• Opening remarks

• Embrace gig

• Star Wars 3

• Sith Lords

• The Force.net

• Imperial Dogs - Stuck in a room with R2

• EU Constitution news

• iTunes Podcasting announcement

• Khavi Collective

• Sabi - Matmilk (Sabi's blog)

• Britcaster.com

• Harry Spotter & the acne outbreak

• Big Brother 6 - Surveilance culture

• Closing comments

A totally brilliant night. Top band, playing a homecoming gig, in the centre of the city. Great atmosphere, and it didn't rain!

Sorry there is no sound..

Intro
Britcaster
Current state of Podcasting
Apple Itunes support
Winer Vs Curry
Closing comments

8 min (3.9Mb)

How reassuring to read in Thursdays edition of the Scotsman that British military hardware was used by soldiers as they massacred protesting civilians in the torture friendly nation of Uzbekistan.

These are not mere 'loopholes' in the law, that allow a regime that regularly kidnaps, imprisons, and tortures its own people, to benefit from British military equipment. These are huge and deliberate gaping holes, left there, by those in our own government, who happily prop up such regimes, under the condition that they carry out a little friendly torture when our own government requires it.

With the citizens of that Uzbekistan currently in fear for their lives after over a 1000 were shot dead in recent protests, doesn't it make you feel all warm and cosy about your own leaders, to know that they willingly buddy up with such despicable characters.

An interesting Morning Coffee Notes from Dave Winer over at Scripting.com. He talks about the fallout from the Apple iTunes podcast/RSS announcement, and points out that Apple are now in a position to become a commanding player in the RSS standards pecking order. Not only will they set the standard for the interface users will use to download podcasts, but they will also be in a position to act as 'gatekeepers' who can determine which podcasts are the most visible as a result of their placement on the popular iTunes interface.

Dave feels these podcasts are likely (in the main), to be those produced by the bigger media players like NBC, BBC, NPR, and Disney. Alongside these, those podcasts produced by the community, that Apple decides are the most commercially viable, or perhaps the most popular, may also get a share of the new (centralised) pie. What this will mean for those podcasts outside of the Cupertino loop is currently uncertain. Either way the stakes have been raised, and the commercial podcasting era has now officially begun.

Whilst on the subject of podcasts, I feel it would be a gross dereliction of my duty as a Brit podcaster, to not pass on the aural pleasure of the Britcaster forum and directory to any interested readers. It's a great site for all things podcast related in the UK, and is sure to provide you with a spiffing audio window into the weird and wonderful world of Blighty.

Check it out.. :-)

So Apple has finally decided to get with the program, and support podcasting functionality in the next version of iTunes (4.9). Currently the plan calls for podcasts to be free downloads, and for podcasters to submit their podcasts to Apple, who will then hand-pick those it considers the best. No doubt those not included in the 'draft' will be integrated in some other way, unless Apple has plans to incur the wrath of the podcasting community! It's certainly a smart move by the Cupertino company, coming at a time when the first cracks have begun appearing in the all conquering iPods armor. I mean imagine the marketing buzz that this gives the company who own the 'pod' brand.

It's also great news for podcasting as a whole though, because it promises to bring many more people to the party. Over 400 million songs have now been sold through the iTunes outlet, and whilst Apple has not announced any intention to charge for podcasts, both producers and consumers are likely to benefit from the increased exposure this will bring to the medium. How it is all going shake out in practice though, nobody (outside of the infinite loop), is quite sure! It is certain that many more 'professional' content producers will now begin to look at the possible benefits of utilizing podcasting, and this alone will have a major effect on the 'home-brew' scene as it presently stands. Podcasting is about to move into the mainstream, and one thing is certain, it's going to be a very interesting ride.

My internet connection is likely to be out for a few hours over the next day or so, whilst the line is upgraded. Normal service will be resumed ASAP.
;-)

I've done nothing this weekend except lie around with my wife watching episodes of the brilliant Channel Four show 'Spaced'  and (re-watching) Star Wars I & II in preparation for Revenge of the Sith. When not doing that, I've been downloading E3 footage and screenshots of the amazing new Zelda : 'Twilight Princess' from Nintendo.

Sometimes, I still act like I'm 6!

Thanks Justin for the DVD. I know we took nearly a year to get round to watching it (!) but when we did, it was pure fried gold! ;-)

To be honest, I couldn't care THAT heartily for Star Wars. It has great totemic and emblematic value, and I'm looking forward to the movie, but it doesn't matter to me as it does to some. The prequels have been enjoyable, and I have no doubt the new movie will prove the best of the three early episodes, but I can think of many films that mean more to me, and have touched me more profoundly. Great ambitious movie making, and all round popcorn entertainment nonetheless.

