apple

Craig Murray's blog censored...

Cartoon/Matt Buck (Creative Commons)

...as, following threats by Usmanov's lawyer Schillings, Craig Murray's ISP takes his blog down. Usmanov, a Russian billionaire, has a large holding in the Arsenal football club. Once again free speech is under threat from the super rich and their fancy lawyers. Schillings proudly proclaim to protect the reputations of high profile individuals, corporates and brands. Presumably from the rest of us, the great unwashed of the blogosphere. See Areopagitica and Chicken Yoghurt for plenty of details. See also Wikipedia/Alisher Usmanov and check out these links:
Curious Hamster, Pickled Politics, Harry’s Place, Tim Worstall, Dizzy, Iain Dale, Ten Percent, Blairwatch, Davide Simonetti, Earthquake Cove, Turbulent Cleric (who suggests dropping a line to the FA about Mr Usmanov), Mike Power, Jailhouse Lawyer, Suesam, Devil’s Kitchen, The Cartoonist, Falco, Casualty Monitor, Forever Expat, Arseblog, Drink-soaked Trots (and another), Pitch Invasion, Wonko’s World, Roll A Monkey, Caroline Hunt, Westminster Wisdom, Chris K, Anorak, Mediawatchwatch, Norfolk Blogger, Chris Paul, Indymedia (with a list of Craig Murray’s articles that are currently unavailable), Obsolete, Tom Watson, Cynical Chatter, Reactionary Snob, Mr Eugenides, Matthew Sinclair, The Select Society, Liberal England, Davblog, Peter Gasston Pitch Perfect, Adelaide Green Porridge Cafe, Lunartalks, Tygerland, The Crossed Pond, Our Kingdom, Big Daddy Merk, Daily Mail Watch, Graeme’s, Random Thoughts, Nosemonkey, Matt Wardman, Politics in the Zeros, Love and Garbage, The Huntsman, Conservative Party Reptile, Ellee Seymour, Sabretache, Not A Sheep, Bartholomew’s Notes on Religion, The People’s Republic Of Newport, Life, the Universe & Everything, Arsenal Transfer Rumour Mill, The Green Ribbon, Blood & Treasure, The Last Ditch, Areopagitica, Football in Finland, An Englishman’s Castle, Freeborn John, Eursoc, The Back Four, Rebellion Suck!, Ministry of Truth, ModernityBlog, Beau Bo D’Or, Scots and Independent, The Splund, Bill Cameron, Podnosh, Dodgeblogium, Moving Target, Serious Golmal, Goonerholic, The Spine, Zero Point Nine, Lenin’s Tomb, The Durruti Column, The Bristol Blogger, ArseNews, David Lindsay, Quaequam Blog!, On A Quiet Day…, Kathz’s Blog, England Expects, Theo Spark, Duncan Borrowman, Senn’s Blog, Katykins, Jewcy, Kevin Maguire, Stumbling and Mumbling, Famous for 15 megapixels, Ordovicius, Tom Morris, AOL Fanhouse, Doctor Vee, The Curmudgeonly, The Poor Mouth, 1820, Hangbitch, Crooked Timber, ArseNole, Identity Unknown, Liberty Alone, Amused Cynicism, Clairwil, The Lone Voice, Tampon Teabag, Unoriginalname38, Special/Blown It, The Remittance Man, 18 Doughty Street, Laban Tall, Martin Bright, Spy Blog The Exile, poons, Jangliss, Who Knows Where Thoughts Come From?, Imagined Community, A Pint of Unionist Lite, Poldraw, Disillusioned And Bored, Error Gorilla, Indigo Jo, Swiss Metablog, Kate Garnwen Truemors, Asn14, D-Notice, The Judge, Political Penguin, Miserable Old Fart, Jottings, fridgemagnet, Blah Blah Flowers, J. Arthur MacNumpty, Tony Hatfield, Grendel, Charlie Whitaker, Matt Buck, The Waendel Journal, Marginalized Action Dinosaur, SoccerLens, Toblog, John Brissenden East Lower, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Peter Black AM, Boing Boing, BLTP, Gunnerblog, LFB UK, Liberal Revolution, Wombles, Focus on Sodbury…, Follow The Money, Freedom and Whisky, Melting Man, PoliticalHackUK, Simon Says…, Daily EM, From The Barrel of a Gun, The Fourth Place, The Armchair News Blog, Journalist und Optimist, Bristol Indymedia, Dave Weeden, Up North John, Gizmonaut, Spin and Spinners, Marginalia, Arnique, Heather Yaxley, The Whiskey Priest, On The Beat, Paul Canning, Martin Stabe, Mat Bowles, Pigdogfucker, Rachel North (193).

