Hell, crackdown by the evil Facebook! Shutting down student protest! In cahoots with the authorities! Even Evgeny Morozov is onto it: "Over 50 political accounts deleted in Facebook purge" http://goo.gl/YmBWD — Evgeny Morozov (@evgenymorozov) April 29, 2011 Look folks, this was a problem waiting to happen. Here’s why.
Agh, today is painful. I’m a republican, atheist, anti-nationalist, and there’s a royal wedding going on, people sing god save the queen, and British flags are everywhere. Which got me thinking: which of my political views are actually similar to those of more than 50% of the British population? I […]
First up we have Is your Cat confused about the referendum on the voting system on the 5th May? With cat versus dog simplicity, some nifty graphics, and why AV keeps out the nasty dogs. It’s even good at explaining AV! Second we have Does she know what she’s talking […]
OK, you have worked our the basics of Twitter. If you haven’t, then read Jessica Hische’s excellent guide (even if it’s Mum, not Mom), and I’ve written a few words on Twitter for politics. Then read on, for this is a guide about how to use Twitter Lists, the way to […]
Joe Litobarski wrote a post earlier today entitled “Blogs are Dead… Long Live Facebook!” Like a lot of Joe’s stuff it’s a thoughtful case, but, ultimately – in my view – wrong. Far from becoming redundant, blogs are simply changing – blogging and the mainstream media are merging (more from […]
“Black male headteachers in Britain’s state schools number just 30” is the startling headline on The Guardian’s website, and on the side of the front page of today’s printed paper. There are 127 female heads too, meaning that – in total – 0.7% of headteachers in the UK are black, […]
After appearing on BBC World Service World Have Your Say to discuss the True Finns, I’ve now written a piece for Comment is Free about the same issue – you can read it here. The comments thread is full of bile, although there is one issue I would like to […]
Tim Montgomerie has written an astounding piece at Conservative Home, entitled “We need to address the abusive relationship rather than just stop the latest punch from Brussels”. For Tim, like many Tory bloggers, any notion of accurate reporting goes out of the window when it comes to the European Union, […]
“The reactions to the election gains of Timo Soini’s True Finns (Perussuomalaiset) in Sunday’s general election in Finland have been full of earthquake metaphors. “A tremor hit the EU” is the way the BBC’s Gavin Hewitt describes it. If that is so, then this was only the latest in a […]
Something has been nagging at me since the True Finns’ election success on Sunday. I think it’s because I am struggling to answer this question: why must True Finns be brought into a governing coalition? This question was brought into focus in a Twitter discussion with Mia Välimäki: http://twitter.com/mialeenasofia/status/60055951830556672 The […]
Thursday 12th April and Dr. Silvana Koch-Mehrin MEP runs an event in the European Parliament entitled “The New Rules of Openness”, together with LibertyGlobal. The poster advertising the event is shown above. The very same day the Vroni-Plag Wiki released its first analysis of Koch-Mehrin’s PhD thesis, an analysis that […]
The Constitutional Affairs Committee of the European Parliament yesterday backed Andrew Duff‘s report (PDF here) that proposes reforms to the way MEPs are elected. Most controversial is the proposal to create a Europe-wide list of 25 MEPs, essentially a transnational list, that would give European Parliament elections a truly transnational […]
