Phone rings. "Have you ever had any accidents or injuries?", he asks. Gah...
"I did once have an elevator fall on me. weighing about 80 tons. I was just walking along, when someone cut the cable and it fell on me."
"Where was this?" he asks.
"Swansea." "So, was that quite a serious injury?" "It put me in a coma for two months. but then I got up and walked away."
"So... er... you must be a pretty strong man..."
"Well... not really!"
*CLICK* as he hangs up...
Monday, June 29, 2009
Monday, June 8, 2009
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
European Election predictions 2009
Tories will get over 30% of the vote. Everyone else under 20% - the small parties will have their vote split unevenly between them.
UKIP will, disappointingly for them, get fewer seats than last time - their attempt to capitalise on expenses-gate was only a short-lived success, partly undermined by their own expenses scandals on historical record.
The Greens will gain a seat or two because their anti-BNP tactical voting campaign has been (undeservedly) successful.
The Lib Dems aren't likely to make much progress; they're doing okay but the last Euro-election was at the height of their anti-Iraq-war movement exploitation madness and it'll be impossible for them to build on that, although the seats will probably shift around a bit to reflect the change in their support base.
The BNP will be lucky to get a single seat, I doubt it will happen (and hope it won't) but they won't get more than that (although it's not like we'd be the first country to elect a fascist into the European Parliament - in fact we may be the last!). A lot of the people who reckon they intend to vote BNP just aren't going to bother turning up to the polling station. The blitz of anti-BNP advertising was just a dogwhistle tactical wheeze by Labour...
No idea what will happen to the Labour vote, too many crazy things have happened in the past 48 hours but they will be in third if not fourth place.
UKIP will, disappointingly for them, get fewer seats than last time - their attempt to capitalise on expenses-gate was only a short-lived success, partly undermined by their own expenses scandals on historical record.
The Greens will gain a seat or two because their anti-BNP tactical voting campaign has been (undeservedly) successful.
The Lib Dems aren't likely to make much progress; they're doing okay but the last Euro-election was at the height of their anti-Iraq-war movement exploitation madness and it'll be impossible for them to build on that, although the seats will probably shift around a bit to reflect the change in their support base.
The BNP will be lucky to get a single seat, I doubt it will happen (and hope it won't) but they won't get more than that (although it's not like we'd be the first country to elect a fascist into the European Parliament - in fact we may be the last!). A lot of the people who reckon they intend to vote BNP just aren't going to bother turning up to the polling station. The blitz of anti-BNP advertising was just a dogwhistle tactical wheeze by Labour...
No idea what will happen to the Labour vote, too many crazy things have happened in the past 48 hours but they will be in third if not fourth place.
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Wilson Vs Boyle
Professor David Wilson writes about why he thinks Susan Boyle should pull out of the final of Britain's Got Talent.
Prof Wilson should shut his mouth, it's deeply unprofessional for him to be offering his self-declared "expert" opinion on a subject he is not familiar with (and he's clearly not familiar with her given that she gave the exact same "childish wiggle" when she came on for her first audition), in public. And what's more, Britain's Got Talent is a talent contest, not a social experiment as he seemingly interprets Big Brother to be.
Wilson's suggestion that she should pull out is actually the absolute worst advice he could possibly give her - completely unconstructive - if the "fragility" stories are true they would only make matters worse, and if she followed that advice she would regret it for the rest of her life.
It's high time the media stopped paying lip service to this quack.
Prof Wilson should shut his mouth, it's deeply unprofessional for him to be offering his self-declared "expert" opinion on a subject he is not familiar with (and he's clearly not familiar with her given that she gave the exact same "childish wiggle" when she came on for her first audition), in public. And what's more, Britain's Got Talent is a talent contest, not a social experiment as he seemingly interprets Big Brother to be.
Wilson's suggestion that she should pull out is actually the absolute worst advice he could possibly give her - completely unconstructive - if the "fragility" stories are true they would only make matters worse, and if she followed that advice she would regret it for the rest of her life.
It's high time the media stopped paying lip service to this quack.
Friday, May 29, 2009
Illegal file-sharing
BBC: "Seven million use illegal files."
My feeling is that people in the UK feel a sense of entitlement to entertainment content because they already pay a television licence fee and most of the British entertainment industry is also heavily subsidised by the taxpayer.
If the government is serious about changing attitudes so the copyright holder is respected it must scrap the licence fee and allow the entertainment industry to flourish in the free market where the general public get to decide what they want to see (and therefore what gets made) rather than some unelected quango (aka Mark Thompson).
The Strategic Advisory Board for Intellectual Property (SABIP) warned it may be hard to change attitudes.
