Didsbury Chevy
Didsbury Chevy, originally uploaded by spinneyhead.
I spotted this old Chevrolet whilst walking to Didsbury to collect a bike.
Monthly archives: July 2011
Didsbury Chevy, originally uploaded by spinneyhead.
Daily Blog 07/09/2011
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My encounter with the News of the World « Shropshire Star
News of the World political editor, David Wooding, claims the paper’s current newsteam came in “to clean the place up”. He defended the soon-to-be defunct tabloid at the heart of the “hackgate” scandal by declaring that current colleagues were “carrying the can for a previous regime” – insisting there had been wholesale changes to the NotW newsroom staff from five or six years ago.
David Wooding’s defence of his paper and current “decent, hard-working, distinguished journalists” is symptomatic of the institutionalised delusion that has, and continues to afflict NotW and News International personnel.
My own first-hand experience of some of these “decent, hard-working people” is very different to the quaintly, saintly picture of colleagues painted by the deluded Wooding.
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After many years mixing and blending we have discovered what we believe to be the perfect toffee flavoured vodka.
Our toffee vodka is strong (27.5%), it’s not too sweet, it’s not too sickly and it has a crystal clear golden colour. It’s TOFFOC.
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Phone hacking: David Cameron is not out of the sewer yet – Telegraph
For more than three decades the most powerful man in Britain has not been a politician; it has been the brilliant but ruthless US-based media tycoon Rupert Murdoch, who burst on to the scene with the purchase of the News of the World in an audacious takeover bid in 1968. Within barely a decade he had built up a controlling interest in British newspapers.
But he did not just control our media. He dominated British public life. Politicians – including prime ministers – treated him with deference and fear. Time and again the Murdoch press – using techniques of which we have only just become aware – destroyed political careers. Murdoch also claims to determine the results of general elections.
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This week my colleague Alfredo Corchado wrote about an insidious scheme by the drug cartels, who have taken to planting drugs in unsuspecting peoples’ vehicles who then drive them across the border. Some are caught and wrongly imprisoned.
Daily Blog 07/08/2011
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Five Chinese Crackers: Inconceivable!
My guess is that it has something to do with the surveillance of Dave Cook and the murder case he was covering, but so much crazy stuff is going down that I wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out they’d commissioned a midget hitman to hide in the backpack of a French paparazzo on a moped and shoot a blow dart into the neck of Princess Di’s driver so they could make money out of the aftermath. Actually, that’s not outlandish enough. Stuff involving monkeys and lasers and the biggest diamond in the world wouldn’t surprise me now.
Daily Blog 07/07/2011
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Is Murdoch free to destroy tabloid’s records? | MediaFile
Here’s some News of the World news to spin the heads of American lawyers. According to British media law star Mark Stephens of Finers Stephens Innocent (whom The Times of London has dubbed “Mr Media”), Rupert Murdoch’s soon-to-be shuttered tabloid may not be obliged to retain documents that could be relevant to civil and criminal claims against the newspaper—even in cases that are already underway. That could mean that dozens of sports, media, and political celebrities who claim News of the World hacked into their telephone accounts won’t be able to find out exactly what the tabloid knew and how it got the information.
Puch GTI turbo
How eighties is this? It’s a bike from my youth. I never had what I’d consider a proper BMX, but I’m sure I had a Raleigh Grifter for a while.
Harry turned up with this on Sunday. The first thing I did was get on it and try to pull some wheelies.
As far as I can tell all the components are original. There’s a little surface rust, particularly on the chromework, but it’s in really good condition considering what it is and its age. The only things missing are the padding on the top tube and handlebars. If you’d like it, it’s for sale.
Daily Blog 07/06/2011
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Kappa Onsen hotel haikyo — Tokyo Times
At its peak in the early 90s, Kinugawa attracted over 3 million visitors a year. This huge number inspiring the construction of more and more mammoth hotels — practically resorts within themselves — which rapidly destroyed the spa town’s character and atmosphere. This ‘progress’, along with a shift in tourist patterns and the collapse of a local bank, created a perfect storm of sorts, setting the area on a course of rapid decline. A shift that has seen visitor numbers drop enormously, resulting in the closure of countless businesses. And perhaps none of them represent this downfall better than the sprawling and horribly ugly Kinugawa Kan Hotel and its Kappa Onsen.
From some angles these chocolates are badly named
From some angles these chocolates are badly named, originally uploaded by spinneyhead.
They’re called Counters, but, because of folds, when I first saw the packet the O, E and R were obscured.