Zelda however is a different matter. It remains a titanic video game franchise, that (for me), is the single greatest example of the videogame as a piece of art. The best Zelda games in the franchise tend to be those that Nintendo has time to complete. The scale of their vision usually leads to a production cycle of a round 5 years for each true evolution/next generation Zelda to appear. In between Nintendo tend to spin out an extra Zelda, re-working and expanding the engine and ideas developed over that five year cycle.

Looking at the screenshots and movies from this years E3, it is obvious that this promises to be the most immersive and spectacular version of the game ever produced. The scope of the world, the endless creativity of the game design, the wonderful contrast between light and dark environments, and the sheer exhausting brilliance of it make it my only anticipated game this year.

Somedays, I have such a rabid sense of confusion about this world, and about my own place in it. I feel I live in a culture that is so sedated to the truth,  that we have allowed blatant lies to be accepted and paraded as facts. The amazing thing is, that hardly anyone in the mainstream media ever seems to point this out! Nothing seems to be done or said by the political puppets in government, that substantially alters or arrests the decadent cycle of war, famine, and repression. Power continues to be centralized, secretive, and ruthless, and the truth about how and why this is happening, remains elusive.

In such a society, the bigger the lie is, the more successfully it passes unnoticed. No judgment is enacted upon the grand perpetrators of this criminal deceit, because they are the very people who spawn, organize, and maintain it. They watch over it carefully, in order to preserve the vested interests they have in seeing it successfully adopted. They escape unpunished for the crimes and atrocities they commit, because they are the very people who control the event. They engineer the problem, control and manipulate the information available about the problem, and provide the solution to the unknowing people at the proper time. Which perhaps explains why they are willing to risk such a criminal enterprise in the first place.

We live inside a web of lies. Therefore, deceit has become the common currency. 'Fact' has become a commodity, to be traded and brokered by the wire pullers, kingmakers, and fixers of finance, media, and the information war machine. The 'facts' are what the network tells you they are, and they get their version of the 'facts' from the mouths of those who have the most to gain by not revealing them.

How do you like them apples!?

Do the British people really want a biometric identity card system? The British government seem convinced that we do, and the popular media insist that all polls show widespread support for its introduction. Despite the fact, that most people have no real idea of the way in which it will impact their lives, and that there has been no debate of any depth in the mainstream media about the potential pitfalls. We are informed that it will help in the fight against terrorism, crime, and identity theft, but no strong substantive evidence has been produced to validate these assertions. Nonetheless, this system is being presented as the new model for preserving our "Domestic Security' and solving the social ills of modern Britain.

The Madrid bombers were not prevented in their designs by the Spanish ID card system, and there is no convincing evidence that it discourages crime. Identity cards or similar systems of social categorization and identification also have a history of being used by repressive regimes. In China, they are used as a tool of social engineering, and other countries have used them to impose quota systems. At their worst, they can be used to target dissidents, and stifle the oppositon of those people deemed by the state, to be politically or ideologically 'dangerous.'

How does it help to foster trust between police officers and members of the public when at any time, that officer has the right to request to see wether your 'papers' are in order? What happens when that officer doesn't like the information he or she sees? Isn't it likely that these additional powers will see a further increase in the abuse of authority by those who wield them? As for the 'fight against crime' how long will it be before something as valuable as Identity cards are cleverly forged by the criminal community? What other corruption's and abuses will become widespread within this new computerized database? Ask yourself honestly, is it really likely that these things will not happen!?

A partial definition of a police state, is a place where armed men are able to stop and search anyone with impunity. Where people feel themselves to be constantly under supervision, suspicion, and surveillance, and where free speech is only permitted, so long as it does not conflict with the official version of events. The dangers posed by the introduction of an identity card scheme are being deliberately minimized by those who have most to gain from their introduction. We are being systematically conditioned to give up more and more personal freedom and privacy in exchange for a false and fraudulent notion of security.

Useful Links

Privacy International
NO2ID
Liberty

Audio leftovers from a great family weekend.
We also had a great party, had a lotta laughs.
My brother has the photos at http://thegreatjapaneseadventure.blogspot.com


MP3 File

Three generation conversation
Welsh
English
Danglish!


MP3 File

• Vox issues a party invite.
 He doesn't really have one, but go anyway, you never know, you might enjoy it!
• Bilderberg Meeting 2005
• Mashup music
• Star Wars Vs Jimmi Jammes - I Am Your Father mp3.
Closing comments.
Corrections.
mp3 link/Podcast

Possibly one of the strangest sights I have ever seen!