Blimey

David Hayes Vs Nikolai Valuev

Somebody needs to update Nikolai Valuev's Wikipedia entry. That wont be me though. I hope this video isn't removed by the time you get to see it. It's very panto.

300 seconds

Twitterfall

It's a bit good isn't it?

You can read (or listen) all about the Moral Maze program on Radio 4 over here. It was a good way to discover another real time application that surpassed the quality of the content being observed. Quite a few laughs and apparently a few of you were keeping an eye on the #moralmaze hashtag taking my Twitter follower account over 1200 although no doubt I'll say something and lose a few of those. It's all good.

The Client's A Wanker

Brilliant new fresh blog called I AM THE CLIENT over here. Go check it out.

Adscam

I've had the pleasure of getting hammered with George Parker of the notorious Adscam one or two times in London and San Francisco and I can confirm he is full of piss and vinegar, although those less familiar with the legend would be surprised to learn that he was once a running fanatic and actually uncannily accurate over a number of important industry prediction issues on his blog which is mandatory reading over here.

Anyway, earlier today (OK so I'm up at 4am these days but I nap at 9am so it's all good) I got this DM from George on Twitter

..and I laughed....because  in no particular order: Now he's definitely out.

But not before coming back in again...

Then he's off again

Then back in

One last time??

Fuck Twitter, I need a drink.

Maoxian

How rude:

Clearly a man of refined taste:

Via Maoxian

The Naughties

Andy has just posted the graph above revealing the relationship between new technologies and the lag that subsequently catches up to play a reinforcing role for truth and transparency. As it's the Noughties we're living in I think he's picked up on some very tasty irony for this. It's a post I'm envious I hadn't thought of before and is well worth checking out over here.

X - Rated

One of the defining moments of British cultural insight was the death of Princess Diana. I"ve never forgiven you for devouring every bit of grubby news about her love affairs via the tabloids, only to do an about face turn at her funeral when the crowds finished baying for one of our cultural gladiators' blood only to toss flowers in the way of her funeral train and weep openly before a sea of suburbia clapped their way, meme-like into Westminster cathedral during her brother, Charles Spencer's historic j'accuse speech pointing the finger at the Royal family for their meanness of spirit and narrow minded ostracizing of a wife they had pre-selected for their son, the Prince of Wales.

Of course there's a lot more complexity than just a binary view of good and bad but even with all Diana (Princess of Wales) faults it was evident that despite her fondness for playing up to the cameras, promiscuity (is Harry really a Windsor?) and possible manipulation of public sentiment, the good shone through, and her championing of AIDS, love of her children and campaign against British arm dealers selling UK made land mines (hated by the establishment) were proof of that. 

It's for this reason I still like the Prince of Wales for his principled stand on architecture (one that Ayn Rand's Fountainhead chimes nicely with), his proposal for a multi faith head of religion (as opposed to just Church of England) and dedication towards sustainability. He may be a bit wacky but this pales into insignificance when compared with the British publics attempt to whitewash their own hypocrisy on sentimentality and the cause and effect thereof.

So what is it with the X factor? I listen each season to a large number of UK tweets in what apparently is a mix of obsession and loathing much like our former tragic heroine and yet I can't help but feel like some sort of digital ethnographer on the tail end of observation, viewing a murky world of consumer designed TV, shaped by a rolling narrative of the unexpected mixed with the salaciously expected. 

Its easy to be sniffy about popular culture and while very aware that I've long lost the ability to be able to force interest over the medium term in that which is considered entertainment for the majority of Brits I'm still confounded by the gusto for garbage.

But really.....some of the most clever people I know are up to their hips in the banal viewing and low end wading of trash culture which reminds me of the bread and circuses to keep the end of empire crowds from recognising the depth of problem solving required to address the pressing issues that surround us all. 

I get it. I don't like it. Do we get what we deserve? Probably.

My thanks to Ruby Pseudo for her post and the essence of Ros Bifs culture marketing that inspired my own.

Word

It's been a year and a half since I last did one of these.

Google Connect

One of the great things about social media is the sheer flexibility of it all. I don't have any rules and I'm completely entitled to change my mind at any moment as to how I run this blog. Management reserves the right to be an arse hole and so forth. 


However, as a fully paid up "data junkie" I had an epiphany the other day while thinking why so many of the people on Twitter are in some sort of cluster link fuck fest and yet fail to really engage in what makes Twitter delightful. So, I've decided I'm going to remove some of the social networking tools at the side of this blog (as well as pipe some of you who just link on Twitter into Friendfeed) so this is really the last chance to make it easy for yourself and join Google connect. I'll still be on it but it wont be on display as I'm cleaning up my data streams or rather going for a full on tweak that is really never ending. Click below and join in or don't. It's all good :)

For Fox Sake

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
For Fox Sake!
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

Long before it was safe to do so, when the United States was reeling from the sky scraping collapse of three buildings in New York and any suggestion of even handed analysis or    probing and difficult questions was yelled down by people screaming 'they hate our freedoms'. I made my political position clear although you might be surprised to find I'm neither Democrat or Republican.


What annoys me is that those same people baying for blood invariably couldn't point to Iran on a map and are unaware of having their political opinions shaped by the media and its business driven agenda (industrial military and media complex and so forth or MIC as its often known). FOX is most certainly part of this machine as is CNN although they are both complicit in addressing real issues.


