Don’t annoy a dragon, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup
This video is 15-odd minutes long, but very much worth watching. It is a fantastic evaluation of why and how blogging, and the entire internet, works and is rising in popularity. It also explains why lolcats
exist.
If you only watch one video online today, make it this one.
via benhuh!com
Gordon Brown has launched a new gimmick initiative - and an online one at that!
Politicians get a chance in prime ministers question time and other question times - I think it’s time the public had a chance.
We have until June 21st to submit questions. So we should all get on our webcams and submit questions to Gordo. When [and if] they will be answered, however, is not detailed. This apparently going to be a “regular event” - but how often? Once a week? Once a month? Once a quarter? Currently the details are so vague that there is nothing there to hold Brown to,
But, the thing is, which questions will he answer? The site says that he will respons to “the most popular questions submitted by the YouTube community.” But how is that to be measured? There doesn’t appear to be any voting mechanism on the “View” feature, and the videos there are shown by random. There’s also the question of whether a review/censorship procedure is in place as well…
However, this is quite a good idea. It’s different, even if a bit of a WebCameron-esque. Though WebCameron doesn’t have that questions facility any more [or most of the other interactive tools it used to]. Probably because people ask awkward questions, and online, you can’t avoid answering them - something which Gordo will soon realise. People get vitirolic online in a way they wouldn’t in person, and Gordo may well soon experience that.
Let’s make sure that we all ask the PM a question or five. And maybe we’ll get some answers. Though somehow I doubt it.
Apparently:
A voluntary code of conduct for bloggers and internet commentators is supported by almost half of all internet users, a survey has claimed.
The researchers said 46 per cent of web users believe bloggers should agree to a set of guidelines which reflected the laws on defamation, intellectual property rights and incitement. (The Telegraph)
First of all: Define an “internet user”. Do you mean anyone who uses the internet, someone who uses the internet a lot, or what? An “internet user” could mean a granny who spends a couple of minutes several hours sending an email on occasion, all the way through to the geek who spends every waking hour online.
This survery also has no numbers for bloggers/blog readers who support a code. So, basically pointless.
Whilst lots of people who use the internet on any basis might support the idea, no-one who understands the dynamic of the medium would.
Let me show you my response from the last time this idea was raised. It is just as applicable now.
It seems that the iPlayer has pissed of internet providers:
Erm, why should the BBC contribute towards updating an ISPs infrastructure? We pay the BBC tax every year anyway, and we pay for broadband internet as we use it. If you need to upgrade your network in order to supply the services that your customers expect, then I think you should just do it - and pass the cost on to your customers. That’s kinda what the market is all about, paying for the service you want and need.
People - such as myself - want to download TV shows using iPlayer so as to watch them when we choose to, rather than only being able to when they are being broadcast, and will paywhat we need to do so.The BBC - like every other website - are just providing a service which people want. The ISPs just have to keep up with the demands of their customers. Or go out of business.
If keeping their customers means upgrading their network capabilities - which it does - then they’d better get on with doing it! And stop bitching about it.
Art by Sean Bonner, released under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 license.
Uploading Parliamentary debates to YouTube is currently banned. But why?
Why should debates in our Parliament not be “allowed” to be put on YouTube or other video-sharing websites?
I agree completely with Lib Dem MP Jo Swinson when she said:
Parliament belongs to us, the people, and so should the official filming of any and every debate held in it.
If Parliament wants to connect with the people, then it has to do so fully, by allowing the use of video of it in session by the people! Besides, it’s not like they can stop them being put on it, really. But this current way just means that only the politically partisan bits are uploaded by political fanatics, rather than it all being available for everyone to see.
Yeah, like this is going to work.
You can hardly “ban” people from the internet. That is absurd in so many ways. And it won’t work, no matter what they do, in this way. By banning - or, rather, trying to ban - “pirates” from the internet they are trying to force the ISPs to police the internet and break contracts with their own customers.
Yes, they’re going to love doing that.
Also, why is it up to the governemnt to control this kind of stuff? It really isn’t. The internet is far too complex with its global structure to have specific national laws passed against it. Unless they are proposing to do a China, they have no chance of making it effective.
Internet piracy is best combated by the cost of the things that are most routinely downloaded reduced significantly and/or making them available online. Then it becomes nigh-on pointless. Much music piracy has undoubtedly been reduced by the availability of buying songs relatively cheaply on sites such as iTunes, and the availability of TV programmes to be watched “on demand” online after they have been broadcast, such as with the BBC’s iPlayer or Channel 4’s 4oD, will cause a massive drop in the illegal downloading of those programmes.
Instead of lobbying for laws against it, media companies would be far better advised to harness the potential and offer downloads of their own, on their own terms. Then internet piracy will die of starvation. Otherwise it will just change form.
Sources: BBC, The Telegraph
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