In my opinion he was the greatest recording artist to have ever lived. His Thriller album is the biggest selling album of all time.

He was undeniably a troubled man, and may he rest in peace. My thoughts are with his family.

In case you’re not sure what they are:

Hip flasks are vessels used to carry a small amount of liquid on ones person. They are usually made from pewter or stainless steel and are traditionally designed to carry alcoholic spirits such as whisky, rum, Scotch or whatever takes the owner’s fancy!

They come in a range of sizes, the most popular of which is the 6oz size which carries enough for a few shots of your favourite tipple. Small flasks are great for sliding in the top pocket of a jacket or blazer, or for squeezing into small purses or bags. Larger flasks have the obvious advantage of holding more liquid and therefore can provide greater utility to the drinker! Some even come with nip cups built into the flask to provide the perfect accessory for bringing in the bells come Hogmanay!

They also come in a range of shapes which are designed for different uses. The classic curved shape with square corners is the ‘Hip Flask‘ or ‘Kidney flask’ shape. A flattened out version with rounder corners is known as a ‘Pocket Flask’ as it slides in and out of pockets easier. Smaller flasks are often tall and slim to slip into top pockets or ladies purses. And of course, like anything else, there are a multitude of special shapes including round flasks, grip shaped flasks, heart shaped flasks and many more.

They are generally made from Pewter, in Sheffield, England – the home of pewter. Pewter is an alloy of tin and a few other materials. It’s very lightweight and gives a good shine with fairly little effort. It’s perfectly safe to drink from as today’s pewter is lead-free. Some flasks are also made in Stainless steel – particularly leather bound hip flasks.

I’m not sure if it’s all entirely factual, but it is interesting reading, and it wouldn’t take much to convince me that it’s all true!

Fundamentally, i believe that all media should be free. That includes primarily literature, music, tv shows, films and software. I think that consumers should pay for any products containing, or relating to, that media, such as the CD which holds the music, or the physical book which contains the story. However, the actual media should be free.

In my understanding, media is a service, and that virtually all media published is freely available, but that publishers or producers limit and control access to that media, and charge for the privilege of getting it when you want it. Let me explain this point with a few examples:

You can listen to a particular song on the radio for free when the station decides to play it, and the station pays for the ability to play it when they want to. You can even request that a station plays a particular song when you want them to and you can listen to it for free, roughly when you want to (although it’s a rather tiresome). So, you can listen to any song when you want to completely legally, but it’s just rather difficult.

Essentially what is being charged for when you buy a CD is the physical CD and the ability and freedom to listen to it whenever you want.

Here’s another similar example:

In the UK, you can join your local library and can read virtually any book you want to, for free. However, you can only keep it for a limited time.

What is being charged for when you buy a book is the physical book (the cost of producing it etc) and the ability to read it whenever you want and keep it for as long as you want.

Films and tv shows are similar, virtually every tv show or film will come on terrestrial tv at some point, but you are paying for the privilege of watching it at the cinema, watching it earlier on Sky/Virgin or on DVD.

I believe that for all these examples, if you are prepared to buy the equipment (e.g. a computer and an internet connection) you should be able to have unlimited access to the actual media for free.

Who pays? Indeed, the authors, creators, writers, singers etc have to be paid or many of them simply wouldn’t do it. When you listen to a song on the radio for free, the station is happy to pay the royalties because they are able to monetise their station significantly to cover the cost of paying the royalties (the BBC in the UK is a unique exception). When you read a book in a library in the UK for free, the British government pays the royalty because they believe that having free libraries is beneficial to the population to the point where the country will prosper as a result (of course this includes more than just libraries).

The main difficulty i see with this outlook is that new forms of revenue generation will have to be introduced to ensure that the creators are still paid for their work. I’d imagine the best way to monetise the actual media would be advertising. I know that i would happily watch a 15 or 30 second advert to download a free song or tv show. I know that i would still go to the cinema even though i could download any movie for free. I know that if i downloaded a great album i would be inclined to tell others, and that i would pay to see the band/artist live. I know that i will also still buy CDs or books even though the related media is freely available because of the benefits associated with them. For example, i have a website running Zen Cart which is open source software so is free, however i was quite happy to pay £25 for a book on how to use it (despite the information being freely available on the internet) because of the way that the book is laid out and the ease of use because of that (i probably still would’ve bought the book if it was available as a free download because i think that some things are easier to have in physical book form that digital).

