wake up and smell the copy
Posted in internet, technology on Sep 23rd, 2008
You know how, once you get familiarised with something, it’s hard to spot that it’s stupid? Well, every now and then you get a flash of perspective.
Earlier my brother sent me a link to a Times Online story. As sometimes happens in email, the link got broken across two lines. In this case just the [...]
Posted in journalism on Jul 25th, 2008
Everything’s been feeling just a little joyless of late. Tamsin has even been moved to ask if this is the Summer of Doom. Bugger me, I’m not arguing. I think I might have inspired the question.
So, when AntonyM sent this link to Giles Coren’s latest tirade I could almost have kissed him. If you can’t [...]
Posted in internet, journalism, writing on May 1st, 2008
Hi, it’s 2008.
Just wanted to remind you, because BBC News thinks it’s discovered a security flaw in Facebook applications. Yes, apparently they can gain access to your and your friends’ profile information, so a malicious application could pose as a legitimate one and harvest profile details, even if they’re not public.
I had to double-check the [...]
Posted in digression, technology on Apr 20th, 2008
We’ve been bashing Microsoft a bit lately, though I don’t notice anyone but Scott rushing to their defence. It’s a lazy pastime, so I promise to be nice to them. After this post.
I started thinking about the opprobrium heaped on Microsoft by bloggers, commentators and anyone else who’s used its products. Much of it unfair, [...]
Posted in writing on Apr 13th, 2008
I can’t help it.
I’ve trained myself to overlook a bit of apostrophic abuse here and there, and I’ve come to accept that people have to be left to stew in their own lax capitalisation and dreadful grammar, but this is just too much:
Nnnnnnnng. Nnnnnnnnnnnng. Nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnng.
Posted in digression on Mar 19th, 2008
I’m hurt.
I’ve been trying very hard not to just slag off the BBC lately, and a friend pointed out this evening that he kind of missed it. Well, if you think I’m going to say something sarcastic about under-bonnet forecourt-proximity-detecting depreciation devices you’ll be sorely disappointed.
Instead, a mini rant about Microsoft. Regular readers will know [...]
Posted in digression on Feb 28th, 2008
Marks & Spencer has a lot to answer for.
I don’t mean because it contributes 400 million carrier bags to the 13 billion apparently handed out by British retailers each year, or even because of the “widespread discrimination” that Unite alleges at the store’s meat suppliers.
But because of that fucking “These are not just…” thing.
First, a [...]
Posted in digression on Jan 7th, 2008
If you’d asked me a little while ago what the single most annoying thing in the world is, I might have proposed this: the moment when you’re stuck in a seemingly interminable queue for some kind of customer service representative, and a prerecorded voice interrupts the ring tone to tell you: “we apologise for the [...]
Posted in digression on Dec 12th, 2007
I’m not happy.
I worked for too many years in IT, and if there’s one lesson that you’d think I would have learned from my time there it’s that faster is not always better.
This would, on early evidence, seem to apply to my internet connection, which was upgraded about a week ago from a faultless 8Mbit [...]
Posted in journalism on Dec 10th, 2007
One of the things that troubled both Charlie and me before we came to work at Spannerworks was the very idea of a journalist working for a marketing company. That and the idea that we’d never again be able to listen to Bill Hicks and laugh without reservation.
Neither of us was sure exactly how, indeed [...]
blog digression freelance internet journalism marketing online journalism politics PR reading technology work writing
hackbash is published under a Creative Commons Licence.
