November 2007

A picture is worth, er, £225,000

I can't help smiling at this story. Firstly, that Wigan should want Steve Bruce as their manager, after his earlier stint lasted 7 weeks, and secondly that the deal should be held up because of a dispute about, er, image rights.

Expectations

It's a feature of England qualifying campaigns. There will always be a stage where England appear to have blown it, followed by a reprieve caused (at least in part) by another team.

New blog

I just noticed that the very first post here was exactly 4 years ago. I should really have given Ulaca a plug before now, but I didn't quite get round to it. Somewhat in the Hemlock style, with a bit of Fumier thrown in.

Cold front

When I was first in Hong Kong, I remember looking out of my hotel window one evening and thinking to myself that I needed to wear a jacket when I went out. Well, I felt a bit cold, and it seemed logical that it would be cool in the evening. Somehow my brain hadn't registered that the reason I felt cold was that the chambermaids always turn the temperature down to the minimum when they clean the room. Of course it was actually hot and humid outside, as I soon discovered.

It'll never catch on

Things have changed somwhat in the world of televised football in the last 20 years. This week the BBC and Sky have agreed to pay £88m per season for rights to the Football League, Carling Cup and Johnstone's Paint Trophy. Clearly that's a lot less than the Premier League deal (and slightly less than ITV Digital agreed to pay in 2001), but I don't think anyone could have imagined 20 or so years ago that broadcasters would pay even a fraction of that for rights to the 2nd, 3rd & 4th Divisions, the Milk Cup and the Freight Rover Trophy (as they then were).

Guilty, apparently

Has the law been changed? Is it OK for newspapers to tell us who committed a crime long before it even gets to court? Are people no longer presumed to be innocent until they're proven guilty? Yes, it's the SCMP (Spiderman scales block to stab ex-girlfriend). Normally these stories are written with a modicum of care, so as to strongly imply who must have been responsible, without actually spelling it out.

Idiot on board

I see that the government is auctioning off more 'vanity plates'. Is there any better way of saying "I am a plonker" than paying good money to have your own personalized number plate? Not that I'm complaining - as a taxpayer, I have to approve, and as a bonus it always gives me a laugh when I see one of these idiots driving around.

No!

It seems that Leicester fans may have been celebrating prematurely when Gary Megson left. The BBC reports that Leicester have interviewed Joe Royle, Peter Reid and Graeme Souness for the manager's job and the appointment could be made by Saturday. When I wondered why Peter Reid wasn't on the shortlist for the Ireland job, I was trying to be ironic.

Variable on demand

One thing that annoyed me about all the advertising for Now's Mega Sports Pack was that it was far from clear what was on offer. Well, now we know, and it is somewhat better than expected. However, the picture quality is very variable. For all the talk about SD & HD (standard and high definition), the reality is that only a few games seem to be available in what I would describe as SD, and the rest of the coverage is very fuzzy on a large screen (perhaps that's why they give away 9" football-shaped TVs).

Not quite what it seems

More nonsense in the SCMP today - the headline is "Losses from pay TV piracy down 15pc with use of secure network" but it turns out that there are just as many people "stealing" cable signals, but they would have paid less this year because Cable TV have cut their charges. That isn't quite the impression you might get from the headline or the comments about IPTV.

Who needs a computer?

What is a computer? Why do we have "computers" when actually what many people need is one or more consumer devices (or "appliances") that do a fairly limited number of things (such as web surfing, playing games, watching movies, and word processing) as painlessly as possible, and without having to worry about viruses and upgrading operating systems and other assorted nonsense.