Concluding my second blogging hiatus

Hi readers,

I’m too aware that I have neglected my blog of new posts for far too long, and I pledge for this to end. I have no miraculous plan for my content as I did when I ended my last hiatus, though I shall try my best to update my blog on a more frequent basis. I’m not without excuse, though. I’m now in my second year of my degree, and the workload has increased more than I anticipated, plus, I have a four month old daughter, both of which take up vast amounts of my time! But both are giving me great amounts of joy, therefore better time management calls, to allow time for Promulgo to write a post or two a month!

HTC Desire S – my verdict

A little over a week ago I bought the HTC Desire S. It’s my second non-Nokia phone, and my first non-Symbian. Running Android v2.3, it’s very different to what I’m used to.

The phone itself has everything I would expect – a nice 5mp camera, a front facing camera, 3.5mm headphone jack etc. It was the Android OS which really sold it to me, but I was also impressed to discover after purchasing it that it has a multi-touch interface, making zooming in and out a breeze – and personally I feel it’s a much nicer multi-touch interface than what’s found on Apple’s iPhones. On the HTC Desire S there is the added ability to move around (as opposed to being constrained to a fixed point) when zooming in and out, and on mapping software rotation is also attainable. Another feature which I’m very pleased about is that the HTC Desire S has Gorilla Glass – a very tough and scratch resistant glass. HTC Sense is a great feature loaded onto this device – once registered you can call your phone from your computer if you’ve lost it around the house if it’s on silent; as it calls the phone on its loud setting. HTC Sense is also a great feature in case the phone is stolen, as you can delete all data from the phone from a computer or lock the entire phone.

My one gripe with the phone (though I found a solution) was the extremely poor network signal. I later found that by default my phone was put to GSM/WCDMA auto. The 3g WCDMA must have been placed on a constant priority over the 2g GSM, because once I manually set my phone to solely GSM I have had no signal problems whatsoever; I guess 3g signal is poor in the Peterborough area.

I am finding the Android OS to be a much nicer interface than iOS – it’s nice to have a clear separation between widgets and the icon menu; it allows the most frequently used apps to be at the forefront, as opposed to being on a singular layer as in iOS. My one gripe with Android is the poor availability of settings – I still haven’t found out if I can turn off the small vibrate which comes on as I type every individual letter.

Switching to Android was definitely a good move I feel – it’s such a nicer interface than what Symbian have ever brought out. I would recommend Android 2.3 to anyone wanting a smart phone which truly is smart.

Liberally defeated

In the past year and a half, the Lib-Dems have been their most active in Parliament since 1906 when Bannerman had a majority government – gaining nearly 60% of seats in the Commons. Following this, the Liberals staged two elections in 1910, barely winning each election, until 1918 when the Liberals were then ousted from the public’s view of being a party to lead the country, in line with the growth of the Labour Party. In the early 1930s and mid 1940s, the Liberals had partial power in National Governments, though their MPs never held the most senior of roles in these governments.

So how does the current coalition differ from the National Governments of the ’30s and ’40s? Fundamentally they don’t in the sense of why they occured – to better deal with a crisis through greater cohesion in the House of Commons. There are two main differences; firstly, the 2010 General Election ended with a hung parliament, and in National governments all parties were included.

We all know what the crisis was the crisis in Britain – the recession. But on top of that, their was a degradation of public trust in politics because of the expenses scandal.

The TV debates significantly helped get the leader of the Lib-Dems (Clegg) words around the country, and he played the debates extremely smartly by not being as aggressive as Cameron and Brown. Clegg came across on face value as a man with clear objectives on how to fix Britain, offering something different to the norm – which at a time when politicians were abusing the finances available to them, he seemed to be the best out of the three.

The coalition was a rare chance for the Lib-Dems to show the country that they could once again take lead, but a series of broken promises to Liberal supporters has left in weak popularity. The political changes were no real surprise to Conservatives; it was the Liberals who voted for one thing and received a right-wing solution.

I write this post, of course, because of the results yesterday on local elections and the voting referendum, and reactions to the results. Yesterday was a big day for all parties – because it was in essence a national popularity update for parties. The results were clear – huge Liberal losses. They did terribly in the local elections, and also failed with getting AV through (Liberals were the largest party in full support). The Liberal losses say a lot about public view of the Liberals – it’s degraded in the year the Clegg has been the Deputy PM.