The government says work must be done internationally to tackle the problem.
Intellectual Property Minister David Lammy said the report put into context the impact illegal downloads had on copyright industries and the UK economy as a whole.
But he added: "This is not an issue confined by national boundaries and I am sure that other [EU] member states and their copyright industries will find this report of use in the development of policy."
My feeling is that people in the UK feel a sense of entitlement to entertainment content because they already pay a television licence fee and most of the British entertainment industry is also heavily subsidised by the taxpayer.
If the government is serious about changing attitudes so the copyright holder is respected it must scrap the licence fee and allow the entertainment industry to flourish in the free market where the general public get to decide what they want to see (and therefore what gets made) rather than some unelected quango (aka Mark Thompson).
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Dancing in the Gutters
Via JibJab I assembled this video on Saturday and tweeted it at Rich Johnston, writer of "Lying in the Gutters", the premier rumour column for the comic book industry.
By Sunday he'd retweeted it, leading to Heidi McDonald highlighting it on The Beat (and then bumping it the next day so everyone got a chance to see it), Joe Quesada boasting of his new physique, and Blog@Newsarama declaring this as an example of JibJab used "for evil" and "at this point, we probably deserve it".
And I presume that Leah Moore did not appreciate seeing her father dancing around like a stripper (sorry Leah, it never crossed my mind).
The all-star cast of recent editions of "Lying in the Gutters": Alan Moore, Joe Quesada, Rich Johnston, Dan Didio and Paterson Joseph, take it away!
By Sunday he'd retweeted it, leading to Heidi McDonald highlighting it on The Beat (and then bumping it the next day so everyone got a chance to see it), Joe Quesada boasting of his new physique, and Blog@Newsarama declaring this as an example of JibJab used "for evil" and "at this point, we probably deserve it".
And I presume that Leah Moore did not appreciate seeing her father dancing around like a stripper (sorry Leah, it never crossed my mind).
The all-star cast of recent editions of "Lying in the Gutters": Alan Moore, Joe Quesada, Rich Johnston, Dan Didio and Paterson Joseph, take it away!
Try JibJab Sendables® eCards today!
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Not why Ditko left Marvel in the 60s
In response to Steve Ditko's fisking of Joe Quesada, one of the commenters, BobH, disputes the urban myth that Ditko left Marvel because of a dispute he had with Stan Lee over the identity of the Green Goblin. This isn't news to me; by all accounts the working relationship between the two creators had completely deteriorated, Ditko was unhappy at the lack of credit and renumeration he was getting for his work in creating Spider-Man, and Lee's dialogue often bore little resemblance to the stories Ditko was telling (my favourite example being the death of Mendell Stromm in ASM #37: Ditko draws a man shooting him to death, Lee's ludicrous dialogue has the gunman miss and Stromm "dying of a heart attack"). So to my mind the Goblin thing seems too trivial to be a tipping point (in fact given Ditko left a month after the Mendell Stromm issue I do wonder if it might have been that). However, when BobH is asked for a quote on this, the one he produces rather surprises me. (I reproduce his post here in full, without his permission, because as he points out Breitbart's commenting system stinks; not only am I unable to link to the comment directly, it doesn't even show up half the time I actively look for it. Apologies to BobH.)
Just in case this is unclear to anyone reading this, it was widely believed that making Norman Osborn the Goblin was entirely Stan Lee's initiative - this completely debunks that myth too. (An unnamed man resembling Norman Osborn was indeed seen in Jameson's business club in ASM #23 and #25.)
Ditko's prose style doesn't really lend itself to excerpts, as you can see above, he constructs amazing, sometimes maddeningly complex arguments. So I encourage you go order the newsletter in question (or join me in encouraging Ditko's co-publisher to put together a collection of the relevant essays).
However, a few tastes:
"So certainly, the GG [Green Goblin] could hardly be any reason for me quitting Marvel"
"Now digest this: I knew from Day One, from the first GG story, who the GG would be... I planted him in J. Jonah Jameson's businessman's club." [prior issues of the newsletter had a contest to identify all the planted appearances of the character]
"I planted the GG's son (same distinct hair style) in the college issues..." [referring here to Harry Osborn]
This will probably be my last reply here, as the commenting system here makes no sense to me. Feel free to contact me via e-mail or my site (should be linked in my name above) if you wish to continue.
Just in case this is unclear to anyone reading this, it was widely believed that making Norman Osborn the Goblin was entirely Stan Lee's initiative - this completely debunks that myth too. (An unnamed man resembling Norman Osborn was indeed seen in Jameson's business club in ASM #23 and #25.)
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