h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

They should start advertising it as homeopathic beer...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-21295117

A very moving "in pictures" bit by the bbc, from a presentation on for a while in Argentina, about the military coup

"Absent faces"

>>I like the idea of a new Titanic. <<

The Titanic was one of three similar sister ships, the Titanic and Britannic sank early while the Olympic had a long service life.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/02/28/jimbo_wales_wikipedia_monachy/

Jimmy Wales has declared himself Monarch over the hundreds of thousands of volunteers writing for Wikipedia. Everything I read about him these days I can't help but think that he's been hanging out with David Ike.

Reading the article it seemed benign with no David Icke complex. Interesting he says that the volunteers - which I assume he means is the writers / researchers - are overwhelmingly female 87 % to 13 %.

Better Jimmy Wales than the team at Google that is a for profit organisation, that takes privately gathered information and effectively sells it to advertisers, converting everyone's google browser experience into a personalised advertisement with flashing ads and pop ups.

Might be worth reading this too Stone Aart:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/12/20/cash_rich_wikipedia_chugging/

"The US soldier accused of leaking large numbers of secret documents to Wikileaks has pleaded guilty to 10 of the 22 charges against him.

But Pfc Bradley Manning, 25, denied the most serious charge against him, aiding the enemy, and may still be prosecuted.

A military judge later accepted the guilty pleas, with which he could face up to 20 years in prison.

The soldier also mentioned his shock at discovering a video of an aerial combat mission in Iraq in which two employees from the Reuters news agency were killed.

"The most alarming aspect of the video to me was the seemingly delightful bloodlust the aerial weapons team happened to have," he said, comparing the troops to children "torturing ants with a magnifying glass".

The Obama administration has said the leaks threatened valuable military and diplomatic sources...."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-21610811


"Reuters had unsuccessfully requested the footage of the airstrikes under the Freedom of Information Act in 2007. The footage was acquired from an undisclosed source in 2009 by the Internet leak website WikiLeaks"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_12,_2007_Baghdad_airstrike

This is the youtube video of the above (next post). I'm no military specialist, maybe someone can explain it

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJBL8aAsk28

Plans for national beach sports stadium in Skegness

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lincolnshire-21621293

"We believe that Skegness beach represents one of the last untapped major sports and entertainment markets in the country, and will offer the entire nation an excellent opportunity to strengthen an established beach sport, hopefully destined for the 2020 Olympics."

Really?

I've not been to Skegness for quite a few years. I'm guessing it must have changed. A *lot*.

I have. It hasn't.

What was the thinking behind awarding Barack Obama the Nobel Peace Prize - did he deserve it?
In the mean time maybe Dennis Rodman and Kim Jong-un could be the next recipients
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-21625906

London won the Olympics based on producing a sports legacy for inner city kids:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-21627003

Was anyone stupid enough to believe in any of that legacy stuff?

Without that stadium there wouldn't have been a "Jess Ennis"
"Ennis was discovered at the stadium when she went to a summer holidays athletics club when she was 10."
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/03/01/olympic-legacy-dealt-a-bl_n_2791387.html?utm_hp_ref=uk?ncid=GEP

With all the money spent at the Olympics, with all the money spent on taking over the debts of the banks ...

"We've achieved so much as a country in the London Olympics, so to lose some great facilities sends out the wrong message, really.
"I understand budgets and costs, but I think we need to find a way to keep it."

She obviously doesn't understand about budgets and costs then, or she would have realised the answer was to not overspend obscenely in the first place. As for the 'wrong message' being sent out, it shouldn't come as a surprise, since school playing fields were being sold off at the very same time the British Olympic Distraction was being built.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-19291911

people in Sheffield are angry about that, but they are just as angry - if not more so - that their local sports centres are also in danger, and I think that given the choice they would save their local ones because a wider spread of people, a lot of whom can't travel far, can get use out of them. It costs Sheffield 5 pounds for each visitor to the stadium - what choice did they have, realistically?

I suppose the kids of Sheffield with all the closure of civic / public facilities (sports, libraries etc), will instead be persuaded to buy playstation games, itunes etc to occupy themselves, or form gangs to terrorise the locals.