Were the Liberals ever really back, or was the country just unsure about who to vote for amidst the national crises? Clegg was given one chance, and he’s failed. With calls for Clegg to step down as leader of the party, and Scotland’s Lib-Dem leader standing down, will the coalition succeed? The Fixed-Term Parliament Bill of 2010 has not yet been passed, so there is a possibility that should the coalition fall through, a general election would not be restricted.

I’ve been debating with myself on the possibility of general election and the possible results. Would we get similar votes to what came about in 2010, or would a party gain a liberal majority? Until yesterday, I thought that results would be akin to the two elections in 1910 i.e. almost identical. But there was a clear siding with the Conservatives in the AV results, and Conservative councils gained similar numbers to the last local elections. However, Labour must also be considered due to their large gains, and the fact that the party was split on AV. In abstract, I feel that yesterday’s results shown that Britain is back to where it was before the 2010 election – two party politics: Conservative and Labour. Hallelujah!

Labour’s focus-lacking evangelism

Earlier today I attended a Q and A session for David Miliband at Staffordshire University. It was advertised by Miliband on entrance that the reason for his visit was to promote people to vote Labour in the local council elections. Just to begin this “review” of the session, I don’t see the relevance to have an MP who used to be in the Shadow Cabinet leading a Q and A session in the midst of local council elections. Miliband’s knowledge lies in foreign affairs, not domestic. Miliband spend a year as the Minister of State for Communities and Local Government from May 2005 – May 2006, he’s not who I would consider someone who should be campaigning across the country for people to be voting Labour in the upcoming elections, but instead Caroline Flint, who is infact the Shadow Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government.

The only reason I can observe for David Miliband campaigning for Labour in the local council elections is simply because his face has been in the media in recent months. Maybe this is the life for David with his brother leading the Labour Party – David is given little odds and ends so he can gain publicity even if they aren’t relevant to him post (Or lack of one, as David stodd down from the Shadow Cabinet and now just holds the seat for South Shields).

I don’t want to sound to harsh, but even though only a narrow win, I’m pleased for the Labour Party that Ed Miliband won in the Labour Leadership Election of 2010. Why? Because David Miliband’s orating skills are negligible. I was willing to put this aside when he first began talking to the audience, but as time progressed there was little improvement, he slurred his words, mumbled and got lost in his sentences frequently.

The supposed reason for his attendance was to speak about the local council elections, though I don’t recall him bringing this up at all. He made a point to nervously denounce the conservative “break-up of the NHS”, their “Wrong choices” and their ethos of “Private good, public bad”, yet made no point regarding the local council elections.

The questions he were given were largely based on the greater context to his introductory speech (so again, not local council elections), yet he could not answer many. Miliband may have travelled all the way to Stoke-on-Trent, but he clearly wasn’t ready for the questions, nor fit for purpose.

Following Miliband’s poor answers, Labour Councillor Bagh Ali stood, and in abstract told people to lead a smear campaign against the Lib Dems and Conservatives, because it’s only Labour which want to increase the amount of jobs in Stoke-on-Trent.

I for one did not buy anything that was said to me, not to say that it was a worthless experience, becuase I havce been able to write this post about how David Miliband is scouting the midlands like a Labour evangelist (I say this because Labour have recently chose to prey on on groups who they think will be more impressionable to Labour ethos – students and members of trade unions), spreading his word – but exceptionally poorly. To finalise this post, I do feel a little sorry for David, he should have not been put in the position to talk about whatever issues were raised without prior knowledge of the questions asked, and because he failed to set an agenda in his introductory speech about where he wanted the questions to lead.

Labour (and my Students’ Union who I’m guessing helped plan this event) may be under the delusion that all students are left-leaning; but I’m here to show that we’re not all the same, some of us know what’s better for our country.

Why I’m voting no to AV

On May 5, the Alternate Vote Referendum is taking place across the UK. The Conservatives are strongly no, and Labour and the Liberal Democrats are pro-AV.

My mum received her poll card recently, and she was unaware about what the referendum is all about. So I attempted to explain; and I explained it poorly. It’s not that my knowledge lacks in AV, but instead because it’s terribly difficult to simply explain the AV system. I then found a youtube video to explain AV; and she was not impressed. Not overly political, my mum (as with many other people) enjoys the simplicity of First-Past-the-Post (FPTP). If the populace does gain a majority in yeses to AV, I will not envy the people working in polling stations in the next general election, attempting to educate the relatively uninterested on how to vote.

Not only is simplicity something which sides me to FPTP, but also the fact that it fuels indecision in the voter. Leading parties change because of those voters which sway. But what about those who have an alliance with a specific party? I am a member of the Conservative Party, and I do not wish for the possibility for another party to gain a vote from me if the conservative MP I vote for does not fain a majority and is knocked out.

