You’ll find on my website about my neighborhood – www.newingtongreen.org – a local history section. I recently discovered a book in the Islington library which details the origins and history of each street done as a retirement project by the reference librarian of Islington’s central library. The book is Streets With a Story by Eric Willats published 1988 by the Islington Local History Education Trust but as far as I know out of print.

I discovered that Poet’s Road (on which I live) is named after Samuel Rogers (who lived at the corner of Ferntower and Newington Green Road). There’s also a connection with Sir John Masefield – the poet laureate from 1930 to 1967 (best known for “I must down to the seas again for the call of the running tide/Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied”) after whom Masefield Court on this street was named

I also learned that the estate near me was built on the site of Dalston Synagogue not during WWII (when as I had heard a bomb dropped on it) but in 1967. I guess it had simply fallen into disuse by that point – I would be interested to hear if anyone else knows anything about it (or anything about Poet’s Road or the history Newington Green area not already mentioned on the website).

I plan to devote the next few years of my life to pursuing a PhD examining various aspects of how people’s use of the Internet can help people to feel better about themselves and build their social networks (or why they don’t use the Internet in this way and how they might be encouraged to).

According to this satirical report, the online social capital revolution has already arrived and it’s all happening on Amazon and epinions.

“…While some online reviewers give little more than basic pros-and-cons of a product or a one- to five-star rating, many use the write-ups as a vital means of self-expression, providing in-depth anecdotes about their own experiences with a particular product, or even their autobiography. On Amazon.com, some reviewers create deeply personal Listmania! lists, such as “The Best Kung Fu Movies Ever” or “Things You Absolutely Need To Survive Working In A Cubicle.”

“Through these product reviews, in which we fulfill our collective desire to guide our fellow humans to good purchasing decisions, a sense of community emerges,” Piersall said. “But just as important, a sense of self emerges. By publicly expressing our feelings about the Coleman Quickbed air mattress, we tell people not merely about this product, but about ourselves.”

With reviews running the gamut from commentary on the Criterion Collection DVD of Fellini’s 8 1/2 to the usefulness of a portable Weber propane gas grill versus the traditional full-size standup model, Piersall said that ‘once again, we are talking.’…

Although the Onion exaggerates for effect, I would actually argue the basic point is right – that people becoming self-appointed experts on Espresso makers (whether on weblogs, personal web pages or via product review sites) may indeed increase their feelings of self-worth.

There was an article not long ago (though I can’t remember the address, unfortunately) which talked about how being “star reviewers” at sites like Amazon and epinions has changed people’s lives.

Castle Wolfenstein Enemy Territory has just been released for free download. It’s a not at all realistic but quite fun first person shooter in a WWII setting – multi-player only.

This is really unfortunate timing since I still have an exam to do. I was hopelessly addicted to the first CW game (and the original Apple ][ game come to that!) and this new variant provides even more yummy features. So why is it free? According to an interview on Gamespot with the developer:

“GS: Why did you decide to make it completely free?

PW: It was a really tough decision, and nobody likes to cancel a game, but in my personal opinion, this decision was made in the interests of players for once and not driven purely by financial considerations. The result is an unprecedented decision by id Software and Activision to release a game that is completely free and stand-alone. “”

I guess even though it was complete they didn’t think it worth spending the money to market it, which seems odd. Perhaps it is meant to market some future version of the game?Sex schibrowski Bart lisa undKostenlos Saint interrassisch Sylvia Galeriedp InterrassischKarton shemalesnackt Batgirl Zeichentrickfilmgangbangs InterrassischBangladesch Sex Erotische von Geschichtenweiblichen Spritzgießen Orgasmus vonvideos gay ofboys FreePissing fannies1cialis viagra levitra compareviagra vs levitra vs 2cialisdecember weight 2005 viagra inurl itemidviagra propecia inurl itemid 2005 december1cialis levitra viagra salesdecember 2006 itemid casino inurl viagraitemid viagra casino december inurl 20052cialis comparison levitra viagra Mapbwv allegro bach mp3 526live abacus mix mp32010 54 64 90 mp3acid4 mp3 plugin 0dat moment 545 mp3 opacker bilk mp3ed 555 mp3acksonville mp3 boys woo Map

I was visiting London’s City Hall on Saturday and I came across this exhibit:

It’s meant to be interactive – you lift handles on the left side and models of a car, a bus, a bicycle and a tube train slide down the rails. Unfortunately, the tube train has fallen off its track – not unlike other tube trains have tended to do. (Incredibly, more than four months after the Central line derailment the trains on that line are only now starting to run on time!)

The first lengthy review of my weblog I have seen has appeared on The Weblog Review. I am pleased to hear that the reviewer, Wendy, says “David’s a good writer and typically knows his facts” but a little chagrined that she “was expecting something huge, something that would just jump out at and scream. I didn’t really find that here.”

Oh well – keeping this updated daily takes me a surprisingly long time even though individual entries are often quite short, and the time I spend on it is (at least in theory) at the expense of other work so I guess I’m resigned to having a weblog that is not quite as useful or interesting as I would like it to be. I suspect if it was more personal and perhaps more strongly opinionated I could get more readers, but I was burned once before years ago by some over-frank remarks that were read by the wrong people so I will stick to being informative and/or entertaining in the areas I cover and you will only get the occaisional innocuous glimpse of my personal life.

