Recent Posts

PC
EU Politics

The cautionary tale of Corbett’s spoof blog

Richard Corbett is probably Britain’s best known blogging MEP, and as I’ve stated here before I reckon he’s Britain’s best MEP. Give him his due – he does put his head above the parapet and try to take on Britain’s vast array of eurosceptics, which is more than can be […]

monitor.thumbnail.jpg
EU Politics

Getting a grip of the Euro-blogosphere (updated)

I wrote a first version of this entry in September 2007, and have added and amended it ever since. A starting point for my reflections was this analysis from Euractiv of the Euroblogosphere. I have also reflected on the issues of the Euro-blogosphere having contributed to this academic analysis by […]

Stavros Dimas
EU Politics

EU vocab in the British media

According to the Today Programme on BBC Radio 4 this morning Stavros Dimas is the “EU’s Environment Chief“. Well, sort of. He’s actually European Commissioner for the Environment. Now would the same programme dream of calling John Hutton “Britain’s Industry Chief” or Hillary Benn “Britain’s Environment Chief“. No, of course […]

Home network
Technology

The Ultimate Home Network

The requirements: music in the living room, printer and internet connection in the office, laptops to connect from anywhere in the flat, and the need for hard disk backups of both laptops. Today I reckon I’ve finally managed the whole thing: the Ultimate Home Network. My internet connection is with […]

Brothers
EU Politics

Jaroslav Kaczynski, Treaties and Referendums

Poland is the latest EU Member State to look like it might put a spanner in the works of ratification of the Treaty of Lisbon (DJ Nozem has a good list of the other silly requests currently known). BBC has a lousy article about it, and EU Business has a […]

Chuka4Streatham screenshot
UK Politics

Chuka selected in Streatham

It’s always good to have played a small part in a victorious political campaign, and so it has proven with the website Chuka4Streatham; that was my limited contribution to Chuka Umunna’s successful bid to be selected as successor to Keith Hill as Labour candidate in Streatham. Details of the vote […]

Phone in a square
EU Politics

On a political high – whodoicall.eu

My connection with politics is like some kind of bad addiction. It hurts a hell of a lot most of the time, but you get some highs out of it from time to time. The last week has been one of those highs, and it’s even better as it’s an […]

Only in Belgium
EU Politics

Only in Belgium… (complete the sentence)

Realising that its international reputation is not, ahem, what it once was, Belgium has launched a PR campaign called “Only in Belgium” to try to attract investment. Apparently this initiative goes across the language divide in the country – so much so that the map on the homepage prominently displays […]

Hewitt
EU Politics

Hewitt for the Commission – you heard it here first

Now the Daily Telegraph in its gruesome eurosceptic tone is speculating about Patricia Hewitt as Britain’s next nominee to be a European Commissioner. Now I reckon I got there first with this one – I posted about it first on 29th November 2007. Not bad, eh? Devil’s Kitchen commented on […]

ZDF logo, Euros from Blue Magic, Jay-Z
EU Politics

From ZDF to Jay-Z: The Euro in Time Square

I always enjoy watching ZDF Heute, the news programme of one of Germany’s state owned Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen. Not only is the manner of delivery of the presenters so refreshingly staid and old-fashioned, but the way stories are covered is amusingly dead-pan. This lunchtime there was a report on how […]