There is a great worry that more extreme parties will gain greater influence in parliament, and this too is a worry for me. As much as many people dislike the main and largest political parties – they know what they’re doing. Would you really trust a member of the British National Party, the Pirate Party, the Libertarian Party etc. to represent you and your constituency and lobby your constituency’s needs – I think not. This is the primary concern for many anti-AV people. But there’s one more issue hidden behind this – with more diversity in parliament, parties will have to form coalitions more in order to gain an overall majority in parliament. And coalitions are not desirable – it shows that there is no consensus and therefore there will be fragmentation in decision making. FPTP means that there are less parties at the top, generally meaning strong majorities can be gained nationally, allowing for strong and decisive decision making.

On person, one vote has worked for us for hundreds of years. Just because of some relatively short term problems which can either directly or indirectly blamed on front-line politics, we need not scrap a system that is simple and works. But instead, we need to trust that because political downfalls have been highlighted, they will be addressed. So let’s not ruin our political system – vote no to AV on May 5.

 

More on AV viewpoints here

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/danielhannan/100067892/ten-reasons-to-vote-no-to-av/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11609887

Interrobang‽

Though most of my posts are of a political, music, or technology genre; this post is on the dynamism of the English language. So, quite a difference, don’t you think‽

Notice something unfamiliar? Well, you have just been introduced to the interrobang! Have you ever wrote a question and felt it was exclaiming something too? At this point, many people with write/type and excamation mark either before or after the question mark (!?/?!); but why not combine both‽ It can be used for questions with excitement, disbelief or rhetoricism.

The English language is not stagnant, it is forever changing – which is why I believe the interrobang should become part of standard punctuation, because I come to the point where I need to use both an question mark and exclamation mark.

So join me and help the interrobang become recognised!

The best blogs in urban geography

I may be studying BSc Geography, yet still I see true beauty in the layout of cities, and how people use and move around them. Frequently called concrete jungles, cities represent the human ecosystem in a concentrated space. And when efficiency of movement is intertwined with concentration, cities can become as beautiful as the countryside that surrounds it.

Urban planning and its incorporation with technology can create something fantastic, and these 5 blogs below couple urban geography and technology in a great way.

1. Urban Tick – With a large focus on applying technology to urban geography and people in general, Urban Tick create some great infographics. Not everything on the blog is their own material, but it’s a great place to find sources that otherwise might not have been found. I always devote some time in my week to update myself with this blog, maybe you should too!

2. Urban Omnibus – The blog has a very focused approach, solely putting research into the urban makeup of New York City. A must see for anyone even vaguely interested in urban geography and/or New York City.

3. Future of Cities – Ok, so this isn’t a blog, instead news updates for University of Oxford’s Institute for Science, Innovation and Society, but the reel of posts resembles that of a blog. Future of Cities is research led urban geography, with many predictions about how decisions today could impact people in the future.

4. Digital Urban – I must note that these blogs are not in any way ordered, apart from the order they came into my mind – not by importance. Digital Urban is perhaps my favourite  blog on urban geography. There’s a large integration of data and technology, which results in many beautiful videos being posted that sometimes make me feel like taking the physical geography route was foolish of me.

5. Fast Company – Though not directly an urban geography blog, this technology website  frequently publishes articles with rich infographics relating to urban and population geography. For the person that wishes to not read too much, yet not miss out on useful information, Fast Company is a great website.

Shot from a video on Digital Urban about phone connections in the UK

 

If you can spare a few minutes I wholeheartedly recommend you spending some time to read through these blogs. Who knows, maybe there’s a part of your life that has made some of these blogs possible – there’s a lot of research that goes in to urban geography, turning human movement into something quite scientific. Happy reading!

 

Why Twitter owns Facebook pt.2

I wasn’t intending on writing another post on the pros and cons of the two main social networking websites I use after Why Twitter owns Facebook, but Facebook has become such an annoyance to me tonight that I simply cannot resist.

One phrase for Facebook – over the top. It’s inevitable that Facebook would become to hotbed of viral material that it is today with such a huge reach. But let’s get serious – Facebook users, must you clog the timeline with such pointless drivel? Groups almost sealed my demise in 2010 – it seemed that there was a group for everything. Yes, that is still there, I guess I have just got used to it to some extent, and the creators of these groups have somewhat exhausted their ideas. It is not creating a better social network as these groups don’t really define the people that are in them, unless they wish to be defined as the drones of society which are mindlessly swallowed into a world of dumb.