If all goes according to plan, in three years or so I will likely become a lecturer in that much-maligned subject, media studies. An article in The Times does not fill me with hope of bringing enlightenment to keen young minds, however. A correspondent who taught a journalism course at Thames Valley University (an ex-polytechnic, I believe) found standards not high:

Of nearly 60 students, only a couple had ever picked up a broadsheet. A handful occasionally bought the Daily Mail and Evening Standard. About a dozen read The Sun and Daily Mirror — and the news pages were invariably skipped through in favour of showbiz and sport. The most popular daily newspaper turned out to be the freebie Metro…

…One student thought that Scotland’s biggest city was Newcastle. Another reckoned Russia’s currency is the dollar.

There is a small upside, however – “Over the past six years, the number of British students accepted on to media studies university courses has risen by nearly 50 per cent”. So there should be plenty of room for advancement!

I downloaded the SuSe 8.2 “experience” CD and it installed without any problem at all. But I didn’t want to be stuck booting from a CD ROM every time I wanted to mess about with Linux (and I don’t know what they left off the “experience”). So I downloaded every file in SuSe’s 8.2 download directory onto my hard disc, created a boot CD from the boot.iso image in the /boot directory and tried to install from the HD with the files onto a new blank HD. And hit a brick wall.

Soon I was on IRC in the #suse channel trying to sort it out and though they were very helpful there (thanks localhorst and cz^thc!) they couldn’t figure out my problem either. And I quickly descended into the hell of trial and error and typing things like “mount -t vfat /dev/hdb1 /mnt” (!)

So I’m giving up again – unless someone who lives relatively nearby would care to have a try at sorting me out either using the stuff I have downloaded or (chance would be a fine thing!) using the pukka 8.2 install CDs.

Failing that, I will have to drag my desktop into town for the next meeting of the Greater London Linux Users Group.

Admittedly my installation is just a tiny bit outside the usual (not having the CDs) but if SuSe is going to make its new Linux downloadable why not do so by just providing the .iso files for all the install CDs instead of providing every last file and expecting the poor user to figure out how to do an installation for themselves?

Anyway, this agony has dulled some of my early enthusiasm for Linux for the desktop I can tell you!

I particularly discussed the threat of Linux to Microsoft and its usefulness in the developing world. The RealAudio stream is here (you have to download it all at once and listen to it – I don’t have a realaudio streamer running).

You may note I have warmed significantly to the OS and its usefulness abroad since I last wrote about this subject in 2001. This is largely due to the ease with which I found SuSe 8.2 installed recently and because I have been impressed with the power of desktop Linux apps like OpenOffice.

I am still not totally convinced it is suitable for the least developed countries but I couldn’t get every nuance of my view in in the few minutes allotted.

The news “hook” for the broadcast was the revelation of a special Microsoft “anti-Linux” fund aimed to make sure gov’ts and large institutions don’t choose Linux by offering cheap or free Microsoft software.

If you want the gist of what was actually broadcast I started by discussing how Linux has been more successful as a desktop than a server application but could have a brighter future in places where people haven’t touched computers before (so they won’t have to unlearn Microsoft habits and the cost savings in software are significant relative to the cost of labour). I went on to suggest that Microsoft may pressure developing countries not to use Linux and when the interviewer suggested this could get MS into trouble I remarked that they have plenty of experience putting private pressure and dodging criticism.

And yes, I admit I may not be everyone’s idea of an expert but they chose me and I hope you’ll agree when my contribution is available that it was at least somewhat helpful, whatever the limits of my knowledge.commercial loans 100 and financecash loan 50020 mobile loan 100 home20 african loans 20to loans uk accessinterest loans 31 onlyaccess college loanspayday credit loan bad advancebad credit 2000 personal loanpayday 2nd loan

Today marks the first time I have ever installed Linux on one of my own computers. I have long thought I might do so but I have been afraid of the problems often described with the installations of earlier versions of Linux. I have to report that having downloaded the single CD “experience” version of SuSE Linux 8.2 I found installation went entirely without a hitch. Thus emboldened I would like to get my hands on the full install and put it on a spare HD so I can muck about with it more extensively.

I don’t suppose someone who has it would mind sending me copies of the discs or telling me where I could find the disc images of the full distribution? Or would that be piracy? The difference between the licensing terms of various forms of open source and “free software” are still a little opaque to me. If I get the software but I don’t hassle SuSe for support I had the impression that it wouldn’t count as piracy. After all, you can download previous versions of SuSe Linux from them for free.sex all hardsex 17canal ahaveconcerning safe-sex a essay persuasivealbano teensanalogue ahadvd files empire adult pornstarsex swim group amatuer Map

… my parents write to tell me they watched something about it on TV. Jim Lehrer’s NewsHour just did a segment about weblogs – my mother told me about it (thanks, Mum!) and you can watch it, listen to it or just read the transcript. Not full of new insight but a nice little overview of the subject (including a short analysis of how weblogs may have knocked Trent Lott out of power). It also rehashed the old argument, “are weblogs journalism?” And it did reveal to me something I didn’t realise – MSNBC has editors who copy-edit what their webloggers write?movie teen chris another not evansmovies lesbian dirtymovies free easyboyfriendmovies sucking 69 freebestiality free movieblack pussy free moviesdownloadable movies sex freefuck movie free clips Map