Noam Chomsky made clear this complex communication topic of media manipulation in his 'Manufacturing Consent' book. During that post 9/11 I was unpopular and (I lost friends over it) specifically yelling (to the TV) at the disgraceful cowardice of the White House Press Corps as they group fellated then POTUS Bush 43. I've also made clear my views on FOX NEWS (Fair and Balanced) over here but I think it's important that if you haven't watched how media really works that you take the time out to watch the Manufacturing Consent Video below.

There really is no excuse for not being informed and if you find it dull. Perhaps you need to  back to your day job because being part of the solution and not the problem is only for the sentient classes.

Disclaimer: Noam Chomsky is my favourite Jewish Person. I imagine if he lived a couple of thousand years ago, that with legendary embellishment he could easily morph into that other profoundly important Jewish figure..Jesus Christ. Watch this and see why he's on another level. I know of no other person who cuts through issues with such compelling truth that it leaves me bewildered as to how he made the lonely journey to what become self evident conclusions.

Green Is Green

I was taking an early morning swim yesterday. It's a good time for me to think, and as ever when I'm surrounded by the sun, the sea and the sand I'm reminded how beautiful nature is and that we're really confronted by a logic bomb when considering how the system we all conspire to take part in, points at the asymmetry of global finite resources and our wasteful production (most products don't exist within six months of their manufacture) and of course our decadent disposable lifestyles. There's a way out of this and advertising or communications has a powerful and wealth creating role to contribute towards a virtuous solution but I've written about that extensively elsewhere (and here) although intend to probably recap on some of John Grant's The Green Marketing Manifesto at some point because many of those issues were thrashed out then.

In any case, I can quickly highlight that the behavioural changes required to make a sustainable lifestyle are largely a marketing problem and where there's a marketing problem there's a business solution if supply side economics are given the credence we already do.

Anyway I was dipping a few toes into the sea and I suddenly recalled that JWT's future trends watcher Marian Salzman was predicting back in 1988 that Blue was the new Green. That we'd be seeing the environment issue as a blue one where it was once green. A lot of us didn't like it at the time because many people from the consumption classes (I use that term deliberately) are still confused as to the extent of change needed and the last thing the communication classes should be doing is confusing them with bogus rebranding efforts. Anyway, Marian was wrong as most future trend watchers are. I've enjoyed some of her work in the past but frankly I think it's time that these charlatans should put their hands up and admit their error rather than just concentrating on their successes. Don't you?

You can read how common sense and Green won the day over here, here, here and here.

Silhouette

China's ability to make knock off copies on luxury goods is sometimes frighteningly close or at least visually. I bought this iPod copy recently for US$37 (8 Gigabyte) and while it's got lots of drawbacks such as slow boot up, quicker battery fade and slow processing plus no interface. It does  have a few advantages. It's got a radio and I couldn't care less if it was stolen like my last two were in Hong Kong. No shadow of a doubt.

What I'm Listening To

I've long been a fan of DJ Stewarts mixes from Bed Supperclubs Electrofrequencies in Bangkok on Monday night to his latest sets on UB Radio. To be frank. He's on fire at the moment with some of the best mixes I've heard him make in all the years I've been rating him as one of the finest DJ's in the business. You can download his UB Radio Sets over here. Breaks, House and Tech for those who need some taxonomy (or ontology if like me you're struggling to separate the two).

There's a feed over here you can pop into your iTunes for the cream. It's free..... as indeed "Everything should be (free)"  and which one of the sets (Flamgini at Funky Dojo) asserts.

Feedburner Statistics

A Star Is Born

Happy days before I got robbed in Hong Kong.

Kasabian Football Hero - Society of the Spectacle

Is this what Guy Debord meant when he wrote Society of the Spectacle?


Via Andy & Eaon. 

Cool Bananas

I just got back from another stunning bike ride round the island I'm living on. I'm very conscious these days that as oil prices spike and the threat of hyperinflation from printing money in the United States and the United Kingdom leaves us potentially looking at an impending breakdown in the food distribution system. It leaves city dwellers with enough food for two days as explained in this TED video I blogged about a week or so ago and so any opportunity to reconnect with nature is fascinating me at the moment and I"m slowly researching what kind of foods I could grow on the island as well as what is available in the wild such as these bananas. Even if my instinct is wrong and my views are alarmist, I just think it makes good frugal sense to see what can be relied upon and so I'm usually taking a bunch of these home with me for the return cycle journey. 

It's very satisfying and strangely I seem to be leaning towards a vegetarian diet or at least one with a 100 or so grammes of meat a week. I also understand from a tweet earlier that a vegan in a Hummer has a lower carbon footprint than a beef eater in a Prius because of the intensive farming required to breed cows for food.

I'd like to raise chickens here but after the last round of avian flu the government has put strict rules in place to prevent this. I'm sure that will be ignored if events take over legislation. In any case it's very rewarding as these bike rides for wild growing bananas take me through some of the steepest inclines on the south side of the island and I'm in better shape than I have been for at least five years when I last visited the Gym regularly. I look a bit like a Frenchman sometimes when I come home on the KLEIN bearing bananas instead of onions. Tropical living my friends ;)

Google Wave

I've been invited on Google Wave and I'd quite like to road test it. For those of you who don't have my gmail address and wish to have a go at using it, just drop me an email to my spam account which is cefrith at hotmail dot bomb.