I can deal with people uploading reels of photos – that is what social networking is. People tag each other and it creates a true digital archive of their life and how it intertwines with others in real-life, not on Facebook.

So, Facebook over the past few days has been…  POLLS. Whoever created these polls for Facebook; I’m shocked it took so long. Polls on Facebook are per se a great social networking and involvement tool. But, as happens so easily on Facebook, it has been degraded within days into something that’s purpose is to get viral messages over that waste my time. On Twitter lists can be created, which acts as a filter. Facebook does have filters, but not to the point where you can just filter out the groups and polls and keep statuses, events and photos in one consolidated timeline.

Facebook, sort it out!

The Unsustainable House

Being in my first year at university, I live in halls. Well, it’s kind of halls, it’s actually a house, but it’s on the campus grounds and is owned by the university.

Staffordshire University definitely wants to cut energy and water use on campus in both buildings of learning and residential buildings. This campaign has been led by stickers posted everywhere you see saying “switch it off” on large windows and also stuck on light switches. Stickers associated with reducing water usage can also be found above most taps. One of my primary concerns with this is that stickers is (as far as I know) the only real method for the university to attempt to change the behaviour of students and lecturers. Does a sticker really make a difference? Should there be active discussion about turning lights off when you’re not in the room and using water more wisely?

My case study on how effective Staffordshire University’s “sustainability” campaign has went. My study is very localised; to the confines of my house, and I by no means expect this to be the same in every house/hall at Staffordshire University, though as everyone in my house comes from different backgrounds, it shows a greater picture by how different types of people have different attitudes towards actively trying to be more environmentally friendly.

To the left, this may just seem like a slightly dirty worktop and basin, but there’s more than what meets the eye. The saucepan has not been washed up straight after use, and has been filled with water. This was left for quite a while, therefore the water inside has cooled and is now unusable to clean with, therefore it has been wasted as it will just be poured away. Sustainable? I think not. I may not be the perfect role model for cleaning dishes, but I make sure that I only use the water required. This situation is one which doesn’t adhere to the “Use water wisely” stickers, though on a level that many might not even think about as an unsustainable practice. Still in the kitchen, there’s another problem; infact a few more. The cooker in our house is quite dated, and the oven door isn’t very tight/sealed; this means that it takes a long time for the oven to heat because a lot of the heat can easily escape. It’s an inefficient use of the energy it uses. I called up maintenance and told them that the over door doesn’t close very well. The response to this was to merely make the safety lock on the door tighter; this did not help with the fact that there was a problem with the oven door gasket. The third issue in the kitchen is the location of the extractor fan relative to that of the cooker – each are separate sides of the kitchen. This makes the entire extractor fan an inefficient system that really doesn’t help with extracting steam and cooking odors. Even due to it’s somewhat redundant placement, it is still used, and because of its poor performance because of its location, the fan is often left on for over an hour after people have left the kitchen. To the people in the house, it is merely a quiet noise, not something which uses energy. The fourth and final sustainability I see in the kitchen is that we are told we have recycling bins on a general information board in the kitchen, though the reality is quite different. We have no recycling bins in our kitchen, nor do we have a bin outside of our house to put recycling in. So, for this, no one can really be held accountable but Staffordshire University, because we have no place to dispose of everyday recycling.

Throughout the house in public areas i.e. kitchen/living area, halls, landing and bathrooms, there is a large problem with people ignoring the stickers about turning lights off (image to the right). Throughout the house, out of all the public places I have mentioned, from my observations it is only the bathroom lights which in fact switched off; others are often left on constantly. Curtains will not be opened and lights are left on. Over the past few days I have conducted a practical test – I turned all of the lights off on the ground floor, then whenever I next need to leave my bedroom, I will observe which lights have been switched back on and left on. Out of the four lights in public rooms downstairs (apart from the shower room), three of these lights will be left on by other people. This is conclusive evidence that the campaign to make people switch lights off when they are not needed is being actively ignored by all residents in the house.

As a brief point, the heating is often constantly on in public areas of the house, and I too often have the heating on in my room quite frequently, as the insulation in these houses is not great.

The final thing I wish to point out  is the water use in the bathroom. More likely than not, there will be a running tap in the bathroom. Not running exessively, but enough to raise concern over the frequency this occurs. The sign telling people to use water wisely is yet another sign which is ignored.

