machine-envy

This week’s column at the New Statesman is a reaction to all the silly season stories calling for a complete ban of Facebook/YouTube/the internet.
Some people are so quick to judge. At the beginning of August, the national treasure that is Sir Elton John was reported, albeit by that other great national treasure, the Sun newspaper, […]

A few weeks ago, I was having tea and cakes with a friend, talking about the usual stuff - Second Life, DRM, the BBC’s iPlayer. Together we came up with a rather implausible train of thought, which said friend dared me to turn into a piece for my New Statesman column. I think it’s turned […]

Okay, it’s happened again - I have a new job and I’m not blogging. Sorry.
This is just a quick post to prove I still exist, and its theme is funny drawings on the web. I keep getting sent links to xkcd - this one cracks me up. And here’s a link to my favourite […]

I’m pleased to announce that as of 15 January next year, I’ll be joining the Open Rights Group as their new Executive Director!
Suw Charman, ORG’s outgoing Exec Director, has just posted the announcement on the ORG website. I’m looking forward to working with her, ORG’s Ops Manager Michael Holloway, and the incredibly diverse and talented […]

openDemocracy will shortly be publishing my interview with Andrew Gowers. In the meantime, the New Statesman have put up my latest column - what to buy a geek for Christmas. Of course, if you’re a real geek, you will have ordered all your presents online by now, so treat it as a little light relief:
“I […]

Stef Magdalinski got in touch to let me know that following my NS piece about MPs playing the system on TheyWorkForYou.com, he was invited to go head to head with Emily Thornberry MP on BBC Radio 4’s Today in Parliament. Steve Bowbrick has the mp3.
This week’s NS column is on e-voting, with a mini-interview from […]

Ahead of its official launch after next week’s pre-budget speech (12.30, Wednesday 6 December, economy fans) the BBC is reporting that the Gowers Review of Intellectual Property will recommend that copyright terms on sound recordings should not be extended.
Boingboing may be reporting this as a victory, but the battle isn’t over yet. The government will […]

I’ve had quite a few articles published since I last posted. Here’s a quick summary:
The net effect on parliament
How can civic hacking site TheyWorkForYou save MPs from themselves?
User demands push Firefox
Two years on from the 1.0 release, is Firefolx losing its sheen?
The right to know everything
Coverage of the IPPR’s excellent new report on intellectual property
Flash! […]

It had to happen. After months waiting for my Second Life contact to get around to writing a piece for openDemocracy on theories of innovation in virtual worlds, I have been forced to rehash his thesis in the New Statesman:
“Those who have not yet heard about Second Life, the online virtual world, can’t have read […]

This week’s column in the New Statesman stretches a metaphor. After Tony Neate, director of GetSafeOnline advised UK web surfers to “treat their PC like their car” and maintain it with regular updates, lock it away safely behind a firewall, etc, I go on to suggest that, if we want our PCs to remain open […]