The human condition...

...after a very good few bottles of Taylor's port in Cardiff is not a pretty sight. Still Tim (as in Tim Brett, photographer-plug, well he deserves it) made some coffee, so it's all good...yes, well before we lose the plot we must ask ourselves where are we going. After the family outing of the past week that is not an easy question to answer. After all I'm now an uncle to a load of good looking kids. What will their world look like when they are my age? Warmer? Chateau Cardiff vin rouge? A very nice year. But what of the wider consequences of our little experiment with mother nature known as market capitalism, or globilaztion? Who gives a fuck? Scary movie? I will probably die in the next fifty years. My kids will probably live on to face the consequences of the global and liberal market party. I do not envy them, nor do I wish to be in their position fifty years further down the road. I have had a wonderful night with my family drinking port and falling over like a good trooper. The internet kept me awake all night pondering my kid's future. It was not a pretty sight at least in my imagination. Spinoza would say we have a moral duty to be good and not to harm. As Deus sive natura I take it that we, as well as the rest of creation, are included in this most divine of integrated plans. Darwin's "dangerous idea" put an end to all the speculations of the philosophers and the world's religions, no matter how sweet and enticing they may be. We are left to clean up the mess. Postmodernism tried and failed. So now, like Kant, we awake from our dogmatic slumbers and look around at a planet that is in ecological meltdown. This is not a Roman fin de siecle. This is the real deal. The hitchiker's guide to the end of life, the universe and everything. 42. Anyone got the question? Since the Pax Americana invented the end of season sale of the assets of planet earth we are all living in a pre apocalyptic state of fear. The war on terror engulfs the agenda of the chattering classes. Then they define our reality. Hitler and Goebbels would be proud of the legacy of ignorance that is the modern world. Sadly we have neither the time or the freedom to escape the karma of our modernistic largesse. We must act. Now. Il faut cultiver notre jardin, Thus I petition the Prime Minister of England to take up the baton of Winston Churchill, who talked us through our darkest hour, and engage in a policy that will encourage the people to see that is in their own interest to work for the preservation and sustainability of life on earth.

Facebook and privacy...

...Social networking site Facebook is changing its privacy policy to allow public profiles and one month from now Google search listings of members information. Sensitive data such as date of birth could become a security issue as we all leave more digital tracks behind us. According to Gigaom "This move transforms Facebook from being a social network to being quasi-White Pages of the Web. Every time a non-Facebook user finds someone on Facebook after a “search,” they might feel compelled to sign-up and get more information. It is a virtuous cycle, meant to attract more people to the Facebook network." We have one month to change our personal security settings. This seems, as Gigaom points out, to be a move to increase traffic and boost Facebook's e-commerce potential and "yet another small step in the overall erosion of personal privacy, thanks to the ever growing popularity of the social networks. I don’t like the direction where all this is headed." I agree, Gigaom.

Calling the Lama from afar...