Though this review sounds very negative overall, as stated at the beginning of the post – I have no evidence to suggest this is a university wide issue; apart from recycling facilities. I have not seen one residential recycling bin since I first came to Staffordshire University. There are recycling facilites in many of the university faculty buildings, though these are not for residential scale use, but instead for waste produced within the faculty building, which can be reflected by the small size of these recycling bins. As an addendum, I would like to point out that there is a sustainability section on the university website which does have a more substantial campaign, though I have never been exposed to this part of the website being advertised.

The Unsustainable House by Jordan White is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
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The Contradiction of the Leftist

What’s the difference between the left and the right/labour and conservatives? Supporters of the Labour Party are likely to say something on the lines of “The conservatives just look out for the richest and don’t care about those who are not in high social strata”. Supporters of the conservative party are likely to say something on the lines of “Labour help the unprofitable and don’t help the UK with economic growth”.

Notice the two topics I decided to bring up in those two statements: a humanistic approach and an economic one. Both statements are extreme examples, though they do highlight one of the key reasons why someone would lie on either the left or the right. Labour pays great attention to reducing income distribution, as they want people to be more equal, and set this as a priority. This can easily be seen by the party’s pro stance on nationalisation (or at least historically) – this system will fund the industries that cannot fund themselves, though are considered an important asset to the country. On the other hand, the conservatives are more economically minded (more specifically, laissez faire minded) – they want the country to be more efficient, for us to specialise with what we’re good at, and to allow failing businesses to collapse, because why should something be helped if there’s no chance of profit (I am conservative, so you’ll have to mind my slightly bias stance!). This economic example trickles through into the mindset of most policies created by each party – Labour want to nurse people through taxing high so they can then decide where the country’s money will be distributed to. Conservatives, however, have much less of a focus on taxation, because their ethos is for individuals to decide where their money earned should be distributed to, therefore what they want can be attained in a more precise manner, instead of the incumbent government deciding what the people want.

In the 2010 elections, the conservatives complained about the amount of bureaucracy the labour party had brought in (“big and bloated government”, in the words of David Cameron), and how a lot of this bureaucracy was unnecessary; the conservatives were opting for a smaller government i.e. being less controlling of the country. It all depends on what you believe the function of government should be. And this is where the contradiction comes in. Left does not mean a smaller, less controlling government as believed by many leftists. Instead, the further left you go, the more controlling the government gets of its people. So, when the supporters of the right are portrayed as Nazis i.e. an extremely controlling government; by supporting the left these people are actually supporting the type of government they say they despise.

There’s a common misconception with the Conservative Party, as brought up in my opening paragraph – there’s a wide belief that “Tories” are for the rich. Yes, I would agree that the Tories WERE majorly for the interests of the rich, but Tory has become a derogatory term for the Conservative Party. The Tories were in fact the forefathers of the Conservative Party. Born in 1846, the Conservative Party was (and still is) a party much more into the interests of the average earner. Conservatives are not necessarily for the rich, they are for people who wish to be accountable for themselves more than Labour allows. If you want more freedom, the Conservative Party will give that freedom.

I really don’t understand how a leftist can preach against the right when what they want is a fairer and more equal society, because the left definitely loses fairness as they incorporate equality. Is it fair to bring in so much bureaucracy and so many quangos? This does not bring a fair and free society. Instead it results in bodies being created to “share” power wider and wider so much so that governments become unaccountable. If this country saw Labour for what they stand for, the Conservative Party would have gained a landslide victory. It’s my belief that the only reason Labour lasted for so long in its last term was because they made themselves so unaccountable that the public was blind to the mistakes they were making; that is, until the recession made all of Labour’s shortfalls all come to the surface and for people to then listen to the conservatives. The conservatives may have “harsher” economic ideas, but they have the economy in mind. In the past century, the only economic highs we have seen without a recession on the scale of the most recent one have been thanks to MacMillan and Thatcher. On the other hand, Labour’s easy going nature in terms of the economy has wreaked havoc as seen in Callaghan’s government with “The Winter of Discontent” and Blair/Brown’s recession. So if you edge left, you might want to have a second thought. That is, If you have any idea about the huge importance of our economy.

As an addendum, I do recognise that the Conservative Party does in fact still call themselves Tories in an informal sense i.e. David Cameron led a “Never voted Tory” campaign in 2010, and the Conservative Party’s Twitter business feed has the handle @ToryBusiness. The Conservative Party really doesn’t do themselves any favours by calling themselves Tories, considering the historical meaning of a Tory, but this shortened name is not a reflection on the Party’s ethos.