Daily Blog 07/05/2011
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Classic cars, customs, hotrods, ratrods & beaters for GTA San Andreas and Vice City
From the thirties to the eighties, from original classic cars to the coolest rat rods. Almost 200 hundred cars, highly detailed and prefectly modeled.
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Rising cost of petrol forces a million drivers out of their cars – Telegraph
Some 1.3 million people have given up driving over the past 12 months, research by Sainsbury’s Car Insurance claims.
The average car owner is spending around £1,720 per year to fuel their vehicle, which is almost a third increase on the year before.
Private grief is not public interest 1
Last year people I know and love were caught up on the periphery of a piece of national news. For several days they had to put up with the stress of unwanted and unprincipled press attention. They learnt that all the bad things you hear about certain members of the Press are true.
Photographers trespassed to get photos which intruded upon people’s grief (and were angry and offended when the tables were turned and they were photographed). Reporters lied- primarily by omission- and acted as if they didn’t know some of the clauses of the Editors’ Code of Practice (then were upset when they met people who did). When the facts weren’t fresh or titillating enough they made things up, inventing hearsay and presenting it as common knowledge. A media feeding frenzy presented evidence of why so many think of journalists as scum.
I wanted to do something about it, to find a way to strike back and get some power given back to us, the public, over them, the newspapers and channels that exist to generate nothing but gossip and thinly veiled propaganda. But I didn’t. I couldn’t find a way into the subject of invasion of privacy that didn’t open people up to invasion of their privacy. I don’t have the tenacity of the creators of blogs such as Five Chinese Crackers, which take apart tabloid lies with such skill. And, I have to admit, I was nervous of the size and power of Britain’s tabloid press. What could I possibly do to affect them? Or, if I did have an effect on them, what could a bunch of people who have already proven themselves vicious and malicious, and have very large audiences, do to undermine me and harm me and mine?
But when there are publications that think it’s okay to hack into the voicemail of a missing teenager to get stories then torture her friends and family- and hinder the Police investigation into her disappearance- by deleting messages because they’re greedy for more information, sooner or later we all have to stand up and shout our opposition to such scum. The latest, sickest revelation from the reopened News of the World phone hacking investigation makes me as angry as the stories I heard last year
If one good thing comes from this horror story let it be that more people get angry about the actions professional privacy invaders who hide behind the lie that they’re journalists. Already companies are pulling their advertising from the News of the World, hitting them financially, the only thing it seems they’ll pay attention to. But we should hope for more. We should demand a greater accountability from the Press, and more ways for us to make them pay every time their actions hurt anyone who is already having the worst time of their life.
The Press Complaints Commission is notoriously useless when it comes to curtailing the excesses of newspapers. That it’s a body run primarily by newspapers obviously doesn’t help. Self regulation clearly isn’t working in this case. And when the Express can withdraw from the Commission so it doesn’t even have to worry about what little bite the PCC has, it’s clearly time for something else.
One idea (and please bear in mind that I only just thought of this and it is after midnight) would be to set up a very special kind of Legal Aid, a state fund for people slandered by a paper to use in their action against the paper. It would have to be carefully managed- a panel of experts, none of them with any ties to the Press, would have to assess claims for libel aid before it could be handed out- but it could claim back costs in any actions which were successful. If the papers knew that the people they lied about could no longer be scared off by the threat of legal expenses then they might learn to stop lying.
That’s just one idea, and a wildly impractical one. I’m not going to suggest it when I write to my MP, but I will tell him that it’s time to scrap or seriously reform the PCC. And you should too. The more of us who make a noise about this the more likely politicians are to pay attention and try to do something in our interests for a change.
Time to cause trouble and demand a more honest and decent media.
Discarded Dreams
Discarded Dreams, originally uploaded by spinneyhead.
Withington.
Daily Blog 07/04/2011
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Sci-fi/fantasy publisher Angry Robot Books has announced a new annual subscription model for its ebook store. For £69, you get every new release for the next twelve months, which AR promises will consist of at minimum 24 titles. For books that are part of a series, subscribers will be able to purchase the earlier titles at a 30% discount (although the discount is only good for one use, apparently). Although the editions are in EPUB format, they’re DRM-free so you can convert them via Calibre if you happen to need another format.
Heron
Heron, originally uploaded by spinneyhead.
Northenden, beside the Mersey Trail.
Raleigh Activator II
Raleigh Activator II, originally uploaded by spinneyhead.
This is a piece of bike history- the second generation of Raleigh’s early attempts at full suspension. They must have sold well enough for a while, but were ultimately a dead end.
This one turned up at the tip a while ago and was grabbed for nostalgia value. Not sure what will become of it, the headset is very stiff and makes a horrible screech as it turns and the rear mech is knackered. I’ll see what magic WD40 can work.