Photos copyright: Leighton Cooke 2007
...I come from the land of song, so I was happy and proud to be present yesterday evening when Claron McFadden received the Amsterdam Culture Prize in the Musiekgebouw aan 't Ij on the city's waterfront. Claron sang, with Aleksandra Anisimowicz, the duet "I' mi son Giovinetta" by Luzzasco Luzzaschi which was, for me, the high spot of the evening. Alessandro Pianu played harpsichord. Afterwards we talked about music, her native city of New York and our mutual love of Mozart. Claron reaches out beyond the classical medium to embrace dance and many different aspects of the performing arts. She also loves children and Rebeka was captivated by the opportunity to meet a real star. Me too. It was an evening I'll never forget and a fitting finale to my years in Amsterdam. As I prepare to return to the hills of Wales I'm more than a little sad about the dear friends I'll leave behind. For a long time I've been calling my Lama from afar and now he has answered. Nothing is more precious than the chance to be with a great spiritual friend who can lead you out of confusion. I remember an afternoon with Geshe-la many years ago in Bromley, near London. It was one of those timeless moments when you simply know that the heart has no limits. Geshe Damchos teaches with laughter, the best medicine of all. Now many years later those seeds are ripening as this evening I listen to a beautiful solo Tibetan chant of Om Mani Padme Hung Hri. One day Tibet will be free and its people will know no more fear or suffering. Till that day comes we shall sing our songs of the heart, wishing to return to those we love. I am very fortunate to be going home and I wish that everyone who this night is separate from their home and those that they love finds their way back.

Interview with David Holmgren...

...co-founder of the permaculture movement. David tells how , by finding small scale, slow solutions, we can achieve the transition to a lower energy society based on cooperation rather than consumption. Local small scale food production will be crucial to this process. We will all be gardners in the future.

Bill Mollison on permaculture...

...with, once again, thanks to United Diversity for this link. Bill is the founding father of the permaculture movement and shows how sustainable ways of working with nature can safeguard the future of our food supply. There is a garden of Eden. We are living in it if we only realise it and use these methods to develop the land of the earth in an integrated way, rather than the sociopathic path of destruction we have been following so far. The number of permaculture projects on the planet is growing every day and anyone with even the smallest piece of land can use these techniques to create a living and productive environment.

Clean up your act, Tesco!...

...and stop being arseholes. Two of my very best friends come from Bulgaria and they are both kind and idealistic young people. Which is why when I read in this morning's Guardian that Bulgarian workers in Cornwall had been "forced to 'live like pigs on scraps', scavenging vegetables from the fields when their Latvian gangmaster withheld their pay for 34 days" I nearly puked. This is Cornwall, for pity's sake, where I used to go on summer holidays and eat Cornish pasties and drink scrumpy.
"They were sent to work through a subcontracting chain at Southern England Farms, a leading vegetable farming and packing company that appears on Tesco's website as one of its flagship local producers of courgettes, cauliflowers and cabbage. They were housed in dirty caravans, with seven trying to sleep in a six-berth van in one example. They were initially charged £50 a week each for this overcrowded accommodation."
What the fuck? Is Tesco's now owned by the descendants of Heinrich Himmler? Are the British to be able to eat cheap food because subcontractors of Tesco's run forced labour camps in the 21st century? Have we become a nation that turns a blind eye to blatant abuses of minimal human rights? In 2006 Tesco's made 2.21 billion pounds profit partly on the back of forced labour. This is a company that shames the reputation of Britain. What about the many British farmers who are also screwed by Tesco's greed and indifference to whether or not they can make a living? Get your act together, Tesco and stop acting like a corporate parasite. Sir Terry Leahy, if you have any honour, do something about this latest Tesco scandal or resign. I remember when Tesco closed down their store in the centre of Cardiff and made a killing. They have not changed a bit.
Action Network
Tescopoly
Friends of the Earth

Out of the Tunnel...

...Today I found a copy of Rachel's book in Waterstone's in Amsterdam. Even if you already know the story this book is still remarkable. Once you start you can't put it down. Rachel likes to say dammit just like Manon. The style is fast and dramatic and makes you feel as if you are there with her when it all happens. This is not another book written by a victim. Rachel does not ask for sympathy, she just tells her tale. There is much here to give hope to anyone who has suffered a life shattering trauma such as rape or violence. The message is that one can start again and learn to live with the scars. I don't know what amazes me most, Rachel's courage or the mindless idiots who caused all this suffering. I watched the news of the 7/7 London attacks on TV in an Amsterdam cafe as it happened and have been reading Rachel's blog from the beginning. She has become a voice of freedom at a time when politicians have passed one stupid law after another. Every politician should read this book. Rachel stands up for the rights that took many generations to achieve that are being so carelessly eroded. It was touching to know that J proposed marriage right here in Amsterdam, and that she has such a great partner to support her. She sure deserves him. Read this book and it will move you as it did me.
The Friday Project (book info)