I definitely don’t have all the answers on how to reorganise these industries, but i’m aware that the current system, based on laws which are hundreds of years old and managed by people who believe that they must fight to keep their industry operating in the same way since it began, is heading for failure. Millions of people illegally download music, films and software because the industries which control them have not adapted to today’s environment, and i don’t see anything likely to stop that trend until the industries adapt. Industry which is not prepared to be progressive and move with the times will ultimately head for disaster.

It’s great to have such a young talent coming into the sport and making it his own at such an early point in his career. It feels that as one great legend leaves, we have another to fill his shoes. I’m not a die-hard F1 fan, but having this young guy come in and make history certainly increases my interest!

Bit of a let down to be honest…despite growing up wanting to wear a red cape with a big F on my chest (would have been happy to forget about the dodgy colour co-ordinated banana hammock), the latest offering is a bit crap. Missed some of the ending as i fell asleep…which kinda says a lot…but i was not surprised to hear that i didn’t miss that much at all!

Producers…we want more flying and cool stuff! Oh…Kevin Spacey is just cool at whatever he does…though looks a bit daft with those big boots on all the time!

Whether through naivity, stupidity or ignorance, i still get shocked when i read about tragedies that have or are taking place across the world. While talking with Suzy last night, she mentioned the ‘apartheid’ which took place in South Africa in the second half of last century. When i realised that i really didn’t know what she was talking about, but had a general view of what happened, i decided to read up about it on the internet.

It sickens me to think that 20 years ago this was still going on, and to think that it is still going on in parts of the world today. I knew from public perception that Nelson Mandella was thought of as a ‘good man’, but knew nothing of what he actually did, or what he stood for.

Needless to say, it doesn’t surprise me that a paper i read clearly shows that America played a huge hand in supplying the much needed computers to enforce the social, political and racial segregation that caused the suffering, torture and death of thousands of people, and has ultimately left the country with an estimated 7 million people with the HIV virus. I don’t mean to blame the US here, since i’m sure that their government certainly seemed to be doing something about it…whilst doing absolutely nothing, but how much help do you think a country with similar laws against African Americans was likely to give.

It makes me wonder what South Africa would be like to day had this not happened, and how much responsibility it is for the rest of the world to help countries in need. Sadly, at the time, two of the most powerful countries (UK and US) were unlikely to do anything about…but is the situation really different today? America still intervenes in foreign politics, not for the good of the human race, but for the good of their country and more money to line their pockets. When will this change? When you are willing to do something about it.

IBM made millions (if not billions) from the sale of computers to South Africa which left the country in a terrible state, while they sat and counted their money. Is this not wrong? Should IBM not be held accountable? This is part of the area that my dissertation will focus on. People, armies and governments can be held accountable, but often companies cannot. In today’s world, it is not Prime Ministers or Presidents that hold the greatest power in the world, but CEOs! It is private companies that build weapons of mass destruction to sell to the goverments to make profit. They gain from the suffering of others, often without a second thought.

Of course, this is not a simple argument. Can you blame the dealer for being addicted to heroin? Surely if they don’t sell, someone else will. But what is a simple argument in my mind is that if people were to stop living their lives ignoring what is going on and actively do things to make a difference, then the world would surely be a better place for everyone. I don’t expect Fred Smith to jump on a plane and go fighting for Iraqi independence, but i do expect him to actually take time to find out what harm companies like Nike, Gap or McDonalds inflict on the world. It takes me straight back to Gandhi – you must be the change you want to see in the world. What hurts me the most is that most people are that change – they simple don’t care.

Wikipedia article

My heart goes out to Katherine’s family, i hope that she may rest in peace.

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If you don’t read this post, at least please check out this link.

Lies on two accounts here – one by me saying that I wasn’t going to write anything for a while – I disguised my publishings yesterday by making them pages instead of posts – probably unnoticed by the masses! Check out the ‘what I’m up to pages’ to see what’s going on in my life aside from these daily ramblings.
The other lies that are perpetually told and believed everyday are shown so beautifully here. For all those people that laugh at me when I say I don’t eat McDonalds, or wonder why I don’t drink Coke – other than the fact it tastes like mule’s piss after its drunk 7 litres of sulphuric acid.
I would also like to point out for the record that I am a hypocrite and I do have both Nike clothing and Gap clothing and use P&G products (since they own like every fucking type of toothpaste in the world!), or Nestle and some of the rest. However, this is more because I am weak to advertising and the influence of ‘cool’, but I shall do my utmost from now on to not use such products and influence those closest to me to do the same. Please check out the site, join their mailing list and convince others to do the same. Every little helps (irony intended!).