The Times: Tech column - MPs' weblogs/cyberbeggars/Stasi/Spooks
By David Rowan
A few years ago, while editing a national newspaper's comment page, I cajoled John Redwood, MP, into writing a piece not on a serious issue such as Europe, but about why he enjoyed Britpop. It was a revealing article, which offered a rare glimpse into the private man behind the political posturing, although some reckon his career never really recovered. So I was fascinated over the weekend to read the confessions of a Labour MP, not only about his teenage loyalty to Adam and the Ants, and his recent "overwhelming hangover", but also about how he had apologised for being rude to three Tories. No politician, surely, could survive such openness.
You would be wrong to think so. With perhaps half a million people in the UK sharing their thoughts via personal weblogs, it is remarkable that elected politicians are failing to use the medium to communicate more vital matters with their constituents. They could publish when and what they wanted, offer instant comment on the day's news, and push the issues that concern them. Yet only Tom Watson, MP for West Bromwich East, is currently doing so. His weblog - at www.tom-watson.co.uk - is a role model that his colleagues should emulate. Within five years, he predicts, half of all our MPs will blog.
Watson admits that he's "no tech genius"; he updates his site up to seven times a day with easy-to-use Movable Type software. By sharing both his official duties and his personal thoughts, he is reaching out to journalists, constituents and a wider public. It is, he admits, a political risk to commit to the page; but search engines register weblog entries, and Watson's profile is rising not just on Google, but in the real world. And which MP wouldn't want that?
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YOU will, no doubt, be pleased to learn that the Californian student known as Michel, whose GiveBoobs.com website solicited $4,500 (£2,690) for silicone enhancement, last week finally had the operation and is delighted at her "awesome" chest. But with so many cyberbeggars now crowding the market, this looks like another bubble that is ready to burst.
Since Karyn Bosnak famously attracted $13,323 to repay her credit-card debts last summer through SaveKaryn.com, hundreds more panhandlers have tried their luck. But not everyone is winning, as a Wired News survey has found. SaveShane.com, for instance, is stuck at $7.25. What was it that they used to say about "first mover advantage"?
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COMPUTER scientists at the Fraunhofer Institute in Berlin have been busy writing software that could expose some hard truths about the Stasi, the East German secret police. As the Berlin Wall crumbled, agents set about destroying tonnes of incriminating documents, which were cut up and dumped in 16,000 sacks. Their only mistake was to cut the papers neatly into quarters, which the institute is now trying to reassemble. It has taken workers eight years to hand-match pages in the first 300 sacks, but by autumn software will be automating the next 15,700. Memo to MI5: invest in a few shredders.
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IT WAS a smart move by the directors of The Matrix Reloaded to ensure that the computer-hacker storyline was credible enough to gain the geek community's rare approbation. Not so the BBC, whose episode of Spooks last night is being dismissed by a London hacker group as "one of the worst portrayals of 'computer hacking' ever". When a hacker gains control of MI5's "mainframe", an IP address flashes on screen. Some clever coder was bound to trace that IP number, 163.2.100.6, which appears to belong not to MI5 but to the US Navy. Is Greg Dyke trying to tell us who's really running Britain?
(The Times, June 17 2003)
A few years ago, while editing a national newspaper's comment page, I cajoled John Redwood, MP, into writing a piece not on a serious issue such as Europe, but about why he enjoyed Britpop. It was a revealing article, which offered a rare glimpse into the private man behind the political posturing, although some reckon his career never really recovered. So I was fascinated over the weekend to read the confessions of a Labour MP, not only about his teenage loyalty to Adam and the Ants, and his recent "overwhelming hangover", but also about how he had apologised for being rude to three Tories. No politician, surely, could survive such openness.
You would be wrong to think so. With perhaps half a million people in the UK sharing their thoughts via personal weblogs, it is remarkable that elected politicians are failing to use the medium to communicate more vital matters with their constituents. They could publish when and what they wanted, offer instant comment on the day's news, and push the issues that concern them. Yet only Tom Watson, MP for West Bromwich East, is currently doing so. His weblog - at www.tom-watson.co.uk - is a role model that his colleagues should emulate. Within five years, he predicts, half of all our MPs will blog.
Watson admits that he's "no tech genius"; he updates his site up to seven times a day with easy-to-use Movable Type software. By sharing both his official duties and his personal thoughts, he is reaching out to journalists, constituents and a wider public. It is, he admits, a political risk to commit to the page; but search engines register weblog entries, and Watson's profile is rising not just on Google, but in the real world. And which MP wouldn't want that?
++++
YOU will, no doubt, be pleased to learn that the Californian student known as Michel, whose GiveBoobs.com website solicited $4,500 (£2,690) for silicone enhancement, last week finally had the operation and is delighted at her "awesome" chest. But with so many cyberbeggars now crowding the market, this looks like another bubble that is ready to burst.
Since Karyn Bosnak famously attracted $13,323 to repay her credit-card debts last summer through SaveKaryn.com, hundreds more panhandlers have tried their luck. But not everyone is winning, as a Wired News survey has found. SaveShane.com, for instance, is stuck at $7.25. What was it that they used to say about "first mover advantage"?
++++
COMPUTER scientists at the Fraunhofer Institute in Berlin have been busy writing software that could expose some hard truths about the Stasi, the East German secret police. As the Berlin Wall crumbled, agents set about destroying tonnes of incriminating documents, which were cut up and dumped in 16,000 sacks. Their only mistake was to cut the papers neatly into quarters, which the institute is now trying to reassemble. It has taken workers eight years to hand-match pages in the first 300 sacks, but by autumn software will be automating the next 15,700. Memo to MI5: invest in a few shredders.
++++
IT WAS a smart move by the directors of The Matrix Reloaded to ensure that the computer-hacker storyline was credible enough to gain the geek community's rare approbation. Not so the BBC, whose episode of Spooks last night is being dismissed by a London hacker group as "one of the worst portrayals of 'computer hacking' ever". When a hacker gains control of MI5's "mainframe", an IP address flashes on screen. Some clever coder was bound to trace that IP number, 163.2.100.6, which appears to belong not to MI5 but to the US Navy. Is Greg Dyke trying to tell us who's really running Britain?
(The Times, June 17 2003)
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