Blockbuster

Some people have way too much time on their hands. Nevertheless, I think you should check out this version of Michael Jackson's Thriller, done in Lego. Who said he was looking less black?

Freedom my arse

Big Brother is watching you, and it's destroying the evidence.
Firstly, the Cabinet Office is actively engaged in destroying emails that would have implicated David Blunkett -- and possibly Alistair Campbell's not-so-dodgy dossier -- before the Freedom of Information Act kicks in in January.
Secondly, the government is refusing to release advice on the legality of identity cards, having nevertheless allowed a House of Commons debate to try and make them law.
For all its pontificating about Open Government, Freedom of Information and Data Protection, this government and our recently deposed Home Secretary have implemented some of the most Orwellian legislation, amid a torrent of doublespeak. And if you complain, you're a wooly liberal or have something to hide, according to Charles Clarke.
Actually, it's the government that has plenty to hide, not least doing favours for friends at our expense or sending people to die in a foreign country under a false pretext. Let's all sit idly by while they do it.

Age shall not wither

The youngest children are all observation and no analysis, while our elderly tend to be all analysis and no observation. Don't we have room for both?
Infants only acquire their reasoning ability slowly: if I push my fingers in the plug socket I'll get a shock, if I do it again I'll get a shock, let me see what happens if I push my fingers in the plug socket...
As the senses dull, the elderly abandon their capacity to examine anything but move straight on to passing judgement. Things and people are good or (more usually) bad, irrespective of any facts we might be bothered to observe.
This might lead us to believe that the period in between offers a healthy balance between looking and learning. But our adolescence is so overcome by peer pressure and hormones that we think Busted are the saviours of rock. And just as adulthood offers us the chance to escape these shackles and breathe the air of independent thought we indulge in media and dodgy blogs that show us what we know already and tell us what to think about it.

Stop Press!

There's a pillow fight tonight just after 6pm outside the National Gallery: http://www.mobile-clubbing.com/pillow.html

Virtually a white Christmas

Here's a festive link: make your own virtual snowflakes.
Yes, I have been very busy.

The Union of the Beast

If you are worried about the end of the world and the part the European Union is going to play in it, you are probably Ian Paisley. The right reverend honorary doctor tells us that the 1999 Parliament of Europe is fulfilling Revelations, by showing a harlot riding a beast on its currency and promoting the Tower of Babel. But most strikingly, the seat bearing the number of the beast has been left unoccupied: "The Antichrist's seat will be occupied. The world awaits his full and final development. The Lord will destroy him by the spirit of His mouth (the Word of God) and by the brightness of His coming (2 Thes. 2:8). The coming of the Lord draweth nigh." I couldn't have put it better myself.

Pyrrhic victories

A certain Pyrrhus, king of Epirus in the third century B.C., attacked the burgeoning Roman Empire on the Italian mainland in order to defend his fellow Greeks. Though he won a couple of battles, he sustained such heavy casualties that he lost the war. This coined the term Pyrrhic victory, one that I am becoming familiar with in practice rather than as a matter of historical interest.
Having emailed our boss with collective concerns about changes to contracts -- see my Contract Tennis entry of December 6th -- the company has backed down and is now offering us benefits without any of the drawbacks. However, as mouthpiece for my disgruntled colleagues, I am perceived as the ringleader. Plutarch called Pyrrhus the fool of hope: any ideas that I had that our tribunes would engage with their minions constructively have been dashed; I'm now looking for an exit strategy.

Old fruity

This may be close on fifty years old, but it was still news to me. Did you know that the original lyrics to Tutti Frutti went:

Tutti Frutti, good booty
If it don’t fit, don’t force it
You can grease it, make it easy.

Little Richard was an old fruit playing to the New Orleans gay scene and had to rely on a producer to rewrite one of the seminal songs in Rock and Roll...

Privateers and pirates

As I ponder the malevolent machinations of my own employer, I went to see the latest in a series of liberal documentaries to emerge from the States: The Corporation. This film has a pretty powerful anti-capitalist manifesto that exposes the evils corporations do and how they get away with, but is so long that you forget what's been said within half an hour. My most enduring memory of the film is the back pain from very uncomrtable chairs.
One of the more striking tales was of water privatisation in Bolivia where the people finally revolted and renationalised these services through a militant struggle, having to overcome armed riot police to have the water they needed to drink. This was contrasted with corporate representatives selling air pollution licenses as commodities so that not only water but air is privatised in North America. Where do you draw the line?
While it's clear (to me at least) that depriving people of water or health because they don't have the money to pay for it is morally reprehensible, it's not clear why people should be allowed to make a profit out of food. If the air should be state-owned and provided for common good, why not not land? The problem is that our notion of democracy has become synonymous with aspiration: it's no longer about having basic liberties but about being able to own things and make as much profit as anyone else. And while our corporate media continues to tell us that communism has failed, show me a place where capitalism has worked and where no one has been disenfranchised.

Contract tennis

Having decided to lay a bunch of people off for their own incompetence, my munificent masters have decided to present me (and others in my position following our incorporation) with a variation in terms of employment. We will work 7% more hours each week and have to give two months' notice, in exchange for which we will receive a 3% pension contribution and some healthcare options for which I'm ineligible. I also get one day extra holiday a year due to length of service and have a month to sign this. Our initial response was -- collectively -- something less than positive. This has nevertheless been tempered as follows:

Thank you for this email; it goes a long way towards clarifying our concerns and has certainly improved our collective perception of the variation letter. While the general consensus is that the offer is attractive, it does contain fundamental changes to our current contract that need further discussion. We want to raise these collectively so that they can be addressed in an open and practical manner, but there are different priorities that may require some individual negotiations. We appreciate that these kinds of mergers will inevitably entail new ways of working and we're keen to participate in this process and highlight some points.
A number of us are overdue or imminently due performance and pay reviews. We feel that outstanding appraisals should be addressed before we consider variations to the contract and that these will help to inform a smoother integration.
The proposed new benefits offer advantages over our existing contracts, but there is scope to clarify how these are taxed, their coverage and portability, and how individuals might opt in or out if they already pay for some of these benefits themselves. There are a number of other more or less tangible benefits that [the new company] offers which aren't mentioned in the letter but probably should be presented as part of this package, such as sickness benefit, share issue, budgets for training, opportunities to work from home, and how rewards for results will work.
Some fundamental variations in the new terms will need further discussion. It's not clear how the increase in number of hours is offset by the proposed benefits. Holiday allocations have not been normalised so that anyone at [the previous company] for less than two years will lose out under the new terms. The increased length of notice period is another concern and the new variation letter should show reference to our current contract. We would also like to see more emphasis placed on personal development: how will the new structure allow us to progress within the company, both in terms of training and responsibility? For example, extra hours in the contract might be allocated explicitly to personal development.
We would like to engage these issues in a positive and constructive way and discuss how changes to our contract will enable us as a company to progress following the merger.

But even after this effort to be constructive, we should perhaps refer our employers to the Wilson and Alcan cases that will slap down their bollocks straight away... I await a response with baited breath, not least because it'll come to me as I was the muggins at the forefront of this collective bargaining nonsense. I have already set my RSS feeds to collect from CW, Monster, et al.

Presentational discontent

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a fundamental of content management is to separate presentation from content. So how do you go about making a presentation about content management that says anything useful? Talk about content management discontent?

[Oh no, I'm sounding like that woman in Sex and the City.]

This subject is my "field", I should point out. So it came to pass that I was volunteered to speak at Olympia about it this morning to an undefined audience. And it went very well thank you. No substance but no discernable discontent and lots of people proffering business cards. If you're the blindest bit interested, I can email it to you.